Marley tells Scrooge that the chain he bears is the chain he “forged in life”. Made by his own free will and by his own free will he wore it. He then goes to tell Scrooge the nature of Scrooge’s own chain, saying “Or would you know…the weight and length of the strong coil you bear yourself? It was as full as heavy and as long as this, seven Christmas eves ago. You have laboured on it since. It is a ponderous chain.” Here Marley is blatantly telling Scrooge that his own chain is 7 years of greed added on to the length of Marley‘s. At this point Scrooge seems to become distressed and pleases that Jacob Marley speaks comfort. But Marley has none to give. Later on when Scrooge makes the comment “ you were always a good man of business”, Marley’s retort reflects yet again Dickens’ view on the issue of greed. Marley replies, “Business! Mankind was my business. The common welfare was my business; charity, mercy, forbearance and benevolence were all my business. The dealings of my trade were all but a drop of water on the comprehensive ocean of my business!” This “screams” of Dickens’ objections to the conditions of some people’s lives. He is announcing that charity and mercy are everybody’s business, that everyman has a duty to care for others and treat every man and women as their brother or sister. Because Marley did not show compassion and charity in his life, he is paying for it through never being able to rest. Dickens makes the reader optimistic that Scrooge will realise the error of his ways. It is almost jovial when Scrooge tries to utter “Humbug!” but fails.
In the next part of the book, Dickens goes on to the Ghost of Christmas Past showing Scrooge various scenes of the past. He does this to show Scrooge that he made the wrong choices and took the wrong path to become the man he is today.
Firstly, the ghost shows Scrooge himself as a boy, alone at school at Christmas. By seeing him as “a lonely boy reading near a feeble fire and Scrooge…wept to see his poor forgotten self as he used to be”. The ghost reminds Scrooge of how he was a small lonely boy. Scrooge reconnects with his emotions and is reminded of how he felt when he was lonely and unhappy. I think Dickens is trying to put Scrooge in touch with what other people feel too. Scrooge starts to cry, which obviously means the ghost is getting through to him. Later on, Scrooge is shown his sister, Fanny, coming to collect him from school. “A little girl much younger than the boy came darting in…and putting her arms about his neck…addressed his as ‘dear, dear brother’”. Here the ghost is showing him his family, and yet again putting him in touch with his emotions. When we read that Fanny died in childbirth to Scrooge’s nephew, we see that Scrooge loved her dearly as “Scrooge seemed uneasy in his mind”. Scrooge is not very nice to his nephew and we get the impression that he blames him for Fanny’s death. But here we see Scrooge start to feel guilty as if he has let her down, and he knows he should have been nice to his nephew in return for Fanny’s kindness.
Scrooge is reminded subsequently just how easy it is to make others happy and to feel good himself, when the ghost shows him a Christmas party thrown by his first employer, Mr. Fezziwig. Mr. Fezziwig is a jolly, happy man and Scrooge observes this saying “he has the power to render us happy or unhappy…the happiness he gives is quite as great…” Scrooge is clearly enjoying himself as a bystander watching his own self as a young man.
The ghost shows Scrooge yet another scene filled with emotion, this time with pain. Scrooge sees his final conversation with his fiancée, where he chooses money over love. She tells him he has changed and is starting to lust after money. She tells him “I release you. With a full heart, for the love of him you once were.” Scrooge is shown that there is more to life than money and it shows him that money does not buy happiness, as he was once happy with out money. He comes to realise that ever since he has been wealthy, he has also been angry, sad and alone. Scrooge is regretful and angry with himself for choosing money over love. He cannot bear the sorrow he is feeling, but unfortunately for him, the Spirit has one more thing to reveal to him.
Scrooge is then shown his ex-fiancée, happily married and surrounded by her family. Dickens is making a desperate point that this family could have been his if only he hadn’t been so egotistical. Scrooge watches the daughter and wishes he had a daughter that loved him as much as the girl loved her own father. Evidence of this is the quote, “when he thought that such another creature…might have called him father”. This indicates that he is dreaming of what could have been if only he had chosen the right path. When the husband enters the room and mentions that he saw Scrooge, how his partner (Marley) had died and how he was “quite alone in the world”, Scrooge manages to conceive how people think of him. He doesn’t like witnessing the truth because I think he knows it is true so he pleas with the ghost to “remove me from this place”. He can’t handle the reality, “I cannot bear it”, and wants to go home. The fact that Scrooge has already had enough suggests that he is already regretting the past decisions he foolishly made.
Next the Ghost of Christmas Present shows Scrooge exactly what people in the present time think of him. When Scrooge first meets the third spirit, Dickens instantaneously depicts how the ghost has decorated Scrooge’s room with “bright gleaming berries…crisp leaves of holly, mistletoe and ivy”. He furthermore describes the food heaped around the Spirit’s throne. By using words such as “luscious”, “cherry-cheeked”, ”seething” and “delicious”, Dickens makes the food literally leap out of the page and make the readers mouth water. He is describing all the traditional food you have at Christmas and is making the point that Christmas is a time to feast and be merry. At this point, Scrooge slips in the comment that the Ghost’s family –consisting of more than eighteen hundred brothers- must be “a tremendous family to provide for”. We see that Scrooge is still constantly thinking of money and that the Spirits still have a lot of work to do to try and change him.
