A Christmas Carol

Introduction
For my coursework, I have studied the 19th century short classic known as a
Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens. Dickens uses a wide variety of
techniques including anthromorphism, syntax and alliteration in this well-
known classic. It is full of vivid descriptions to make the reader imagine the
environment just as the author would have.
The story is about a mean and miserable old skinflint named Scrooge who
despises Christmas and the good it represents. However, one Christmas Eve
he is visited by the three Spirits of Christmas who intend to change his ways.

How Dickens has made the different settings of ‘A Christmas Carol’

effective

Dickens uses a large variety of techniques to make his story very effective,
from the gloomy and cold streets of London to the disgusting and stinking rag
and bone shop.
His first description describes the weather over the city of London, ‘it was
cold, bleak, biting weather; foggy withal… the fog came pouring in at every
chink and keyhole and was so dense without, that, although the court was of
the narrowest, the houses opposite were mere phantoms.’ Dickens puts a lot
of emphasis on the fog that shrouds the City and tries to make sure that the
reader can feel this too. Another part is where he describes the cold vividly,
‘The ancient tower of a church… became invisible, and struck the hours and
quarters in the clouds, with tremulous vibrations afterwards, as if its teeth
were chattering in its frozen head up there…The water plug, being left in
solitude, its overflowing suddenly congealed, and turned into misanthropic
ice.’ Dickens very cleverly uses anthropomorphism, which is the technique of
making inanimate objects seem alive, on the clock tower and the water plug,
to give even more effect that the weather is very cold and miserable. Dickens
next description of the setting is in Scrooges past, in the countryside. ‘Every
gate, and post, and tree, until a little market town appeared in the distance,
with its bridge, its church, and winding river. Some shaggy ponies were now
seen trotting towards them with boys upon their backs…All these boys were in
great spirits, and shouted to each other, until the broad fields were so full of
merry music that the crisp air laughed to hear it.’ Dickens uses syntax and
anthropomorphism again, in the ‘crisp air laughed’ and vividly describes this
countryside, with its gates and posts, and winding river and bridge. Another
part where Dickens makes the setting effective is at Fezziwig’s party on
Christmas, Dickens puts a huge amount of description in, from the fiddler, Mrs
Fezziwig, the people that come in, the dancing the partying, the food that was
served, Dickens tries to get across the message about how much partying
and dancing and enjoyment there was in the scene, and to do so, he
describes each and every part vividly which gives great effect.
The next part of Dickens settings is in Scrooges present time, on Christmas,
when he is walking through the streets of London again, past the shops which
Dickens puts great detail into, especially the fruiterers where Dickens uses a
lot of anthropomorphism to describe the variety of food that seemed to be
pouring out the shop, ‘there were ruddy, brown-faced, broad-girthed Spanish
onions, shining in the fatness of their growth like Spanish friars, and winking
from their shelves in wanton slyness at the girls as they went by’… ‘There
were pears and apples clustered high in blooming pyramids; there were
bunches of grapes, made, in the shopkeepers’ benevolence, to dangle from
conspicuous hooks that people’s mouths might water gratis as they passed
etc’. This quote shows how much detail Dickens put in to show the reader
how much variety of food there was at Christmas time and how good it all
seemed to be. Another place is at the sea, in the lighthouse, where Dickens
describes the place as ‘Built upon a dismal reef of sunken rocks, some
leagues or so from shore, on which the waters chafed and dashed, the wild
year through, there stood a solitary lighthouse. Great heaps of sea weed
clung to its base, and storm-birds – born of the wind, one might suppose, as
seaweed of the water – rose and fell about it, like the waves they skimmed.’
The next part of Dickens setting is in the future of Scrooge, in the rag and
bone shop disgustingly described by Dickens as ‘lowbrowed, beetling shot,
below a penthouse roof… secrets that few would like to scrutinise were bred
and hidden in mountains of unseemly rags, masses of corrupted fat, and
sepulchres of bones.’ This description is to give the effect to the reader that
this is a very low down and stinking place Scrooge has come to, and it makes
them shudder in disgust.
In conclusion this shows that Dickens uses a variety of different techniques to
make his settings very effective, in particular anthropomorphism, and puts a
lot of vivid detail into each and every one to get readers to imagine exactly
what he wanted them to imagine, and to get them to feel that effect it would
have on Scrooge.

