Charles Dickens’ novella, A Christmas Carol, is one of the most heartwarming Christmas stories of all time.
Marley’s Ghost
The narrator begins A Christmas Carol with the declaration that Jacob Marley is dead. He then shares a detailed description of Ebenezer Scrooge who is ‘a squeezing, wrenching, grasping, scraping, clutching, covetous old sinner!’
The story begins on Christmas Eve with Scrooge busy in his counting house. The weather is bitterly cold but Scrooge’s fire is small. His clerk, Bob Cratchit, has a smaller fire.
Scrooge’s nephew, Fred, stops by to invite Scrooge to his house for Christmas. The two debate the worth of Christmas. Scrooge declares the wish that ‘every idiot who goes about with ‘Merry Christmas,’ on his lips, should be boiled with his own pudding, and buried with a stake of holly through his heart.’
After Fred leaves, two men collecting for charity approach Scrooge. Scrooge replies that if the poor ‘would rather die, they had better do it, and decrease the surplus population.’
At closing Scrooge discusses Christmas day with Bob. Scrooge is resentful that he must pay his clerk for not working.
After work, Scrooge goes home. At the door of his house, he thinks he sees Marley’s face rather than the doorknocker. Scrooge is disturbed but shrugs the vision off.
Later that evening, Marley’s ghost appears. The ghost tells Scrooge that he has come to offer him a chance at redemption. He explains to Scrooge that he wears the chains of greed and selfishness. He also explains to Scrooge that man’s business is charity, mercy, forbearance, and benevolence.
Marley tells Scrooge that people who are not decent humans during life are condemned to spend eternity watching people suffer while being unable to help them. But! He, Marley, has managed to obtain a second-chance for Scrooge, in the form of three ghosts who will visit him on three successive nights.
The Ghost of Christmas Past
Scrooge goes to sleep at two and wakes at midnight to meet the first ghost, which seems to be both a child and an old man. It has white hair and smooth skin. Light streams from its heads and it holds a cap under its arm.
The Ghost takes Scrooge on a tour of Christmas Past which includes his time abandoned at a boarding school, his time as Mr. Fezziwig’s apprentice, his courtship and break-up with Belle, and the death his partner Jacob Marley. Much like Marley is condemned to watching without interfering, Scrooge discovers that he can’t interact in the scenes that the three ghosts show him.
When Belle breaks off her engagement with Scrooge we learn that he has made an idol of money. In sorrow and desperation, Scrooge grabs the Ghost’s cap and tries to hide his light. The ghost disappears and Scrooge wakes in his own room.
The Ghost of Christmas Present
The second ghost is a giant. He wears a green robe, which exposes his chest and a wreath of holly on his head. He carries a torch that resembles Plenty’s horn. The Ghost takes Scrooge on a tour of Christmas Present.
On the tour, they visit Bob Cratchit’s, where Scrooge learns about his clerk’s invalid son, Tiny Tim. His heart is softened by the innocent, sweet natured child. He wonders if the boy will live. The Ghost responds angrily saying that the boy will probably die unless things are changed and “What then? If he be like to die, he had better do it, and decrease the surplus population.” The Ghost suggests to Scrooge that Tiny Tim might be more fit live than Scrooge.
Later, they visit Fred’s home where Scrooge’s nephew defends him as being worthy of compassion. As the night passes, Scrooge notices the Spirit growing older. He also notices feet that do not belong to the Spirit under the Spirit’s robe. The Spirit opens his robe and reveals two children so ragged and malnourished they look monstrous. He names the children Ignorance and Want and claims that unless mankind does something for them they will be the Doom humanity.
The Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come
The third ghost wears a black robe that hides everything but one hand. He doesn’t speak. He leads Scrooge through a tour of Christmas Yet to Come. It features scenes of people laughing over the death of an unidentified man, stealing the dead man’s belongings to make money, and people who weep from relief not sorrow when they find that the man is dead and they might be free.
The ghost leads him to the bedside of the dead man but Scrooge hasn’t enough courage to pull back the sheet. He asks to see tenderness at a death and the ghost takes him to the Cratchits where he sees them mourning Tiny Tim.
Finally, he is taken to the cemetery and finds a tombstone with his name on it and realizes that he is the unidentified man.
Renewal
Scrooge wakes in his own bed, in he is own time, and he realizes that can make amends for his behavior. He declares that he will live in the past, the present and the future at the same time.
He hurriedly dresses himself and calls out to a boy to find out what day it is. He then realizes that he hasn’t missed Christmas and that the Spirits came in one night.
He sends the boy for a turkey and has it taken anonymously to the Cratchit’s.
After celebrating all day Scrooge goes home. The next morning he goes to work with the plan to catch Cratchit arriving late. He succeeds. He pretends to be his old mean self and says he won’t stand for it and then scares Cratchit to death by saying he is going to raise his salary. Bob believes that Scrooge has lost his mind.
The story closes by saying that Tiny Tim did not die and that Scrooge did everything he promised and more.
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