Richard Bentley was a 19th-century English publisher born into a publishing family. He started a firm with his brother in 1819. Ten years later, he went into partnership with the publisher Henry Colburn. Although the business was often successful, publishing the famous "Standard Novels" series, they ended their partnership in acrimony three years later. Bentley continued alone profitably in the 1830s and early 1840s, establishing the well-known periodical Bentley's Miscellany. However, the periodical went into decline after its editor, Charles Dickens, left. Bentley's business started to falter after 1843 and he sold many of his copyrights. Only 15 years later did it begin to recover.

Charles John Huffam Dickens was an English novelist and social critic who created some of the world's best-known fictional characters, and is regarded by many as the greatest novelist of the Victorian era. His works enjoyed unprecedented popularity during his lifetime and, by the 20th century, critics and scholars had recognised him as a literary genius. His novels and short stories are widely read today.