Characterization of Scrooge

Scrooge is characterized by a variety of different techniques, which give him a

very different style and personality than the others. Dickens makes him very
memorable to the reader, as an old, mean man with no heart.
Firstly his physical description is described on page 12 paragraph 3, ‘The cold
within him froze his old features, nipped his pointed nose, shrivelled his
cheek, stiffened his gait; made his eyes red, his thin 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.’ Evidently Dickens had a very good image of
Scrooge in his head, and described as vividly as possible; Scrooge during the
Christmas season. Scrooge, in this paragraph is made to appear like a thin,
sharp, mean-looking old man with his thin lips and grating voice. Dickens
doesn’t describe Scrooge anymore after that apart from one sentence in
Stave 2, ‘He was endeavouring to pierce the darkness with his ferret eyes…’
which showed that Scrooge had very keen and small eyes, almost sneaky
eyes, like a ferret.
The next part of Scrooge is his personality, a good description of that is in the
same paragraph as the physical description was, ‘Oh! But he was a tight-
fisted hand at the grindstone, Scrooge! A squeezing, wrenching, grasping,
scraping, clutching, covetous old sinner! Hard and sharp as flint, from which
no steel had ever struck out generous fire, secret, and self contained and
solitary as an oyster.’ Dickens really wanted readers to understand that
Scrooge was a greedy, selfish, cold and solitary person with no care for
anyone but himself. Another part of his personality and characterization was
the dialogue conversations he had with other people, especially two from
page 14-18, the first is with his nephew, who greets Scrooge with a merry
Christmas and gets the words ‘Bah! Humbug!’ as if Scrooge is dismissing the
idea of Christmas. He finds Christmas to be nothing but extra money to pay
and gain nothing in return as this quote shows, ‘what’s Christmastime to you
but a time for paying bills without money; a time for finding yourself a year
older and not an hour richer.’ The other conversation that he had was with two
businessmen looking for money to give as charity to the poor. One of
Scrooge’s replies are so evil and cold which shocks the reader, ‘If they would
rather die,’ said Scrooge, ‘thy had better do it and decrease the surplus
population.’ The quotes showed how Scrooge thinks that if poor people are
dying, they should hurry up and do it, and so decrease the overcrowded
population, which is such an evil remark that Scrooge made.
The next part of Scrooges characterization is his actions, an especially good
note is when a carol singer came by and tried to sing through the keyhole but
‘Scrooge seized the ruler with such energy of action that the singer fled in
terror’ showing how cruel Scrooge acted towards others, even disliking having
someone sing for him. Also, his actions in his daily routine are very miserable
and cheap. ‘Scrooge took his melancholy dinner in his usual melancholy
tavern; and having read all the newspapers, and beguiled the rest of the
evening with his banker’s book, went home to bed…Darkness is cheap, and
Scrooge liked it.’ All this helps us to understand Scrooge’s nature, he tries to
waste as little money as possible, by walking around his cold house with no
light, he doesn’t like hearing anything that’s seemingly pleasant like the carol
singer and he definitely wouldn’t have paid him showing Scrooge to be a very
selfish man.
The last part of Scrooges characterization is how others react to him and his
reaction to them, this is very well described in the two conversations between
him and his nephew and the two gentlemen. His nephew is shocked to hear
Scrooge calling Christmas a humbug and tries to lighten Scrooge but fails.
Then the two gentlemen who ask for charity from Scrooge get nothing from
him. They get a shock from his coldness to the poor and are very
disappointed about what he says. Because they know that it is pointless to try
and change Scrooges mind, they leave very soon, showing how quickly
Scrooge has a bad effect on people. For Scrooge, these people have a
slightly different effect on him, he thinks that they are all annoying pests who
aren’t earning any money doing what they do, his nephew he thinks is wasted
by marrying and falling in love, and the two gentlemen, after realising that they
are doing charity instantaneously finishes with them because he knows he will
not get anything from it.
In conclusion this shows the characterization of Scrooge in the first Stave. He
is a cruel, greedy and selfish old man who truly cared for nothing but himself
and his money and showed the world that he did.

