[Charles Kent], from a review in the Sun

On 14 April 1848, Dickens wrote to the Editor of the Sun newspaper expressing ‘warmest acknowledgments and thanks’ for this review. On learning that the review was written by the Editor himself, Charles Kent, he wrote to him personally (18 April 1848): ‘…allow me to assure you, as an illustration of my sincerity, that I have never addressed a similar communication to anybody, except on one occasion!’ A close friendship developed, and Kent pleased him by other reviews. ‘I highly esteem and thank you for your sympathy with my writings,’ Dickens told him (24 December 1856). ‘I doubt if I have a more genial reader in the world.’ Alluding to King Lear, he would call him ‘my faithful Kent’. See also No. 117.