ABSTRACT
The Pinches stand above the rest of the minor characters, and in several ways above some of the major figures in the novel . The difficult question facing a late-twentieth-century critic of Martin Chuzzlewit is to decide whether Tom and Ruth bring into the book the salt of Pinch or whether they are themselves so insipid as to make large sections of the story tasteless. As one who has read and studied Dickens for several decades, I may say that my own attitude to the Pinches has varied over the years, and each successive attitude has left traces in print; the truth is that I used to like Tom and Ruth Pinch, to admire Tom, to be charmed by Ruth, to be moved by the brother's selflessness and enchanted by the sister's pretty innocence. My latest rereadings have produced such an opposite impression that I am afraid of fallinginto the other excess. Dickens's own basic attitude never varied: he was in love with Tom and Ruth; he adored Ruth and revered Tom, and thus worshipped them both, more than was good for either of them as characters in fiction.
