CW: Anti-semitism, racism, slavery, classism: I just finished re-reading Will Eisners remarkable Fagin the Jew, which led, naturally, to finding this entry. I find the framing of Fagin the Jew (Fagin, pleading on behalf of his unassumed humanity, being interviewed by Dickens on the eve of his hanging) to mirror how I feel about Dickens racism. I think Dickens tried to inject as much humanity into the ethnic others in his books, as much as he tried to inject humanity into class others that are his protagonists. I think the language, not only of the extremely lower class subjects of his stories but also of his own subjective life, simply didnt have the vocabulary to not carry prejudice, and its a little heartwarming, in a taken in context way when I can almost see Dickens banging his fists against language that doesnt exist in his failing to completely humanize his othered characters, which I think was his whole point.
Posted on: Wed, 22 Oct 2014 14:03:23 +0000
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