A Christmas Carol Essay

Imagine a staged production of A Christmas Carol set in 1843. See the stage set in the exact time it was written by Charles Dickens. The foggy, crowded streets abuzz with carolers and shoppers, the children staring wide eyed into the shops and bakeries. Hear the bells ringing as a round of “Hark the Herald Angels Sing” fills the gaslit streets with joy. As a child, going to see A Christmas Carol was one of my fondest Christmas memories. To witness Scrooge 's’ transformation from a mean, greedy old man to a joyous, loving benefactor always left me smiling and filled me with hope.

The author illustrates that Scrooge who is depicted as "hard and sharp as a flint" is a greedy miser whom is so old and coldhearted that nothing other than his profits will phase him. Dickens uses the scene when the ghost of Christmas past, "a child-like old man" uses flashbacks to show Scrooge of the memories he once made to show the nature of the much younger character. This is evident when Fan "a little girl much younger than Scrooge" had brought out the affection of her older brother as they planned "to be together all the Christmas long, and have the merriest time in all the world." What is important about this example is not just that it shows the compassion Scrooge once felt but also that Scrooge is not truly crooked and horrible to the core establishing the uplifting and inspiring feeling to readers.

According to the text, Scrooge is a tight-fisted hand at the grindstone, who emphatically worships money. Meanwhile, in addition, the text says that Scrooge is a squeezing, wrenching, clutching, covetous, old sinner. In the text it states, “Scrooge had a very small fire, but the clerk’s fire was so very much smaller that it looked like one coal, but he couldn’t replenish it, for Scrooge kept the coal in his room.” The ghost of Jacob Marley visits Scrooge and by showing him a reflection of himself, begins the reformation of Scrooge as we know him at the borderline of the story. The spirit leaves him the opposite from where he was at in the beginning. Throughout the entire beginning of “A Christmas Carol” The miser demeanor is “hard and sharp as flint from which no steel had ever struck”. The text states on page 3 how Scrooge feels about Christmas when he says to the two men who were soliciting money for the poor, “What’s Christmas time to you but a time for paying bills without money; a time for finding yourself a year older, but not an hour richer; a time for balancing your books and having every item in ‘em through a round dozen of months presented dead against you? ”

INTRODUCTION: Charles Dickens is said to be one of the greatest writers that has ever lived. Before we read one of his works in class, I would like you to spend some time getting to know this man and learning what the world was like as he knew it.

In the beginning of the book, “A Christmas Carol” by Charles Dickens, Ebenezer Scrooge is a cold, selfish and greedy man. He owns a business and is rich, but never does anything good with his money and keeps it to himself. He thinks of Christmas as a useless holiday and does not care to talk or smile to anybody he sees. However, as the spirits of the past, present and future visit him, Scrooge becomes much kinder and wants to become a better person. He learns to care for others and becomes more engaged in his community.

Ebenezer Scrooge, was disrespectful to everyone around him, is miserable now that Marley, his business partner of many years has died. According to the text, Scrooge hates things like happiness, generosity, and Christmas. Oh! How he hates Christmas! His feelings about Christmas are consistent until three ghosts show him that his way of thinking is wrong. On pages one and two, it says “External heat and cold had little influence on Scrooge. No warmth could warm, no wintry weather could chill him. No wind that blew was bitterer than he, no falling snow was more intent upon it’s purpose.” The author was saying nothing can change how he acts towards other people. Scrooge was a person who was always down, gloomy, and moody. For example on page one there is a description of him and it says, “ The cold within him froze his old features, nipped his pointed nose, shriveled his cheek, stiffened his gait; made his eyes red, his lips blue and spoke out shrewdly in his grating voice. A frosty rime was on his head, and on his eyebrows, and his wiry chin.” His wrinkled, aged, rough appearance reflects his inner feelings. According to the text, “Scrooge carried his own low temperature everywhere he went.” Scrooge’s demeanor was always low.

