The Life and Adventures of Martin Chuzzlewit (commonly known as Martin Chuzzlewit) is a novel by English author Charles Dickens, considered the last of his picaresque novels. It was originally serialised between January 1843 and July 1844. While he was writing it, Dickens told a friend that he thought it was his best work thus far, but it was one of his least popular novels, judged by sales of the monthly instalments. Characters in this novel gained fame, including Pecksniff and Mrs Gamp.

Like nearly all of Dickens's novels, Martin Chuzzlewit was first published in monthly instalments. Early sales of the monthly parts were lower than those of previous works, so Dickens changed the plot to send the title character to the United States.

Sarah Gamp (also known as Sairey or Mrs Gamp) is an alcoholic who works as a midwife, a monthly nurse and a layer-out of the dead. Even in a house of mourning Mrs Gamp manages to enjoy all the hospitality the house can afford, with little regard for the person she is there to minister to, and she is often much the worse for drink. She constantly refers to a Mrs Harris, who is "a phantom of Mrs Gamp's brain ... created for the express purpose of holding visionary dialogues with her on all manner of subjects, and invariably winding up with a compliment to the excellence of her nature". Mrs Gamp habitually carries with her a battered black umbrella: so popular with the Victorian public was the character that Gamp became a slang word for an umbrella in general. It is believed that the character was based on a real nurse described to Dickens by his friend Angela Burdett-Coutts.

Mary Graham is the companion of old Martin Chuzzlewit, who has told her that she will receive nothing from him in his will. She is a beautiful young woman who is loving and loyal. Mary and young Martin Chuzzlewit fall in love. The two lovers are separated by the argument between grandfather and grandson. They are eventually reunited.

Mr Chuffey is Anthony Chuzzlewit's old clerk and lifelong companion. Chuffey protects Anthony from his son Jonas.

Bailey is a boy employed first by Mrs Todgers, then by the fraudster Montague Tigg. He is reported to have suffered a fatal head injury in falling out of a cabriolet, though he eventually recovers.

Mrs. Todgers owns the inn or boarding house where the Pecksniffs stay when in London. As it is for male guests only, she houses Charity and Mercy in her own suite of rooms.

Characters in America

Jefferson Brick is a war correspondent in The New York Rowdy Journal. He typifies the bluster written in American newspapers, which publish every speech made by a local, and have poor knowledge of the world beyond America.

Mr. Bevan is the kind and level-headed American man who meets Martin on his arrival in New York. He aids Martin in returning to England.

Themes

The main theme of the novel, according to Dickens's preface, is selfishness, portrayed in a satirical fashion using all the members of the Chuzzlewit family.

In keeping with the theme of greed and selfishness in this novel, the Christmas story Dickens published in December 1843, as this novel was being serialized, was A Christmas Carol.

Dedication

This novel is dedicated to Angela Georgina Burdett-Coutts, a friend of Dickens.

Publication

Martin Chuzzlewit was published in 19 monthly instalments, each comprising 32 pages of text and two illustrations by Phiz and costing one shilling. The last part was double-length.

  • I – January 1843 (chapters 1–3)
  • II – February 1843 (chapters 4–5)
  • III – March 1843 (chapters 6–8)
  • IV – April 1843 (chapters 9–10)
  • V – May 1843 (chapters 11–12)
  • VI – June 1843 (chapters 13–15)
  • VII – July 1843 (chapters 16–17)
  • VIII – August 1843 (chapters 18–20)
  • IX – September 1843 (chapters 21–23)
  • X – October 1843 (chapters 24–26)
  • XI – November 1843 (chapters 27–29)
  • XII – December 1843 (chapters 30–32)
  • XIII – January 1844 (chapters 33–35)
  • XIV – February 1844 (chapters 36–38)
  • XV – March 1844 (chapters 39–41)
  • XVI – April 1844 (chapters 42–44)
  • XVII – May 1844 (chapters 45–47)
  • XVIII – June 1844 (chapters 48–50)
  • XIX-XX – July 1844 (chapters 51–54)

The early monthly numbers were not as successful as Dickens's previous work and sold about 20,000 copies each, as compared to 40,000 to 50,000 for the monthly numbers of the Pickwick Papers and Nicholas Nickleby, and 60,000 to 70,000 for the weekly issues of Barnaby Rudge and The Old Curiosity Shop. The lack of success of the novel caused a rift between Dickens and his publishers Chapman and Hall when they invoked a penalty clause in his contract requiring him to pay back money they had lent him to cover their costs.

