“Who Is Fagin?”
By: Steven Marcus
Brett McKey
Andy Richmond
Cassidy Redding
Andrew Thompson
Adam Wilhelm
 Fagin
is back in the news
 The musical, Oliver, and
other productions have
introduced many to Fagin

One of Dickens’s most puzzling characters

There is nothing particularly Jewish about
him

He does not even speak with an accent or
any type of dialect
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Oliver was an orphan and a workhouse child
Fagin was a criminal
These were alike, and almost identical
In their society, the pauper and the criminal were
equal
We now know that Fagin got his name from a boy
who Dickens met during his childhood
Charles Dickens Life

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Father: John Dickens
Charles the oldest son the second Child
Charles suffered from attacks of Violent spasms
Family kept growing
Charles had been attending school at Catham till
family moved to London
The Secret of Dickens Youth
February 1824, Dickens Goes to work and
his father is imprisoned for debt
 Charles left to live on his own
 The family reunited
 Charles never could confront his childhood
 This dark episode influenced his view on
his writings

Charles Job at the Warehouse
 Charles
1)
2)
3)
4)
first job at the warehouse was:
To cover the pots of paste-blacking
with two kinds of paper
Tie them round with a string
Clip the paper close and neat
And paste a printed label on each
pot
Where did Fagin Come From?


An older boy named
Bob Fagin showed
Charles the trick to
using string and tying
the knot.
Bob Fagin’s secrets of
wrapping and tying
parallel with the
character Fagin’s
secrets to successful
pick-pocketing.

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Both Fagin’s can be
labeled as educators of
their individual trades.
Oliver is rewarded for
for proficiency during
Fagin’s pocket picking
game, just as Dickens
was rewarded for
learning the trade of
using string and tying
knots.
Bob vs. Fagin
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Bob Fagin, as well as
many of the other
boys, was an orphan.
Bob was trying to
raise Dickens’ status,
while the schemes of
Fagin, in Oliver
Twist, were designed
for the opposite
purpose.


Bob & Fagin
=Complete opposites
Bob Fagin’s
protectiveness of
young Charles
transformed into the
treacherous care that
the character Fagin
showed towards
young Oliver.
Charles vs. Oliver

The difference
between the other
boys of the warehouse
and Charles was that
Charles maintained
good conduct and
gentlemanly manners.

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This corresponded to
the character, Oliver.
-Oliver= mannerly
-Artful Dodger= rude
At first Charles did not
know how to interpret
Bob. In the same way,
Oliver felt uneasy about
Fagin at first introduction.
Both Charles and Oliver
were regarded as
gentleman.
Two doors:
1) Keeps Charles’ father’s
imprisonment a secret
from Bob Fagin.
2) Becomes the knock on
the door which leads
Oliver to his family.
Section III
Charles continued at the factory even after
his father had been released.
 This affected him and made him somewhat
resentful.
 This affected and stuck with Charles for the
rest of his life.

Charles and Bob
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Charles and Bob worked great together.

They had great dexterity at tying up the pots

Crowds of people would form at the windows to
watch them.

Charles never told Bob that his father was in
prison.
One day John Dickens came to see Charles at the
factory.
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Pride in dexterity.
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Shame of the work.

Pleasure in skillful
performance in front
of an audience.

Anxiety and
humiliation over being
seen.
Over-determined
Dickens’ memory of this event is known as
“over-determined”
 “A multiplicity of meanings and motives
converge upon an event, charging its
separate elements with significances which
refer elsewhere and to other things.
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In Oliver Twist Dickens speaks as an
impersonal narrator twice in this respect.
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Both are connected with sleep.

First occurs at the thieves den with Fagin.
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Second occurs at Mr. Brownlow’s house.
“Hypnagogic”
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“A condition that occurs between sleep and
waking when conscious mind and its
censors relax and unconscious processes
and impulses become more than usually
accessible.
Primal Scene
The two examples that are given are
elements of what Freud called the “primal
scene,” which can either come from a
memory or a fantasy.
 The symbolism with the jewel box and the
knife are self-explanatory; for the window
and the book it comes from the scene at the
window at the blacking factory and beyond
that to Dickens himself reading on his bed
as a child.

The country scenes in Oliver Twist are
created out from the “Eden of infancy” from
which we create our ideas of happiness and
are said to be a foretaste of heaven.
 However, Dickens’ doubts that this is
anything he has ever experienced himself.
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Fagin vs. John Dickens
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Friendship to Fagin
contained the threat of
exposure.

John’s freedom was a
fraud and an outrage
because Charles
“slaved.”
The anger towards and his view of his father
is revealed in the character of Fagin . Fagin is a
terrible, frightening old Jew. Jews are viewed as
the devil in popular mythology and the murder
of good Christian boys. This corresponds itself
to the image of the terrible father of infancy and
of our primal fantasies.
Section III Continued:
The Additional scenes of the
Over-determined and screen memories
Sikes’ murder of Nancy
 Fagin’s trial: Fagin as the object of scrutiny
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Fagin and Sikes, John Dickens, Oliver, and
Charles Dickens
Dickens return to Oliver
Sikes’ Murder of Nancy
 The
small child’s view of sexual
intercourse
– Viewed as an act of murder
– The male killing the female
Sikes’ Murder of Nancy Contd.
Contrast

Fagin and jewels
scene
– Lack if symbolic
representation of
the other partner in
intercourse

Sikes Nancy scene
– Both partners
represented
symbolically
Sikes’ Murder of Nancy Contd.
Comparison

Fagin and jewels
scene
– Oliver watches Fagin
– Fagin recognizes
Oliver is watching
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Sikes Nancy scene
– After Sikes kills Nancy
he sees eyes
– The eyes are watching
him
– Sikes is watched by the
London mob
Fagin’s trial: Fagin as the
object of scrutiny
Fagin under the eyes
 Fagin and Sikes, John Dickens, Oliver, and
Charles Dickens
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Fagin under the eyes

People were looking at Fagin just as they
were looking at
–
–
–
–

Sikes
Oliver
Bob Fagin
Dickens
During the trial Fagin was under the
scrutiny instead of Oliver as was in the
beginning of the book
Fagin and Sikes, John Dickens, Oliver,
and Charles Dickens
Over-Determined Summary
Fagin and
Sikes
John Dickens
Charles Charming
Dickens Innocent
Charming
Identity and pride
Watching
John
and being
Dickens Watched
Threat to
Oliver's/Dicken's
Pride
Oliver
•Over-Determined - A multiplicity of meanings and motives
converge upon an event, charging its separate elements with
significances which refer elsewhere and to other things.
•“His father was alive in him, as was Fagin, and in creating
Fagin, Dickens affirmed that fact as much as he negated it.
Dickens Return to Oliver
While writing Oliver Twist, Dickens was
afflicted with his boyhood illness again.
 This was particularly evident while he was
writing the last portion of the book.
 Dickens understood this as “the penalty for
sticking so close to Oliver
 These happened again, with worse severity
every time after he acted out these last
scenes.
 Dickens’ Father is represented in Fagin (and
Sikes).

Conclusion
Fagin was manifested by Dickens’
experiences
 The fact that Fagin was a Jew didn’t mean
anything
 Fagin relates to Oliver
 Fagin’s evilness yet winsomeness is perhaps
associated with Dickens’ innocence yet
cunningness.
 “Oliver twist could never have imagined
Fagin, and Dickens could neither have
imagined nor created him had Fagin not
been part of himself.”
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