# Is rewriting Fagin and the Artful Dodger to comment on racism and anti-Semitic or racist? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [December 20, 2013, 12:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-rewriting-fagin-and-the-artful-dodger-to-comment-on-racism-and-anti-semitic-or-racist/676813 "2013-12-20T12:43:52Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Brynhildr\_Budladottir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/3ec8ea/32.png) [@Brynhildr\_Budladottir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Brynhildr_Budladottir)\ **Post date:** [December 20, 2013, 12:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-rewriting-fagin-and-the-artful-dodger-to-comment-on-racism-and-anti-semitic-or-racist/676813/1 "2013-12-20T12:43:52Z")
This is going to take a long while to explain, so bear with me. The upshot of this is that I’m writing a story which is based on Dickens’ _Oliver Twist_. This version is set in the future but the future looks a lot like 19th century Brooklyn. _Oliver Twist_ in its original form is famous for being cringingly anti-Semitic in its depiction of Fagin. The question I’m asking is whether or not rewriting Fagin as an Ikey Solomon type fence and the Artful Dodger (the protagonist) as Black in order to comment on institutionalised racism and anti-Semitism is necessarily racist or anti-Semitic in itself. Here are two paragraphs as examples (not here for input). > [@](#): > > 13 June 2137 > This book belong to me Jack Dawkins but people call me Dodger because I be really good at running away when I steal things. It’s just an old notebook with one of them covers and a label and loads of blank pages. Nothing special. > Fagin ain’t gonna be saying nothing about it. I been nabbing things off him for years. Since he taught me to read and write and count. He say it helps you blend in when you need to pull a long con or other big job. Good thing Oliver the newest kid in our family, can read or he’d be useless. When he told me his name I knew he was an orphan. His name’s so funny. > It’s Oliver Twist. Who the hell calls a kid Oliver Twist? The folks running the poorhouse apparently. I laughed. When I asked him about it after his first day here when we was helping Fagin sort out the watches and the loot in the secret compartments in his desk where I found this book- there was staplers, pairs of scissors, more notebooks and pencil cases in the last normal compartment - he stared at me. I wanted to tell him it don’t matter but then he told me. There’s a list and they just name the kids off that. He heard the master talking to the matron of the orphanage he was at about it when he was little. He used to be in an orphanage before they took him back to the poorhouse. I ain’t never forgetting that. Jack Dawkins—at least it ain’t Jack Foundling or something. I’m supposed to show Oliver how to do stuff around here. So that’s why I’m keeping this journal. > > Fagin just gonna give me a look when he pass me in the hallway. The kind that say “I know whatcha did. Don’t try an’ hide it from me.” Then he gonna go back to melting down scrap we stole and found and then gets us to help with filing names off watches and unstitchin letters outta clothes. ‘Cept on Saturday. We don’t do no work then because he religious. Before sunset he lights candles and no-one gives him stolen goods or no stuff to hock (he locks the doors before sunset and closes down the shop) or even turns on the lights. We just sit around and talk. ---
**Author:** ![Brynhildr\_Budladottir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/3ec8ea/32.png) [@Brynhildr\_Budladottir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Brynhildr_Budladottir)\ **Post date:** [December 20, 2013, 12:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-rewriting-fagin-and-the-artful-dodger-to-comment-on-racism-and-anti-semitic-or-racist/676813/2 "2013-12-20T12:57:55Z")
_and anti-Semitism_ BTW the most racist thing I experienced was when I was 13. I was kicked on the butt by a White woman when I was on an escalator who said “Damn Asians!” ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [December 20, 2013, 2:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-rewriting-fagin-and-the-artful-dodger-to-comment-on-racism-and-anti-semitic-or-racist/676813/3 "2013-12-20T14:56:21Z")
I suppose it depends on what you want to _say_ about racism and anti-Semitism. Sounds like it might be a really cool idea. Also, I don’t think you’ll find “nabbed” appearing very often in African-American vernacular. ---
**Author:** ![Brynhildr\_Budladottir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/3ec8ea/32.png) [@Brynhildr\_Budladottir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Brynhildr_Budladottir)\ **Post date:** [December 20, 2013, 9:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-rewriting-fagin-and-the-artful-dodger-to-comment-on-racism-and-anti-semitic-or-racist/676813/4 "2013-12-20T21:47:09Z")
@ReallyNotThatBright: Thanks. Maybe not but I just picked the first word that came into my head… ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2013, 2:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-rewriting-fagin-and-the-artful-dodger-to-comment-on-racism-and-anti-semitic-or-racist/676813/5 "2013-12-21T02:10:29Z")
The danger you face is that, if you’re not deeply familiar with the culture (including dialect) of your Dodger character, you’re going to rely instead on a lot of stereotypes in order to flesh out the culture, and that’ll be unfortunate at best. ---
