When I realized that I would be reaching my 2500th post on Epinions this
month, I tried to think of something I hadn’t reviewed yet that would
be a good choice for a landmark review. Since December and 25 go
together so well, I decided it should be a Christmas review. And then it
occurred to me that I had never reviewed A Christmas Carol, the
actual book as penned by Charles Dickens. Oh, I’ve reviewed film
adaptations, but never the classic itself. And just after this
revelation came the more startling realization that I’d never actually
read it.
I felt like I had, since most productions lift large
portions of dialogue directly from the book, and some - including my
favorite, A Muppet Christmas Carol - incorporate bits of
narration as well. Nonetheless, it only took me a couple of paragraphs,
as the iconic “Marley was dead: to begin with” gives way to an amusing
tangent about the dubious quality of the simile “dead as a doornail”, to
be certain that I hadn’t read it before. It was around this time that
it suddenly occurred to me how wickedly funny Dickens was. I suspect the
skewered stylings of Lemony Snicket may owe a bit to this literary
giant; I thought of him often as I burst into laughter again and again
at Dickens’ amusingly intrusive narrative style.
As everyone reading this review likely knows, A Christmas Carol
is the story of Ebenezer Scrooge, a reclusive miser with nary a kind
word to say to anyone. Though he is a rich man, he is a stranger to
generosity, and in general, those around him have learned not to expect
it. His hardworking clerk, Bob Cratchit, knows better than to ask for a
bit of coal with which to warm himself, and when Scrooge makes the brief
journey to his austere home in the evening, young and old alike steer
clear.
One man who will not be deterred is Scrooge’s eternally
good-willed nephew Fred, who, upon issuing an invitation for Christmas
dinner, prompts his uncle to make his most famous declaration: “Bah!
Humbug!” And just in case there could be any question as to the meaning
of this grumpy outburst, Scrooge spells out his feelings toward
Christmas in the most ghoulish of language: “If I could work my will,
every idiot who goes about with ‘Merry Christmas’ on his lips, should be
boiled in his own pudding, and buried with a stake of holly through his
heart.”
How does a man go from this to someone of whom “it
was always said... that he knew how to keep Christmas well, if any man
alive possessed the knowledge”? Otherworldly intervention. For right
there on the title page, Dickens indicates that this is “A Ghost Story
of Christmas.” The words don’t sound right together; I always raise an
eyebrow when the “scary ghost stories” line comes up in It’s the Most Wonderful Time of the Year.
But a ghost story this certainly is, even if only the first of the four
is the traditional spirit of a deceased person. The other three seem a
different order of being altogether, created for a specific purpose and
never having been human themselves. Sympathetic Christmas Past, jovial
Christmas Present and terrifying Christmas Future serve as our guides
through a story that is all about character development. A Christmas Carol may be a good deal shorter than the typical Dickens novel, but Scrooge is a richly drawn, fully realized character.
The trailers for Disney’s new edition of A Christmas Carol
have been proclaiming the tale “the greatest Christmas story ever
told.” An audacious claim, but not far off the mark. I would venture a
guess that few books have made their way onto the screen so many
different times, to say nothing of the number of theatrical productions
that spring up this time every year. What’s more, some of the most
enduring of Christmas classics in this past century bear the indelible
mark of Dickens’ influence.
I’m thinking in particular of It’s a Wonderful Life,
in which a heavenly messenger escorts a distraught George Bailey
through a world in which he was never born. In a way, this is the
opposite story; a man who has spent his life doing good for others must
be shown, via his absence, what a positive impact he has made. And
instead of going forth and bestowing blessings on everyone in sight, the
many friends he has accumulated over a lifetime shower blessings upon
him. I’m also strongly reminded of How the Grinch Stole Christmas,
in which an ornery creature who despises Christmas is so touched by the
happiness of the simple Whos despite his evil deeds that he makes a
complete turn-around.
As an enormous fan of the show LOST, I can’t help crediting Dickens a bit there too. A Christmas Carol
is one of the first tales that introduced me to the importance of
backstory in truly understanding a character. From the beginning,
flashbacks have been a hugely important element of LOST, allowing
us to gain insight into these characters who gained a clean slate the
moment they emerged alive from the smoldering wreckage of Flight 815.