The first scene the spirit shows Scrooge is that of people in the streets. Dickens portrays them as “jovial” and “full of glee”. They are happy and full of anticipation for Christmas Day. Dickens is showing Scrooge how he should be feeling at this time of the year. The ghosts main objective is to show Scrooge the delight and beauty of Christmas. The Spirit and Scrooge visit the Cratchit’s house where he witnesses them celebrating. He is moved by the fact that they are so poor yet so happy. For instance “two smaller Cratchits’…came tearing in, screaming that outside the baker’s they had smelt the goose…basking in luxurious thoughts” shows how excited the family are. But when Scrooge sees Tiny Tim, he feels “an interest he had never felt before” and inquires as to whether Tiny Tim will live. When the ghost answers that he will not, unless someone changes the path of the future. Scrooge becomes withdrawn and disturbed when the ghost throws Scrooges previous own words back in his face saying, “If he be like to die, had better do it, and decrease the surplus population". Scrooge is instantly ashamed of his ill-considered words and is “overcome with penitence and grief”. Dickens shamelessly is pointing out that all selfish people will be made a mockery of because they deserve it. He is saying that yes, Scrooge is ashamed now but if nobody had pointed it out to him, then he wouldn’t have cared! The Ghost then whisks Scrooge off on a whirlwind journey past Christmas partygoers and in particular people who lived in poverty but were still enjoying themselves because it was Christmas! In every scene Scrooge is shown, people are having fun themselves whatever financial state they are in, they have forgotten about the money and are concentrating on the “Christmas Spirit”. They then arrive at Scrooges nephews’ house where his nephew is having a party. Scrooge starts to enjoy himself so much that he forgets that he is only a bystander and begs for another hour there, “one half hour, spirit, only one!” This shows that Scrooge is actually starting to enjoy Christmas, whether subconsciously or consciously, and it demonstrates that Scrooge is learning to feel again.
Sequential to this, the ghost shows Scrooge two children, each symbolising a fault in mankind. One child is Ignorance and the other is Want. The Spirit says that they are “Man’s” and tells Scrooge to “beware” of them because on Ignorance’s brow is “written that which is Doom”. Here is yet another one of Dickens societal messages. He is showing how Scrooge is guilty of contributing to these two faults of mankind by being greedy when he should have been charitable. I think Dickens desperately wanted to change the way the Victorian Society was organised. He didn’t agree with the way that the poor were divided into the “deserving” and the “un-deserving” and wanted to make a difference.
At that point “The Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come” takes Scrooge on a frightful journey. The ghost leads Scrooge through streets and houses where he hears people discussing the death of a businessman. It is ironic because as this chapter develops, the reader realises that they are actually talking about Scrooge! He is blissfully unaware that they are discussing his demise, “Scrooge was…surprised that the spirit should attach importance to conversations apparently so trivial…nor could he think of any one immediately connected with himself”. This shows Scrooge’s ignorance of the fact that he is dead! Scrooge is shown people picking over his things after his death. The Laundress, Mrs Dilber, criticises Scrooge’s previous way of life and for his selfishness that eventually led to his lonely death. “…why wasn’t he natural in his lifetime? If he had been he’d have had somebody to look after him when he was struck with death, instead of lying gasping out his last there, alone by himself.” The ghost is warning Scrooge that if you treat others poorly, then you cannot expect any courtesy or compassion from others yourself. It is even more ironic when Scrooge is horrified at the way this woman is treating the dead mans belongings, saying, “the case of this unhappy man might be my own. My life tends that way, now”. He still hasn’t realised that he is the subject of their conversation. He is next shown a family who are gladdened by his death. They were in debt to him and he had been selfish and cold-hearted when demanding the money back, even though he knew there was no possibility of them being able to afford it. The ghost is warning Scrooge that his death would be a relief to many people whose lives had been troubled by his existence. When Scrooge discovers that the man they were talking about is himself, he breaks down howling “No Spirit! Oh, no, no!” He cries that he is not the man he used to be, “I am not the man I was. I will not be the man I must have been but for this intercourse. Why show me this, If I am past all hope?” Here he shows regret and we start to believe he has changed for the better. He goes on to say, “I will honour Christmas in my heart, and try to keep it all the year. I will live in the past, the preset and the future. The Spirits of all Three shall strive within me. I will not shut out the lessons that they teach. Oh, tell me I may sponge away the writing on this stone!” In this speech he shows repentance and remorse at his previous life and vows to life every day for the present and to honour Christmas always. I believe that Dickens was trying to say that nobody is completely evil and has some good in them, they just need to look inside themselves to find it.
Scrooge learns from the spirits and changes his ways. He is mainly frightened into changing but also is moved by the scenes he witnesses for instance the cheer at Bob Cratchit’s house. The fact that Scrooge transforms into a happy man shows that we can make up for our bad behaviour and that we all can change for the better. At the end of the narrative, Scrooge becomes “as good a friend, as good a master, and as good a man, as the good old city knew”, he becomes a cheerful man that everyone loves and proves that you can become something you never thought you could be!
I think “A Christmas Carol” has been so successful due to the fact that it appeals to those who are able to communicate with our innerselves. It is such a classic story, and is remembered today as the “one and only” Christmas story. It appeals to the socially conscious of us, and it makes us actually stop and think about the world today. I believe it will still be relevant another hundred years from today as their will always be the problem of social divisions as it is in human nature to demonstrate our faults. We are not perfect and so will show when we don’t particular like something. I think it is so powerful because Dickens was not writing just for the audience of his era but was writing for everybody in any time. Maybe he knew it would still have such relevance today?