A Christmas Carol Essay -- English Literature

A Christmas Carol In a Christmas Carol, Dickens uses some of his past childhood experiences to show us that Christmas is very important and many messages come across in this book. It is split up into five ‘staves.’ The reason that they are staves instead of chapters as staves are used in music and it is called a Christmas ‘carol.’ In most cases, when people hear the word ‘Christmas’, we think of a time for giving and sharing with people less fortunate, a time for being thankful for everything we have no matter how little or how big, a chance to spend time with the people we love, joking, laughing and smiling. Generally a good time is had by all. Possibly the only exception is Scrooge. Scrooge is a cruel, cold, heartless, unwelcoming character who changes his heart and mind at Christmas. What messages were given by Dickens about Christmas? Can we change our hearts and ourselves just like Scrooge? Scrooge is an elderly miser. He’s living in the Victorian times when it was quite different to how we live nowadays, especially at Christmas. When we wake up on Christmas morning, the first thing we want to do is open our presents hoping someone has remembered what we asked for, watch others open gifts we’ve bought, cram as much turkey down our throats as possible and have parties with friends and family. In the Victorian times, they celebrated the birth of Christ. Even the poor who had hardly anything thanked God for all that they had, even though it was so little. Most people spent time with their family, singing songs and eating lovely dinners. It was usually the best dinner of the year. Scrooge did none of this. He hated Christmas. Whenever anything was mentioned about the event, he usually replied ... ...the same as any other day. I like how Dickens used the repetitiveness of the word ‘melancholy,’ as it just highlights how sad, depressed and boring his evening is. You can just imagine the street at which he lives. People in all the houses are laughing, enjoying themselves, singing, spending time together, apart from one man. All Christmas decorations are put up and the rooms are all bright, cheery and warm apart from in one home – Scrooge’s! After reading the final part, Stave 5, our feeling towards Scrooge changes dramatically and we start to feel empathetic because of his changes. Just the first sentence in the 5th Stave shows something has changed. A Holophrastic phrase is exclaimed and it is a total change from the 1st Stave. It says ‘Yes!’ Although Scrooge doesn’t actually say it, it is a positive comment which we rarely saw in the first Stave.