Ebenezer’s journey through past, present and future includes ghosts. The ghost of Christmas past is not itself scary but the tension that’s created in the book before the ghost arrives makes it seem scary. ‘His colour changed, through, when, it came on through the heavy door and passed into the room before his eyes…’ Charles Dickens creates suspense by writing in detail about what’s happening, emphasizing it and adding comedy. This works really well. The ghost of Christmas past shows Ebenezer, of what he once was; Ebenezer slowly begins to remember how it felt to show love and other feelings of emotion, other than hate and greed, towards people. Scrooge’s memory serves to remind him of himself before he became a miserable old man. The Ghost of Christmas present represents generosity, empathy and Christmas spirit. During the visit to the Crachits with the Ghost of Christmas presesnt, Scrooge feels a change. ‘Spirit’ Said Scrooge with an interest never felt before. ‘Tell me if tiny Tim will live’. The spirit spoke doubtfully. When hearing the doubt in the spirits voice, Scrooge becomes distressed. ‘No no’ said Scrooge, ‘Oh kind spirit say he will be spared’. The ghost replies ‘If he be like to die, he had better do it, and decrease the surplus population’. When Scrooge hears his own words repeated by the spirit he feels ashamed and is ‘overcome with penitence and grief’. The ghost of Christmas future scares Scrooge into change through fear of what may be. The ghost shows Scrooge a dead man, and a couple that are happy to hear of the dead mans death. Scrooge is saddened by the fact that the only people who care about the mans death only show happiness. ‘Is there any person in the town who feels emotion caused by this mans death’ said scrooge quite agonised. ‘Let me see some tenderness connected with a death’ said scrooge. You notice that Scrooge has changed as he actually begins to show emotion towards a dead man that he doesn’t know, but really that man turns out to be Scrooges future self, although he yet does not know it. During the last part of the ghost’s journey he shows Scrooge a gravestone which has been neglected. When Ebenezer finds his name upon it he realises he was the dead man that no one cared for. ‘Good spirit’ said Scrooge as if almost begging ‘I will honour Christmas in my heart, and try to keep it all the year’. Scrooge begs and cries at himself with pity, soon realising that the only person who can change his future is he himself. I think the fear of death scares Scrooge, as he knows unless he changes that is what will become of him. Warmth, goodwill and generosity soon overcome Scrooges once bitter self. ‘I am as light as a feather, I am as happy as an angel, I am as merry as a schoolboy’ said Scrooge after the ghosts visit, realising that he can change. Empathy enables Scrooge to sympathize and understand those less fortunate with him.
Dickens often uses Scrooge as a mouthpiece to express the more callous justifications and excuses used to defend the harsh treatment of the poor during Victorian times. Asked whether he wishes to support a charity he replies that he does support charities-prisons and workhouses that are all the charity the poor need. Scrooge’s cold attitude is that if you can’t support yourself then you shouldn’t be alive. Ebenezer Scrooge in this tale is portrayed as a very cold-hearted man. Dickens is very clever at creating his characters, they are either kind hearted good characters much like the Crachits, or bad tempered and grumpy like Mr Scrooge. There are no in between, half bad half good characters, whether they are good or bad Charles Dickens will emphasize it.
Overall ‘A Christmas Carol’ is a classic family novel, it has a happy ending, but it also has a moral to it. It’s a story of change-for the better-for one man and I think that being set in Victorian times helps emphasize how hard those times really were and just how much spending time with your family meant. It was the one-day of the year the whole family could have off work. Although Christmas time was no more than a religious holiday in Victorian times, Charles Dickens made it more than that; he added joy and a lot of festive spirit. In this book I think Dickens tries to show how self-serving, insensitive people can be converted into charitable, caring, warm hearted people.
