Dickens' Victorian Christmas

This year, in the days leading up to Christmas, I read Dickens' A Christmas Carol to my kids, particularly my oldest but all who would sit for it. I got started on it later than intended, who isn't overly busy this time of year, but we were able to line it up and read the last chapter (or 'stave') called 'The End of it' on Christmas Day morning. This is when Ebenezer Scrooge joyously reveals his changed attitude and expresses it all around town. It was glorious and I want to make that a tradition, and will try my best.

I've long loved this story, for reasons given previous (see my post on the Muppet Christmas Carol, imo the best movie adaption). The short version is it's a time-honored tale about redemption and the true spirit of Christmas, plus it's seemingly had considerable impact on how we celebrate the holiday the last ~200 years. Then there's the fact I starred as Scrooge in a 2nd grade play, with lasting effects on my fondness for it. When I read aloud this past week it was from the book that teacher gave me years ago. I'm, indeed, still thankful for it.

If you've never read A Christmas Carol, let me say first it's relatively short (mine's 128 pages) and more accessible than Dickens' other well-known work. I'm sure you could get through it and experience the genuine article, not just the other more popular formats. Some editions of the book have great illustrations!

On this read-through what stuck with me were the views into what Christmas looked like those early Victorian years. The story debuted in 1843 btw. Apparently, according to the novella's wikipedia page, England at this stage was at a bit of a crossroads in how they celebrated Christ's birth. It's interesting to me, for example, that the Christmas tree, an import from Germany, was this strange thing. What we see, however, are family gatherings, feasts and parties, and an (almost) universal rampant mood of generosity and good will. Most critically this is regardless of one's station in life or anything else.

During 'The Second of the Three Spirits,' aka the Ghost of Christmas Present, Scrooge visits the house of his clerk Bob Cratchit. Bob is hard working but well underpaid, and his family has very little. Yet that does not damper his, nor his entire family's good cheer at Christmastime even considering the dire circumstances of Tiny Tim. The sprinkling of the Ghost's torch may help to an extent, but is by no means the only reason. Everyone in Cratchit's house is dressed in their finest, ribbons for the Bob's wife and daughters, one of Bob's dress shirts for his eldest son. The children get so excited about the turkey, being cooked at the baker's some distance away, and then play a trick on their father as he returns home. Tim's selfless perspective, on how he hopes to be an inspiration for others on Christmas Day, in remembrance of how Jesus healed the lame and the blind, is straight out of the text. The retrieval of the goose and the preparation for the meal is a near holy ritual, and the family takes utmost pleasure in it. As well as the (figgy) pudding that followed.

Then the Cratchit family drew round the hearth, in what Bob Cratchit called a circle, meaning half a one; and at Bob Cratchit's elbow stood the family display of glass; two tumblers, and a custard-cup without a handle.

These held the hot stuff from the jug, however, as well as golden goblets would have done; and Bob served it out with beaming looks, while the chestnuts on the fire sputtered and crackled noisily. Then Bob proposed:

"A Merry Christmas to us all, my dears. God bless us!"

Which all the family re-echoed.

"God bless us every one!" Said Tiny Tim, the last of all.

He sat very close to his father's side, upon his little stool. Bob held his withered little hand in his, as if he loved the child, and wished to keep him by his side, and dreaded that he might be taken from him.

Tis enough to melt one cold man's heart.

But there's more and Scrooge's soon in the presence of his ever-cheerful nephew Fred, who'd already invited him to Christmas and can't find it in his heart to say anything bad about the old miser.

"I was going to say," said Scrooge's nephew, "that the consequence of his taking a dislike to us, and not making merry with us, is, as I think, that he loses some pleasant moments, which could do him no harm. I am sure he loses pleasanter companions than he can find in his own thoughts, either in his mouldy old office, or his dusty chambers. I mean to give him the same chance every year, whether he likes it or not, for I pity him. He may rail at Christmas til he dies, but he can't help thinking better of it -- I defy him -- if he finds me going there, in good temper, year after year, and saying Uncle Scrooge, how are you? If it only puts him in the vein to leave his poor clerk fifty pounds, that's something; and I think I shook him, yesterday."

They, Fred and his wife and their friends, go on to play music and games and enjoy each other's company, a certain pair perhaps more than the rest. The gaming includes, as seen in the Muppet movie version for one, Yes and No, where the answer, after many a question, is discovered to be Ebenezer Scrooge himself. Scrooge, watching all this, thoroughly loves it and gets softer and kinder all the while. This is his last sight before saying goodbye to the rapidly aging jolly giant and meeting the dark and wraith-like Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come.

These are the elements of how, I believe, Christmas should still be celebrated. Good cheer, generosity and thankfulness, and time with family and friends. It's no surprise, even beyond the grand final salvation of Mr. Scrooge, that this story has endured so long. Personally I find nephew Fred to be someone to emulate, all the year. I hope that at least some parts of this is what Christmas looks like to you, today.