‘Christmas time! That man must be a misanthrope indeed in whose breast
something like a jovial feeling is not roused – in whose mind some pleasant
associations are not awakened – by the recurrence of Christmas.’
[Extract from: ‘Christmas
Festivities’ by Charles Dickens]
Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol is an enduring
cultural icon, adapted and parodied so many times over the past couple of
centuries that we all know the story off by heart. There’s probably no need for
me to summarise the plot here, but in case this review is all that remains of
our civilisation in a dark post-apocalyptic future, I suppose I should make the
effort any way.
There’s
a tight-fisted old rich-guy called Ebenezer Scrooge, and it’s Christmas time in
London. Scrooge hates Christmas, and seems to go out of his way to be nasty to
people. One night, just before Christmas, Scrooge is visited by the tormented
ghost of his old business partner Jacob Marley, who warns Scrooge to mend his
ways. He is then pestered by three subsequent ‘Christmas Spirits’, the Spirits
of Christmas Past, Present and Future, and by guiding him through visions they
manage to get Scrooge to lighten up and become a better person by the time
Christmas morning opens up. A bad fate is averted, and we end with the words
from Tiny Tim: ‘God Bless Us, Every One!’
So what is the original book like? Well, it’s not that
long, for starters. Just a short little novella which can be easily consumed in
the run-up to Christmas day, with a mere five chapters to divide it up. The
first chapter details Scrooge’s character, and the other people who pop into in
his life, such as his long-suffering clerk Bob Cratchit, his nephew Fred, a
couple of ‘charity workers’ cold calling to raise money for the poor, and the
ghost of Jacob Marley. Each of the Three Spirits gets a chapter all to
themselves, while the final section details the effects of Scrooge’s conversion
on Christmas day, his making amends with the people he treated badly in chapter
one, and general good cheer and joy, especially as Tiny Tim Does Not Die!
The book itself is rather well put together. A fairly
minimal approach from Dickens, with a simple premise that he does great work
with. Scrooge really is presented as a piece of work, with such immortal words
as “If I could work my will, [...] every idiot who goes about with ‘Merry
Christmas’ on his lips, should be boiled with his own pudding, and buried with
a stake of holly through his heart. He should!” and, when asked to donate money
to help the poor of London, who would rather die than work in semi-slavery at
the workhouses, he responds “If they would rather die, [...] they had better do
it, and decrease the surplus population.” He really is a nasty chap, is
Scrooge, and it is no plainer than in the words of Dickens himself.
Having set up our villainous protagonist, it’s up to Marley
(Jacob, not Bob) and the three Spirits to break down his barriers and save him
from damnation. The Ghost of Christmas Past is a strange, trippy thing whose
physical appearance is psychedelically vague to the point of Lovecraftian, who
takes Scrooge back into his past to show him, and the reader, the evolution of
the boy into the dark-hearted man we know today. The Ghost of Christmas
Present, a jolly beaming giant and self-contained temporal nightmare, reveals
how all sorts of people celebrate a wholesome Christmas in the company of
family and friends. Being the main body of the text, these two little journeys
are really just a series of sketches, painted in the true Dickensian way.
Verging on the point of waffly, fortune has it that the creativity and energy
of the writing keeps the reader hooked on every detail of the proceedings, none
more so than in the warmth of the Cratchit family home as they prepare and eat
their Christmas dinner. I do not see how it is possible to remain unmoved by
this particular scene, and the lavish description of the dinner itself made my
mouth water more with each passing sentence, until I was drooling onto the very
pages themselves.
Scrooge
is pretty much converted by the end of the tour with the Ghost of Christmas
Present, but the penultimate section which shepherds in the Ghost of Christmas
Future is a dark one indeed, and is necessary to deliver that last Knock-out
blow. A silent, ghostly sort of ghost, the Spirit of Christmas Future shows
Scrooge what will happen if he continues to be a nasty old skinflint and a
miser; how he will die alone, his corpse being robbed even before it cools,
while Tiny Tim Cratchit also dies, bringing grief to Bob and his family. It is
a dark place for a Christmas story to descend to – alongside the section just
prior, with the Ghost of Christmas Present, after showing all the joy and
warmth experienced by so many people over Christmas, then reveals the two
starved children he keeps under his cloak; symbolically named Ignorance and
Want, while the jolly giant of a ghost uses Scrooge’s own nasty words to batter
him into submission. There is no reason to suggest that A Christmas Carol is a wholly jolly sort of Christmas tale, and it
is surprising that such a dark little story has become an integral part of our
tradition. It may be to do with the happy ending; in the final chapter Scrooge
is a changed man, being won over by the spirit of Christmas and resolving to
make a better man of himself. He gives Bob Cratchit a long overdue pay rise,
reconciles himself with his nephew, hands out money to the charity workers from
before, and both he and Tiny Tim survive thanks to the old man’s change of
heart. It is a classic in unambiguously happy endings.
Whoever
you are, wherever you are, Artichoke sincerely hopes you have a very Merry
Christmas. I know it’s corny to say things like that, but if we can’t be corny
at Christmas then when can we be?
Bibliomas
Dickens, Charles. A Christmas Carol – and Other Christmas
Writings. Penguin: St. Ives. (2003 [A
Christmas Carol first published 1843]).
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