While he was writing it Dickens told a friend that he thought it was his best work thus far,[1] but it was one of his least popular novels, judged by sales of the 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.

He satirized the country as a place filled with self-promoting hucksters, eager to sell land sight unseen.

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.

He works for exploitatively low wages while believing that he is the unworthy recipient of Pecksniff's charity, rather than a man of many talents.

As Young Martin raises funds in London, Tigg cheats him at the pawn shop of the full value of his valuable pocket watch.

Pinch rescues his sister Ruth from mistreatment by the family that employs her as a governess, and the two rent rooms in Islington.

Deciding his occupation does not reflect well on him because it shows no strength of character to be happy when one has good fortune, Mark heads to London to find a situation to test his cheerfulness by maintaining it in worse circumstances.

Young Martin believes the words of men in New York selling land unseen, along a major American river, thinking that place will need an architect for new buildings.

This grim experience changes Young Martin's selfish character, and he takes Mark's suggestion to apologize to his grandfather.

Chuffey, who survives his master Anthony, had seen the drugs and prevented Jonas from using them on his father, who died a natural death.

He believes that he is a highly moral individual who loves his fellow man, but he mistreats his students and passes off their designs as his own for profit.

Charity is portrayed throughout the book as having none of that virtue after which she is named, while Mercy, the younger sister, is at first laughing and girlish, though later events drastically change her outlook on life.

He eventually joins young Martin Chuzzlewit on his trip to the United States, where he finds at last a situation that requires the full extent of his innate cheerfulness.

Mr Nadgett is a soft-spoken, mysterious individual who is Tom Pinch's landlord and serves as Montague's private investigator.

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.

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.

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

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.

[11] 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".

Dickens was serious about reforms in his home country and is credited with achieving changes, notably in the workhouse system and child labour.

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".

[14] 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.

[15] 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.

[16] 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.

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

Adapted by Lyn Robertson Hay and directed by Michael Napier Brown, the production starred singer Aled Jones and featured Katharine Schlesinger and Colin Atkins.