‘A Christmas Carol’By Charles Dickens

Charles Dickens Biography

• Dickens was born in England on February 7, 1812.

• He was the second of eight children, and his father was a clerk in the Navy

Pay Office. • As a child, Dickens' health was frail and

his education was random.

• His mother taught him his letters and Dickens read a great deal from his

father's library of the classics of fiction.

Charles Dickens Biography

• At the age of nine, he was schooled with a neighbor's child, and when his

father was transferred to London, Dickens stayed behind for a while in

Chatham for his schooling. • But when he rejoined his family in

London, dark days awaited him.

Charles Dickens Biography• His father was in debt, and he was sent

to Marshalsea Prison when Charles was twelve. His wife and the young children

lived with him in the debtor’s prison.• While his father was in prison, Charles,

the eldest son, boarded with a family friend in Camden Town, a poor section

of London. He found a job pasting labels to bottles of shoe polish at a

blacking factory, where he worked ten hour days, six days a week and made

very little money.

Charles Dickens Biography

• After his father paid his debts and was released from debtor’s prison, Dickens was sent to school for a few more years

before he became a clerk. • He moved up from there to become a

stenographer at several newspapers. • In 1833 his first published piece appeared in the Monthly Magazine

signed with his brother's nickname. • He later published a few pieces in the

Evening Chronicle before The Pickwick Papers made him famous.

Charles Dickens Biography

• For the next thirty years Dickens churned out novels until he died.

• His other works include: Oliver Twist (1838), The Personal History of David

Copperfield (1850), A Tale of Two Cities (1859), and Great Expectations (1861).

Charles Dickens Biography

• In 1865, Dickens had a slight stroke that left his legs useless, but even this break in his health did not deter him from his active lifestyle of travel and

work. • In 1870, he had another stroke. He

died the next day, leaving the novel Edwin Drood unfinished. Dickens was

buried in Westminster Abbey.

‘A Christmas Carol’ trivia

• Early in 1843, as a response to a government report on the abuse of child laborers in mines and factories, Dickens vowed he would strike a "sledge-hammer blow . . . on behalf of the Poor Man's Child." That sledge-hammer was A Christmas Carol.

• Ebenezer Scrooge encounters "Ignorance" and "Want" in A Christmas Carol. These figures represent the poor child laborers of England.

‘A Christmas Carol’ trivia

• A Christmas Carol was first published in 1843. Initially six thousand copies of the book were printed. More copies were ordered after the first printing was sold in only five days.

• It only took Dickens about six weeks to write A Christmas Carol. Tiny Tim and Bob Cratchit helped speed up the process. As Dickens wrote A Christmas Carol he said that the Cratchits were "ever tugging at his coat sleeve, as if impatient for him to get back to his desk and continue the story of their lives.”

‘A Christmas Carol’ trivia• The Cratchit family is based on Dickens' childhood home

life. • He lived in poor circumstances in a "two up two down"

four roomed house which he shared with his parents and five siblings.

• Like Peter Cratchit, young Charles, the eldest boy, was often sent to pawn the family's goods when money was tight.

• Like many poor families the Cratchit's had nothing in which to roast meat. They relied on the ovens of their local baker which were available on Sundays and Christmas when the bakery was closed.

‘A Christmas Carol’ trivia

• At the time Dickens wrote A Christmas Carol, Christmas wasn't commonly celebrated as a festive holiday.

• In The Pickwick Papers and A Christmas Carol Dickens' descriptions of feasting, games and family unity combined with his message that Christmas was a time "when Want is keenly felt and Abundance rejoices" helped revive popular interest in many Christmas traditions that are still practiced today.

‘A Christmas Carol’ trivia

• In 1867 Dickens read A Christmas Carol at a public reading in Chicago.

• One of the audience members , Mr. Fairbanks, was a scale manufacturer. Mr. Fairbanks was so moved that he decided to "break the custom we have hitherto observed of opening the works on Christmas day."

• Not only did he close the factory on Christmas day, but he gave Christmas turkeys to all of his employees.