Charles Dickens's Martin Chuzzlewit, No. IX (Chs. 21-23)

The Life and Adventures of Martin Chuzzlewit by Charles Dickens

Originally published: 1843-44
Acquired: December 2023
Installment read: February 2024

No. IX (Chs. 21-23)
Back to Martin in America for these three parts, which are less funny than the previous American ones and thus also less interesting; mostly they are about Martin getting caught up in a land speculation scheme. There are some jokes but they are much less densely packed in, and the book is back to feeling flabby and slow; you always get the point of a scene long before it is over. The satire about the racist, anti-emancipation Americans was pretty potent, though:

It was hastily resolved that a piece of plate should be presented to a certain constitutional Judge, who had laid down from the Bench the noble principle that it was lawful for any white mob to murder any black man; and that another piece of plate, of similar value should be presented to a certain Patriot, who had declared from his high place in the Legislature, that he and his friends would hang without trial, any Abolitionist who might pay them a visit. For the surplus, it was agreed that it should be devoted to aiding the enforcement of those free and equal laws, which render it incalculably more criminal and dangerous to teach a negro to read and write than to roast him alive in a public city.

Alas, it had little to do with Martin.

This is the fifth in a series of posts about Martin Chuzzlewit. The next covers installment nos. x–xii. Previous installments are listed below:

1. Nos. I–III (chs. 1-8)
2. No. IV (chs. 9-10)
3. Nos. V–VII (chs. 11-17)
4. No. VIII (chs. 18-20)