1. The Message ofA Christmas Carol Tamiga Patterson Engl 1013 Betty Mealy May 9, 2012

2. What is A Christmas Carol about? Scrooges transformation Spirit of Christmas Importance of friends, family Just a Christmas story? Original illustration, reproduced on charlesdickenspage.com/carol

3. The Bigger Picture Dickens was making a point about life in general, not just Christmas How do we know? Evidence from the story itself Arguments from critics Quotes from Dickens about the story Picture from law.marquette.edu

4. The story itself Set during Christmas, but many events are not related to Christmas Why Christmas? A kind, forgiving, charitable, pleasant time People would be receptive to the actual moral Warning against Ignorance and Want Description of Scrooge at the end

5. Critical Assessment Horsman: Dickens Christmas books on moral regeneration (119) Glancy: Pattern of Christmas books (62) Johnson: *S+ymbol and allegory (86)

6. Dickens Own Words Dickens first fully- planned, cohesive novel Inspired by the Sermon on the Mount (Glancy 57) Aimed to awaken some loving and forbearing thoughts, never out of season *italics added+ The preface to the original edition, reproduced on (qtd. in Glancy 59) charlesdickenspage.com/carol

7. What was the moral? Be kind and loving all year long Learn from the past to change the present and future If Scrooge could change, anyone can May that be truly said *+ of all of us! And so *+ God Bless Us, Every One!

8. Works Cited Dickens, Charles. A Christmas Carol. New York: Creative Education Inc., 1990 Glancy, Ruth. Student Companion to Charles Dickens. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 1999. Horsman, Alan. The Oxford History of English Literature: The Victorian Novel. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1990. Johnson, Edgar. A Christmas Carol Criticizes Englands Economic System. Readings on Charles Dickens. San Diego, CA: Greenhaven Press, 1998. 86-93.