How the Ghost of Marley episode is made effective

Dickens makes the Ghost of Marley episode effective by using a variety of

different techniques. From the beginning it starts off with all the bells in the
house mysteriously ringing out. Then they suddenly stop and Scrooge, who
remembers that haunted houses always sound of ghostly chains, can hear the
sound of clanking and dragging chains from the cellar. Dickens continues to
build up the spooky effect by making the chain sound come nearer and nearer
to Scrooge, rising up to him. Finally the ghost makes a dramatic entrance by
floating through the door without opening it. ‘It came on through the heavy
door and passed into the room before his eyes’. This final part causes the
tension to reach its climax. ‘Upon it’s coming in, the dying flame leaped up
again, as thought it cried, ‘I know him! Marley’s Ghost!’ and fell again.’
Dickens uses anthropomorphism here to show that perhaps even the fire
knows that Marley is here.
‘The same face: the very same. Marley in his pigtail…His body was
transparent: so that Scrooge observing him, and looking through his
waistcoat, could see the two buttons on his coat behind…he felt the chilling
influence of its death-cold eyes…’ Dickens shows how he makes the Spirit of
Marley seem the exact yet different, in the ethereal way, how Marley is the
same looking person, but transparent and chilling.
Scrooge is forced to ask the questions, as the Spirit keeps his silence and the
human curiosity in Scrooge breaks through and makes Scrooge ask what the
Ghost wants with him. Even then, the Ghost prolongs his curiosity by
answering with only very simple, one-word answers or short phrases. But
slowly the Ghost builds up speaking and starts talking long sentences and
paragraphs in the end as if Dickens wanted to show the Ghost was getting
used to talking again. And all through this, although Scrooge tries to
encourage himself to stand up to the Ghost, he very quickly crumbles under
its malevolent stare and infernal atmosphere. Dickens tried to make the Ghost
of Marley as memorable and effective as possible by making it as scary as
possible, and Scrooge was a good person to use to react to the ghost.
Scrooge’s reaction is one, who at first is stubborn and doesn’t believe in his
senses, but slowly caves in to the reality, that his old partner is back in spirit
form and has visited him.

How the Ghosts of Christmas Past and Future are made effective and
memorable

The Ghost of Christmas Past is made effective firstly by its introduction. It

comes at exactly midnight, when the bell rings twelve, which is strange to
Scrooge, as he knew that he went to bed at half past two; ‘Twelve! It was past
two when he went to bed.’ Then Scrooge has ‘the curtains of his bed were
drawn aside, I tell you, by a hand… the curtains those to which his face was
addressed.’
Then there was the appearance of the ghost itself, ‘It was a strange figure –
like a child; yet not so like a child as like an old man. Dickens shows that this
Spirit is a very strange creature, how its appearance keeps changing. ‘But the
strangest thing about it was, that from the crown of its head there sprang a
bright clear jet of light.’ This light seems to be a symbol of the Ghost, it
represents the goodness of the Spirit and the faded memories of the
Scrooges past being lit up and remembered by a clear white light. However
even this isn’t as amazing, according to Scrooge as he reflects on it, as how
the figure of the Spirit seems to constantly change ‘what was light one instant
at another time was dark…being now a thing with one arm, now with one arm,
now with twenty…’ Dickens tries to make this spirit as unique and as strange
as possible by giving it the power to change constantly, looking different in
every second, almost as if it were to represent the different things in Scrooges
past, how he changes and grows. Another part that Dickens tries to make
memorable about the Ghost is how gentle and calm it is despite Scrooges
many complaints and angers. ‘The grasp, though gentle as a woman’s hand…
the Spirit gazed upon him mildly.’

The other Spirit is the Ghost of the Christmas Future. This one, in contrast to
the Ghost of Christmas Past is dark and shadowy. ‘The very air through
which this Spirit moved it seemed to scatter gloom and mystery’, this Spirit
seems to have a power that none of the others possessed, the power to
cause a feeling of dark mystery. ‘It was shrouded in a deep black garment,
which concealed its head, its face, its form.’ The Ghost seems to conceal itself
in its robe, like concealing itself in mystery and darkness. Dickens wanted this
Spirit to seem like a bringer of death, like the Grim Reaper, and although it
may be shrouded in darkness, not evil, just a higher being than everything
else. Another effect that the final Ghost had is where it takes Scrooge: the rag
and bone shop, how gruesome and disgusting the shop seems to be,
scrounging over some dead mans body, who the readers know will be
Scrooge. Then there is that cold dark room, with the dead mans body in,
covered up. What makes these scenes so effective is how the Spirit, although
silent makes Scrooge answer his own questions and tells him what to do
using just his hand.
This Spirit represented the darkness of Scrooges future; it was shrouded so
that Scrooge could not see him, like he could not see what was yet to come. It
brought death with it, perhaps it was Death, and in it revealed to Scrooge his
early and untimely death. The Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come was a very
symbolic figure of Death, Future and Darkness.

How Scrooge Changes

The key element in the Spirits attempt to change Scrooge (offering him
redemption), is for Scrooge to see how he used to be in the past, where and
what caused him to change, what he has done in the present and how he
should’ve behaved, and what will happen if he continues to live as he does in
the future.