Dickens responded to the disappointing early sales of the monthly parts compared to sales of previous works as monthly instalments; he changed the plot to send the title character to the United States. This allowed the author to portray the United States, which he had visited in 1842, satirically, as a near-wilderness with pockets of civilisation filled with deceitful and self-promoting hucksters.

Dickens's satire of American modes and manners in the novel won him no friends on the other side of the Atlantic, where the instalments containing the offending chapters were greeted with a "frenzy of wrath". As a consequence Dickens received abusive mail and newspaper clippings from the United States.

Satire of 1840s America

The novel has been seen by some Americans as unfairly critical of the United States, although Dickens himself wrote it as satire similar in spirit to his "attacks" on certain people and particular institutions in his native England, in novels such as Oliver Twist. Dickens was serious about reforms in his home country and is credited with achieving changes, notably in the workhouse system and child labour. Such satirical depictions by him and other authors contributed to the call for legislative reform.

Fraud in selling land sight unseen was shown as a common event in the United States of the 1840s. Most Americans were satirically portrayed: they proclaim their equality and their love of freedom and egalitarianism at every opportunity. Those who have travelled to England claim to have been received only by aristocrats. One character, Mr Bevan, is the voice of reason with a balanced view of his nation and a useful friend to Martin and Mark. Another American character, Mrs Hominy, described the United States as "so maimed and lame, so full of sores and ulcers, foul to the eye and almost hopeless to the sense, that her best friends turn from the loathsome creature with disgust".

Dickens attacks the institution of slavery in the United States in the following words: "Thus the stars wink upon the bloody stripes; and Liberty pulls down her cap upon her eyes, and owns oppression in its vilest aspect for her sister." The institution of slavery had not been practised in England since the 12th century and Britain outlawed the slave trade in the British Empire in 1807 and provided for the gradual abolition of slavery in most parts of the British Empire in 1833, so the sight of slaves and the still lively debates on keeping or abolishing the practice in the US were an easy stimulant for satire by an English writer.

George L. Rives wrote that "It is perhaps not too much to say that the publication of Martin Chuzzlewit did more than almost any other one thing to drive the United States and England in the direction of war" over the Oregon boundary dispute, which was eventually resolved via diplomacy rather than war.

In 1868, Dickens returned to the US and at a banquet in his honour hosted by the press in New York City, delivered an after-dinner speech in which he acknowledged the positive transformation which the United States had undergone and apologized for his previous negative reaction on his visit decades before. Furthermore, he announced that he would have the speech appended to each future edition of American Notes and Martin Chuzzlewit, and the volumes have been emended as such in all successive publications.

Adaptations and references

In 1844 the novel was adapted into a stage play at the Queen's Theatre, featuring Thomas Manders in drag as Sarah Gamp.

Short film adaptations of the novel were released in 1912, produced by Thomas A. Edison, Inc., and in 1914, produced by the Biograph Company.

thumb|1912 Martin Chuzzlewit film ad in The Motion Picture Story Magazine

The first stage performance in the 20th century came in 1993 at the Royal Theatre Northampton. Adapted by Lyn Robertson Hay and directed by Michael Napier Brown, the production starred singer Aled Jones and featured Katharine Schlesinger and Colin Atkins.thumb|1993 stage production of Martin Chuzzlewit at the Royal Theatre Northampton

The novel has been adapted four times by the BBC

  • 1954, as a twelve-part serial in the BBC Home Service starring Donald Wolfit as Mr. Pecksniff, Devid Peel as Martin and Andrew Cruikshank as Old Martin
  • 1964, as a thirteen-part serial on BBC One starring Barry Jones as Old Martin, Gary Raymond as Martin and Richard Pearson as Mr. Pecksniff
  • 1987, as a ten-part serial on BBC Radio 4 starring Patrick Troughton as Old Martin, Christopher Benjamin as Mr. Pecksniff and Valentine Pelka as Martin
  • 1994, as a six-part television miniseries on BBC Two starring Paul Scofield as Old Martin/Anthony Chuzzlewit and Pete Postlethwaite as Tigg Montague.

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Sources

;Online editions

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  • Martin Chuzzlewit at Internet Archive
  • Martin Chuzzlewit (1987 BBC Radio serial) at Internet Archive