A Christmas Carol – Charles Dickens

“There is nothing in the world so irresistibly contagious as laughter and good humour.”

A Christmas Carol. 

An absolute classic and essential for every Christmas.

Although, admittedly this is the first time I’ve read it and my previous experiences have been through various movie adaptations and school plays.

I’m sure everyone knows the story. Ebenezer Scrooge is a man about business. He is bitter, grouchy and has a dreary outlook on the world. The thing is he looks down upon anyone else who has a different view to himself. Ebenezer Scrooge is very set in his ways and prefers to be left in peace rather than enjoy the company of family, any attempt of friendship is refuted.

Until, that is, he is visited by four spirits.

This story starts off brilliantly, I must say. “Marley was dead: to begin with.” immediately draws you in, even knowing the story through other mediums I was surprised at how instantly I was gripped. 

I forgot how much I love this story. I haven’t watched A Christmas Carol in years. There are many adaptations I’ve seen and while almost all of them are very true to the original source material, I’m now wondering how many of them actually did the story justice.

In the versions I’ve seen there’s a lot of weight placed on the horror of the spirits, which I understand however, the second one especially, are always so loud and booming to the point I’m not entirely sure what they’re saying. It was quite nice reading it and finally understanding what I’d missed previously – this could also be attributed to the fact I was so young when I did watch them. I wonder if I would feel differently now and might watch an adaptation this December to find out.

Of course, the main takeaway message from this story is Ebenezer Scrooge learning about himself and how the world perceives him. How he changed from a light-hearted young boy into a greedy and selfish man. 

Ebenezer Scrooge was considered one of the wealthiest men around however, with all his riches he really had nothing. It’s shown by the Ghost of Christmas Present. Families all together, who have very little in the way of money but everything in terms of love and adoration for each other. 

His own future showed him that it didn’t matter how much wealth or money he had. He died and it hadn’t mattered at all in the end. His only legacy was in the memories of others. 

He promised to keep Christmas in his heart every year and throughout the year. I think that’s a really good lesson. You can’t help but smile upon seeing Ebenezer make changes to his life. Sure he was partially scared into doing it, as he didn’t want to end up like his old partner. However, you can see from the scenes with Tiny Tim that perhaps he didn’t always consider the consequences of his actions, and then he took steps to amend them. 

I’m so glad I finally read this story. It is incredibly heartwarming and I think I’m finally in the Christmas spirit myself.