At no point is this stated directly in the novel; rather it stems from Dickens describing her as such in his preface to the 1841 edition ("the boys are pickpockets, and the girl is a prostitute").

However, it has been speculated that he is invoking the term's then-synonymous usage referring to a woman living out of wedlock or otherwise on the margins of "respectable" society.

[citation needed] In spite of her criminality, Nancy is portrayed as a sympathetic figure, whose concern for Oliver overcomes her loyalty to Sikes and Fagin.

Nancy was tainted at a young age by Fagin, the receiver of stolen goods who persuades poor youths to do his bidding.

"[2] In the preface, Dickens states in writing dialogue for Nancy that he deliberately avoided using the crude language that would have been used by a real person like Nancy: No less consulting my own taste, than the manners of the age, I endeavoured, while I painted it in all its fallen and degraded aspect, to banish from the lips of the lowest character I introduced, any expression that could by possibility offend; and rather to lead to the unavoidable inference that its existence was of the most debased and vicious kind, than to prove it elaborately by words and deeds.

[3]Instead, Nancy and her friend Bet are introduced using faux-genteel terminology, portrayed as if seen though Oliver's innocent eyes, but recognisably ironic to the reader.

Bet's brash refusal to get something for Fagin is described as "a polite and delicate evasion of the request" showing "the young lady to have been possessed of natural good-breeding.

Nancy commits one of the most noble acts of kindness in the story when she ultimately defies Bill, in order to help Oliver to a better life, and she is subsequently martyred for it.

Her character represented Dickens' view that a person, however tainted by society, could still retain a sense of good and redeem for past crimes but will surely be paid back for their bad deeds committed before.

One of the main reasons Dickens puts Nancy in Oliver Twist is so that she can be contrasted with the pure, gentle Rose Maylie.

However, he defended his decision in the preface to the 1841 edition, explaining that it was his intention to show criminals, however petty, in "all their deformity", and that he had thought that dressing Nancy in anything other than "a cheap shawl" would make her seem more fanciful than real as a character.

In the 1994 London revival of the musical Oliver!, Nancy was played by Sally Dexter, later by Claire Moore and Ruthie Henshall.

Unlike most adaptations, however, she is portrayed as a younger girl known as "Red" and Oliver's love interest despite her supposed relationship to a female version of Sikes.