Editing Oliver Twist (section)

==Allegations of antisemitism==
{{See also|Fagin#Allegations of antisemitism}}
Dickens has been accused of portraying [[antisemitism|antisemitic]] stereotypes because of his portrayal of the Jewish character Fagin in ''Oliver Twist''. [[Paul Vallely]] writes that Fagin is widely seen as one of the most grotesque Jews in English literature, and one of the most vivid of Dickens's 989 characters.<ref name=Vallely>{{cite web |last1=Vallely |first1=Paul |title=Dickens' greatest villain: The faces of Fagin |url=https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/films/features/dickens-greatest-villain-the-faces-of-fagin-509906.html |website=The Independent|location=London |date=7 October 2005 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20081205101924/http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/films/features/dickens-greatest-villain-the-faces-of-fagin-509906.html |archive-date=5 December 2008 |access-date=13 February 2015 |url-status=dead}}</ref> Nadia Valman, in ''Antisemitism: A Historical Encyclopedia of Prejudice and Persecution'', argues that Fagin's representation was drawn from the image of the Jew as inherently evil, that the imagery associated him with the Devil, and with beasts.<ref>{{cite book |editor1-last=Levy |editor1-first=Richard S. |author-last=Valman |author-first=Nadia |chapter=Dickens, Charles (1812–1870) |title=Antisemitism, A Historical Encyclopedia of Prejudice and Persecution |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=942FvgEACAAJ |location=Santa Barbara, Calif. |publisher=ABC–Clio |year=2005 |pages=176–177 |isbn=1-85109-439-3 |access-date=30 December 2020 |archive-date=1 June 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220601204535/https://www.google.co.uk/books/edition/Antisemitism/942FvgEACAAJ?hl=en&gbpv=176 |url-status=live }}</ref>

The novel refers to Fagin 274 times<ref>{{Cite web |url=http://www.gutenberg.org/files/730/730-h/730-h.htm |title=The Project Gutenberg eBook of Oliver Twist, by Charles Dickens |access-date=2 July 2019 |archive-date=16 July 2019 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190716191238/http://www.gutenberg.org/files/730/730-h/730-h.htm |url-status=live }}</ref> in the first 38 chapters as "the Jew", while the ethnicity or religion of the other characters is rarely mentioned.<ref name=Vallely/> In 1854, ''[[The Jewish Chronicle]]'' asked why "Jews alone should be excluded from the 'sympathizing heart' of this great author and powerful friend of the oppressed." Dickens (who had extensive knowledge of London street life and child exploitation) explained that he had made Fagin Jewish because "it unfortunately was true, of the time to which the story refers, that that class of criminal almost invariably was a Jew."<ref name="Oliver Twist intro">{{Cite news |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=R63Gk3ntfFkC&pg=PR19 |title=Oliver Twist – introduction |last=Howe |first=Irving |date=31 May 2005 |publisher=Random House Publishing |isbn=9780553901566 |access-date=26 December 2021 |archive-date=26 March 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220326044032/https://books.google.com/books?id=R63Gk3ntfFkC&pg=PR19 |url-status=live }}</ref> It is widely believed that Fagin was based on a specific Jewish criminal of the era, [[Ikey Solomon]].<ref>Donald Hawes, ''Who's Who in Dickens'', Routledge, London, 2002, p.75.</ref> Dickens commented that by calling Fagin a Jew he had meant no imputation against the Jewish people, saying in a letter, "I have no feeling towards the Jews but a friendly one. I always speak well of them, whether in public or private, and bear my testimony (as I ought to do) to their perfect good faith in such transactions as I have ever had with them."<ref name="dickens-johnson">{{Cite book |last=Johnson |first=Edgar |title=Charles Dickens His Tragedy And Triumph |publisher=Simon & Schuster Inc |date=1 January 1952 |chapter=4 – Intimations of Mortality |chapter-url=http://dickens.ucsc.edu/OMF/johnson.html |access-date=8 February 2009 |archive-date=2 October 2011 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20111002175325/http://dickens.ucsc.edu/OMF/johnson.html |url-status=live }}</ref> Eliza Davis, whose husband had purchased Dickens's home in 1860 when he had put it up for sale, wrote to Dickens in protest at his portrayal of Fagin, arguing that he had "encouraged a vile prejudice against the despised Hebrew", and that he had done a great wrong to the Jewish people. While Dickens first reacted defensively upon receiving Davis's letter, he then halted the printing of ''Oliver Twist'', and changed the text for the parts of the book that had not been set, which explains why after the first 38 chapters Fagin is barely called "the Jew" at all in the next 179 references to him. A shift in his perspective is seen in his later novel ''[[Our Mutual Friend]]'', as he redeems the image of Jews.<ref name=Vallely/>