**Author:** ![Brynhildr\_Budladottir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/3ec8ea/32.png) [@Brynhildr\_Budladottir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Brynhildr_Budladottir)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2013, 2:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-rewriting-fagin-and-the-artful-dodger-to-comment-on-racism-and-anti-semitic-or-racist/676813/6 "2013-12-21T02:32:50Z")
> [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](#): > > The danger you face is that, if you’re not deeply familiar with the culture (including dialect) of your Dodger character, you’re going to rely instead on a lot of stereotypes in order to flesh out the culture, and that’ll be unfortunate at best. (Another note: again this isn’t a Morwen asks for input thread) Nineteenth century AAVE (often unfortunately caricatured in minstrel shows) is what I’m familiar with. My general idea with this was that in a 19th century style setting some forms of 19th century language might come back into use. ---
**Author:** ![Brynhildr\_Budladottir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/3ec8ea/32.png) [@Brynhildr\_Budladottir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Brynhildr_Budladottir)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2013, 2:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-rewriting-fagin-and-the-artful-dodger-to-comment-on-racism-and-anti-semitic-or-racist/676813/7 "2013-12-21T02:58:19Z")
> [@Morwen Edhelwen](#): > > (Another note: again this isn’t a Morwen asks for input thread) Nineteenth century AAVE (often unfortunately caricatured in minstrel shows) is what I’m familiar with. > My general idea with this was that in a 19th century style setting some forms of 19th century language might come back into use. Sorry for quoting myself but on the 19th century language issue: Unfortunately I don’t know enough about linguistics to know if language usages can come back into use (one example is "gay"to mean happy, lively or bright or even loose or immoral; I once saw something which described a woman as living “the gay life”: the quote was from the 1880s and the implication was that she was living in a way considered “immoral” by “respectable” Victorian society.) Does anyone know if that’s actually possible? Googling doesn’t really tell me anything. ---
**Author:** ![Isamu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/7c8e57/32.png) [@Isamu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Isamu)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2013, 3:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-rewriting-fagin-and-the-artful-dodger-to-comment-on-racism-and-anti-semitic-or-racist/676813/8 "2013-12-21T03:06:31Z")
You shouldn’t even think about whether it’s racist or not. Just write the story you want to write. ---
**Author:** ![Brynhildr\_Budladottir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/3ec8ea/32.png) [@Brynhildr\_Budladottir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Brynhildr_Budladottir)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2013, 9:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-rewriting-fagin-and-the-artful-dodger-to-comment-on-racism-and-anti-semitic-or-racist/676813/9 "2013-12-21T21:48:17Z")
Any Jewish or Black Dopers want to give their opinions? ---
**Author:** ![DSeid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dseid/32/20194_2.png) [@DSeid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DSeid)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2013, 10:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-rewriting-fagin-and-the-artful-dodger-to-comment-on-racism-and-anti-semitic-or-racist/676813/10 "2013-12-21T22:01:01Z")
Jewish. It would so much depend on how it was done. Oliver Twist’s Fagin comes off as so anti-Semitic because the only clearly Jewish character in the book played to the stereotypes of the time. If that wasn’t the case then the character could just as easily demonstrate some complexity, how people can be religious in ritual and areligious in morality. That requires it being a theme repeated in other characters of other faiths. ---
**Author:** ![Brynhildr\_Budladottir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/3ec8ea/32.png) [@Brynhildr\_Budladottir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Brynhildr_Budladottir)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2013, 10:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-rewriting-fagin-and-the-artful-dodger-to-comment-on-racism-and-anti-semitic-or-racist/676813/11 "2013-12-21T22:38:36Z")
@DSeid: Thanks. IIRC though there’s a character called Barney in the Three Cripples, who’s called Jewish and described as no less ugly than Fagin. (And he talks through his nose). He’s a very minor character though. I actually think that beyond Fagin just being a miser and a child exploiter, he’s also part of a 19th century tradition that all so-called “Oriental” (including Jewish) men were seen as cowardly, weak and effeminate by 19th century standards. Bit off-topic, but are you American? What state do you live in? ---
**Author:** ![DSeid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dseid/32/20194_2.png) [@DSeid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DSeid)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2013, 5:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-rewriting-fagin-and-the-artful-dodger-to-comment-on-racism-and-anti-semitic-or-racist/676813/12 "2013-12-22T05:09:13Z")
American. Chicago area. Why? ---
**Author:** ![Brynhildr\_Budladottir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/3ec8ea/32.png) [@Brynhildr\_Budladottir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Brynhildr_Budladottir)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2013, 7:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-rewriting-fagin-and-the-artful-dodger-to-comment-on-racism-and-anti-semitic-or-racist/676813/13 "2013-12-22T07:46:12Z")
@Dseid: Just wondering. ---
