Martin Chuzzlewit is Charles Dickens' comic masterpiece about which his biographer - Foster - noted that it marked a crucial phase in the author's development. Old Martin Chuzzlewit, tormented by the greed and selfishness of his family, effectively drives his grandson, young Martin, to undertake a voyage to American which will have crucial consequences for himself, his grandfather, and his grandfather's servant, Mary Graham, with whom he is in love.