Massage egos or start to criticise mean fellow? (7)
I believe the answer is:
scrooge
'mean fellow?' is the definition.
(character in Dickens' A Christmas Carol)
'massage egos or start to criticise' is the wordplay.
'massage' indicates an anagram.
'start to' indicates taking the first letters.
The first letter of 'criticise' is 'c'.
'egos'+'or'+'c'='egosorc'
'egosorc' anagrammed gives 'SCROOGE'.
(Other definitions for scrooge that I've seen before include "seasonal miser" , "Dickens' skinflint (7)" , "Miserly curmudgeon" , "Dickens's miser" , "Ebenezer ......., miser created by Dickens" .)