**Author:** ![bob\_2](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bob_2/32/3341_2.png) [@bob\_2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bob_2)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2013, 3:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-rewriting-fagin-and-the-artful-dodger-to-comment-on-racism-and-anti-semitic-or-racist/676813/14 "2013-12-22T15:14:22Z")
Surely, the point about Fagin’s jewishness, just like Shylock’s, three hundred years earlier, is that, at that time, it was shorthand for all kinds of stereotypical character traits. Writers write for an audience, and will use those characters and descriptors that are meaningful to them. “Jewish” to me at least, does not conjure up an image of a miserly crook, or even a rapacious moneylender, just as “black” does not personify an inferior species of human. In the UK today, the adult leader of a gang of thieving children would be expected to come from Eastern Europe, as we see reports of people trafficking, slavery and prostitution, led by this geographical group. An author using this would also avoid any accusations of a racial nature ---
**Author:** ![Brynhildr\_Budladottir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/3ec8ea/32.png) [@Brynhildr\_Budladottir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Brynhildr_Budladottir)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2013, 11:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-rewriting-fagin-and-the-artful-dodger-to-comment-on-racism-and-anti-semitic-or-racist/676813/15 "2013-12-22T23:16:29Z")
@bob: Not just in the UK but all over Western Europe. In Eastern Europe itself it tends to be the Roma and Sinti (called Gypsies) who are blamed. And AFAIK in the mid-late 19th century “Eastern European” and “Jewish” were often nearly the same; quite a lot of Jewish people in both the UK and US have Eastern European (Ashkenazi) ancestry. And actually it wouldn’t be racial but ethnic assuming the author was White and writing about Eastern European Whites. (I’m not White btw) And yes, Fagin’s religion/ethnicity was shorthand for “exploitative miser/fence.” ---
**Author:** ![Brynhildr\_Budladottir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/3ec8ea/32.png) [@Brynhildr\_Budladottir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Brynhildr_Budladottir)\ **Post date:** [December 23, 2013, 10:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-rewriting-fagin-and-the-artful-dodger-to-comment-on-racism-and-anti-semitic-or-racist/676813/16 "2013-12-23T22:18:01Z")
Here’s part of an essay in a book I found on the topic of Fagin and anti-Semitism: > **[Jewish Presences in English Literature](https://books.google.com.au/books?id=Z98ixsptZNMC&printsec=frontcover&dq=jewish%2Bpresences%2B%2Bin%2Benglish%2Bliterature&hl=en&sa=X&ei=HLW4UoHWE8mmkgW364HQCA)** > > "The image of the Jew in English literature, as in the Western imagination, has at its base the figure of the Christ-killer. All representations of the Jew in Christian culture are constructed in the light of this irreducible definition." -- from the... ---
**Author:** ![Brynhildr\_Budladottir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/3ec8ea/32.png) [@Brynhildr\_Budladottir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Brynhildr_Budladottir)\ **Post date:** [December 23, 2013, 10:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-rewriting-fagin-and-the-artful-dodger-to-comment-on-racism-and-anti-semitic-or-racist/676813/17 "2013-12-23T22:19:09Z")
[deleted] ---
**Author:** ![DSeid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dseid/32/20194_2.png) [@DSeid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DSeid)\ **Post date:** [December 24, 2013, 9:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-rewriting-fagin-and-the-artful-dodger-to-comment-on-racism-and-anti-semitic-or-racist/676813/18 "2013-12-24T21:56:33Z")
The essay and **bob++**'s comment both make me wonder … The essay differentiates between two groups. One that is fanning a stereotype out of, if not hate then at least honestly held dislike. And another (Dickens in this case) playing into a stereotype that they know is held, even though they might not so much hold it themselves and even though they have no personal issue with the group, but as a “useful” shorthand to create a feeling and understand about the character with the target audience. Is one more or less reprehensible or harmful than the other? ---
**Author:** ![Brynhildr\_Budladottir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/3ec8ea/32.png) [@Brynhildr\_Budladottir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Brynhildr_Budladottir)\ **Post date:** [December 25, 2013, 4:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-rewriting-fagin-and-the-artful-dodger-to-comment-on-racism-and-anti-semitic-or-racist/676813/19 "2013-12-25T04:25:13Z")
@DSeid: I think it’s definitely more reprehensible and harmful to use a stereotype out of hatred than to use one as shorthand. ---
**Author:** ![Alessan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alessan/32/465_2.png) [@Alessan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alessan)\ **Post date:** [December 25, 2013, 7:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-rewriting-fagin-and-the-artful-dodger-to-comment-on-racism-and-anti-semitic-or-racist/676813/20 "2013-12-25T07:53:22Z")
> [@Morwen Edhelwen](#): > > @DSeid: I think it’s definitely more reprehensible and harmful to use a stereotype out of hatred than to use one as shorthand. Really? Because the former is, at least, honest. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-rewriting-fagin-and-the-artful-dodger-to-comment-on-racism-and-anti-semitic-or-racist/676813.md?page=2)