Meanwhile, starting in season three, viewers have caught glimpses of the
future, prompting us to demand, “Are these the shadows of things that
Will be, or are they shadows of things that May be, only?” It’s one of
the crucial questions of the series, and it has yet to be answered
definitively. Then, of course, there is the redemptive journey. If a
bitter old curmudgeon can become a beloved benefactor, why can’t a
hardened conman become a respected leader? Why can’t a drunken coward
become a sacrificial hero? Why, if Scrooge can reform, perhaps there’s
even hope for a homicidal sociopath like Ben Linus.
I know
this story backward and forward. Nonetheless, while reading the book, I
was often caught by surprise by little nuances that don’t generally make
the transition from book to screen or stage. For instance, the book
made me much more aware of the depth of Marley’s remorse. While he
always seemed mournful to me, and even sympathetic to Scrooge’s plight,
what really struck me in the book was his distress at no longer being
able to directly intervene when he sees those in need. It isn’t just
that he wishes he wasn’t loaded down with chains; he truly wants to help
the disenfranchised now and aches to think of all he might have done in
life. For just a moment, the book shows us dozens of others like him, a
harrowing spectacle indeed.
In the Christmas Past section,
certain details amplify the effect of the visitation. Most notably,
Scrooge, on three different occasions, is moved by a moment in his
distant past to wish he had treated a particular person more kindly in
his much more recent past. Witnessing his own childhood loneliness, he
feels for the lone caroler who came to his door. Whisked away to the
merriment of a ball thrown by his magnanimous employer Fezziwig, he
realizes that he has been a brutal boss. And remembering the warmth of
his little sister, he regrets his refusal to get to know her orphaned
son. Perhaps catching me most by surprise was Scrooge’s reaction to the
teenage daughter of his former fiancee. As he sees this young woman, he
suddenly longs for fatherhood himself, realizing that it could have been
his. I always understood him to be deeply distressed over the loss of
his one true love, but I never gave much thought to their potential
children or had any inkling that he himself did.
In Christmas
Present, the first thing I noticed was an overabundance of food, and
this quite prevailed throughout the chapter. I always contend that one
mustn’t read Brian Jacques’ Redwall series on an empty stomach, owing to
the inevitable detailed descriptions of sumptuous feasts. I’d repeat
that warning here. I’d almost go as far as to say that Dickens
momentarily loses himself in list upon list of mouth-watering
delicacies.
Another observation: more characters. Martha, the
eldest of the Cratchit daughters, is already employed and living her own
life. Her presence among the family is akin to Sondra’s Thanksgiving
return from college in season one of The Cosby Show.
Topper, a friend of Fred’s, spends the majority of his time at the
Christmas party attempting to seduce one of the sisters of Fred’s wife.
This is a silly subplot, but considering the lighthearted tone of much
of the novel, it doesn’t feel intrusive, especially as Fred’s party is
such a small part of the overall narrative. In this original version,
Fred and his guests still jest a bit at Scrooge’s expense, but it
doesn’t seem to bother him as it does in many adaptations.
The
only aspect of Christmas Future that struck me as very different was
Scrooge’s constant search for himself in this future. He is anxious to
see just what has become of him, though it never occurs to him that the
deceased man of whom so many speak in such derisive tones could be him.
The finale, too, is rendered faithfully in most adaptations, without any
significant omissions, though some versions have Scrooge paying a visit
to Bob on Christmas instead of delivering his gift anonymously and then
messing with his clerk’s head at work the next day.
Aside
from small details like these, what interested me most was the
narration. While the physical descriptions often translate to the screen
beautifully, and of course Scrooge’s biting dialogue is used as
liberally as possible, much of Dickens’ sly commentary gets left by the
wayside. For instance, he takes a long time in explaining to us that
Marley is definitely dead when the book begins, taking a brief side trip
to reference Hamlet and the ghost whose appearance precipitates
the rest of the story. Occasionally, he has reason to trot out an
aphorism such as this: "It is always the person not in the predicament
who knows what ought to have been done in it, and would unquestionably
have done it too." At the same time, we get a sense of deep reverence
for the holiday at hand. Fred’s festivities prompt the observation: "It
is good to be children sometimes, and never better than at Christmas,
when its mighty Founder was a child himself."
I could go on,
but I’ll leave the rest to be discovered by others like me who know the
contours of the story by heart but haven’t picked up the book, thinking
they will find little within its pages to surprise them. Trust me when I
say that you haven’t fully experienced this classic until you have read
it in the original Dickens. Of Christmas, Fred tells Scrooge, at the
conclusion of a most flowery speech, “though it has never put a scrap of
gold or silver in my pocket, I believe that it has done me good, and
will do me good; and I say, God bless it!” The same might be said of A Christmas Carol.
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