A good reference of how Scrooge was before he met the Spirits is on page
12, ‘Oh! But he was a tight-fisted hand at the grindstone, Scrooge! A
squeezing, wrenching, grasping, scraping, clutching, covetous old sinner!’
Scrooge is clearly defined as a mean, perhaps even evil, greedy and selfish
person. ‘Hard and sharp as flint, from which no steel had ever struck out
generous fire; secret, and self-contained, and solitary as an oyster.’ Scrooge
kept himself to himself, and wished for other people to leave him that way. He
was merciless in his dealings and very quick to notice things: ‘hard and sharp
as flint’ and apparently he was never nice to anyone.
Another good reference of his personality before he was spirited away is other
people’s reactions to him, as on page 14 with him and his nephew arguing
over the value of Christmas. ‘‘A Merry Christmas uncle, God save you!’…
‘Bah!’ said Scrooge. ‘Humbug!’ Scrooge callously disregards Christmas as
nonsense and this is his nephews reaction to it; ‘Christmas a humbug,
uncle… You surely don’t mean that, I am sure?’ His nephew is fairly shocked
to hear his own uncle just wave away Christmas without a thought.
Another thing that Scrooge thinks about Christmas is that its not worth
anything, in fact to him its just wasting money on extra bills and parties as he
quotes ‘What’s Christmastime to you but a time for paying bills without money;
a time for finding yourself a year older, and not an hour richer; a time for
balancing your books, and having every item in them through a round dozen
of months presented dead against you?’

During the Ghosts visit to Scrooge, several noticeable changes happened to

him during that period. For example, during Fezziwigs party in Scrooges Past,
he became so caught up with the merrymaking and dancing, he started
making merry and dancing himself; ‘During the whole of this time Scrooge had
acted like a man out of his wits. His heart and soul were in the scene, and
with his former self’.
Another noticeable change is during the visit to the Cratchits house, where
Tiny Tim comes in and Scrooges stone heart is softened by the sight of the
small and unfortunately crippled boy who although is very young, has some
very interesting insights into the world. Scrooge wants so much for Tiny Tim to
live and begs the Spirit of Christmas Present if it could be so.

After the Ghosts visited Scrooge, he became the complete opposite of what
he was in the beginning of the story, as the Ghosts and Dickens intended him
to be. In the very beginning of the chapter Scrooge is already extremely
happy and excited to still be alive and to have the chance to mend his ways:
‘Best and happiest of all, the Time before him was his own, to make amends
in!’
Scrooge seems to become so happy and slightly crazy with everything as he
says, ‘I am as light as a feather, I am as happy as an angel, I am as merry as
a schoolboy, I am as giddy as a drunken man!’
Another good point is that Scrooge has given up his mean and selfish ways
now, he buys the large prize turkey in the butchers and sends it Bob Cratchits
house, and even the boy who he sends to buy it for him, he promises to give
half a crown to. He also accepts his nephew’s invitation to Christmas, for the
first time ever, and enjoys partying with all day. Also to round everything off,
he tells Bob Cratchit to take a holiday and get a pay-rise.
‘He became as good a friend, as good a master, and as good a man as the
good old City knew…he knew how to keep Christmas well, if any man alive
possessed the knowledge’. Scrooge has completely changed from his old and
miserable self now; he has become much happier and joyous, and always
kept Christmas well.

Interpretation

The story of a Christmas Carol has more to it than just of some old man who
hates Christmas, it is an allegory, a story with a subject that has a much
deeper meaning. The story has many different meanings to it, and all relate to
the same thing-the good in humans, but how Scrooge has none.
One such meaning is charity, when the two gentlemen enter Scrooges
workplace asking for charity, he replies that the poor should die if they cannot
work and therefore decrease the surplus population. Also another meaning is
redemption, at the end, Scrooge declares that the Christmas Spirits of Past,
Present and Future will strive within him so that he may become a better
person and escape the fate that has befallen his old business partner Marley.
One of the other meanings is in the City itself. Society has basically two types
of people, the rich and the poor, and while rich get richer, the poor just get
poorer. Scrooge is one of those rich people, although he is a rich person who
does not use his money at all, while his clerk Bob Cratchit is a poor person
with barely enough money for food to support his family. In the end Scrooge
changes and starts to use his money for the better of Bob, society and the
city, which is also charity. In doing that, he gains redemption for his past sins
and at the same time improves society for the better.

Conclusion
After reading ‘A Christmas Carol’ I believe that the novel is about the
goodness in the hearts of men, and how those who don’t seem to have it,
must change or be punished for eternity.
Charity, Redemption and Improving Society is the three most important things
Dickens wanted people to see, and Scrooge in the end changes and honours
these, in the Christmas spirit, because he sees the error of his old ways and
because he knows what will happen in death, should he not uphold the
principles in life.