Dickens conveys Scrooge’s personality change based on fear that is influenced by surrounding characters, as he fears that no individual will remember him on earth. As Scrooge is a part of the upper class, Dickens refers back to the audience who were the middle/working class as they are full of joy even though they are treated without respect but they have the best values as they are hard working and kind. Due to Scrooge treating his employees with no compassion as he has a heart, “...as hard as a flint…” this allows the fear that Scrooge feels to become apparent towards the reader. The catalyst of his fear is the entrance of Marley who displays the consequence of living a mean-spirited life, “...the chains I forged in life..” but Scrooge doesn't

Sometimes in life we don't realize the significance of events until it is in the past and too late. In the preliminary stave of a Christmas carol, by Charles Dickens, we are introduced to a character known as Ebenezer Scrooge. Ebenezer Scrooge is a character that has to learn the true spirit of Christmas, facing his cruel attitude towards other human beings and reforming himself to become a warm- hearted, loving and generous person. We are shown many different personalities of Scrooge throughout the first stave, thus giving us a clear picture in out head of what Scrooge possibly is like.

As the night darkens Scrooge will soon find out the true meaning of christmas. Scrooge, wwin the play A Christmas Carol, by Charles dickens is the main character in a story that follows the past of an ungrateful old man. When Scrooge is first introduced, he is disrespectful in the way he acts and the way he talks. However, at the end of the play he is cheerful in the way he treats and talks to the people around him. During the night Scrooge changes from disrespectful to cheerful, and in the process learns to cherish others.

Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol takes the reader on a journey to find out how the main character, Scrooge, transforms from a life of anger and cruelty to a life of love and kindness. Throughout the novel Scrooge saw himself in the past, present and future. These aberrations touched him deeply and forced him to undergo change for the good of himself and others. Because Scrooge was able to experience the company of the ghosts of christmas past, present and future he positively changed his attitude and his outlook on life.

Scrooge is very inconsiderate of others, and accordingly to the text on page one, stave one it said that “ No wind blew was bitterer than he”, and he was a person who did not believe in the Christmas spirit until a trio of ghosts shows him his past, present, and future. According to the text the

Scrooge is a very miserable and despondent person that despises happy things such as Christmas. The text states he was a tight fisted hand at the grindstone. It also refers to him as an “old sinner”.

The way Scrooge acts in the story says a lot about him, but so does the description about him in the sixth paragraph. The passage clearly states that Scrooge is “a tight-fisted hand at the grindstone” and is “hard and sharp as flint, from which no steel struck out a generous fire.” Furthermore, the passage continues to show more detail by saying that he’s “a squeezing, wrenching, grasping, scraping, clutching, covetous, old sinner” and “solitary as an oyster.” All of this shows a generous amount of greediness and coldheartedness. The text even says “the cold within him froze his features,” which proves the point that he is not a very happy camper. The story continues and compares him to weather and how it can be beautiful, while Scrooge cannot be. As it continues, we discover that Scrooge hates Christmas and everything related to it (including carolers, donors, etc.)

He dislikes Christmas all together. “Christmas is a time were you find yourself a year older but not any richer.” Scrooge was very selfish, arrogant, and cold hearted. A man came in to his office asking for money for the poor and scrooge turned him away. “Hi Mr. Scrooge I was hoping if you could give a little to the poor?

A Christmas Carol is preeminent a Christian moral story of reclamation about, as Fred , (Scrooges Nephew) puts it, the "kind, forgetting, altruistic, lovely time" of Christmas. Scrooge is a skinflint businessperson who speaks to the greediest driving forces of Victorian England's rich. He subscribes to the rules of the Poor Laws, which abuse the underclass, and has no glow in his soul for anything other than cash. Dickens perfectly showcases this, by representing Cratchit as the hardworking poor, and Scrooge as the conspicuous image of the avaricious Victorian rich. Cratchit is an unassuming, frail man who must choose the option to obey to his employer’s requests.