English 12 - Mr. Rinka Lesson #46

1. English 12 - Mr. RinkaLesson #46 A Christmas Carol By Charles Dickens

2. Two Christmas Christmas is both a religious holy day and a secular holiday. Religious Holy Day: • Birth of Jesus Christ the Messiah and founder of the Christian faith. • Considered 2nd most important day to Easter in the Christian faith

3. Celebrated on December 25th after 4 weeks of Advent in which Christians prepare quietly and humbly for the birthday their lord. • Season is marked with religious carols celebrated the birth of a child in a stable. • Has become the pivotal event in marking historic time.

4. Christians will gather on Christmas Eve or Christmas Day in church to celebrate this religious event. • The Nativity scene is the predominant decoration that is seen in homes and churches.

5. Secular Holiday: • Family gatherings around a large dinner and exchange of presents. • Traditions are carried on from generation to generation • The Christmas tree and festive lights decorate almost all homes, stores and public places

6. Sentimental songs about friends, family, winter landscapes and decorative trappings are sung. • The exchanging of gifts and cards make this time a highly commercial period. • The tradition of peace and good will toward men encourages donations to the poor.

7. Dickens’s Influence on Christmas • Although Charles Dickens was a Christian, his story A Christmas Carol is often considered the pivotal element of reestablishing the attitude of “Peace on Earth and good will toward men.” • Many point to this story as establishing a secular aspect to

8. Christmas that captures the holiday spirit in everyone. • Though the religious significance of the season is still paramount for most people, western culture has adopted this time of the year as the most popular and important when it comes time to family, friends, and service to the poor.

9. This prevailing milieu is the theme of A Christmas Carol which sees the transformation of Ebenezer Scrooge from a “cold-hearted” miser to a benevolent and happy participant in this celebration.

10. Legacyhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Christmas_Carol While the phrase 'Merry Christmas' was popularized following the appearance of the story, and the name "Scrooge" and exclamation "Bah! Humbug!" have entered the English language, Ruth Glancy argues the book's singular achievement is the powerful

11. influence it has exerted upon its readers. In the spring of 1844, The Gentleman's Magazine attributed a sudden burst of charitable giving in Britain to Dickens's novella; in 1874, Robert Louis Stevenson waxed enthusiastic after reading Dickens's Christmas books and vowed to give generously; and Thomas Carlyle expressed a generous hospitality by

12. staging two Christmas dinners after reading the book. In America, a Mr. Fairbanks attended a reading on Christmas Eve in Boston, Massachusetts, in 1867, and was so moved he closed his factory on Christmas Day and sent every employee a turkey. In the early years of the 20th century, the Queen of Norway sent gifts to

13. London's crippled children signed "With Tiny Tim's Love"; Sir Squire Bancroft raised £20,000 for the poor by reading the tale aloud publicly; and Captain Corbett-Smith read the tale to the troops in the trenches of World War I. According to historian Ronald Hutton, the current state of observance of Christmas is largely

14. the result of a mid-Victorian revival of the holiday spearheaded by A Christmas Carol. Hutton argues that Dickens sought to construct Christmas as a self-centered festival of generosity, in contrast to the community-based and church-centered observations, the observance of which had dwindled during the late 18th and early 19th

15. centuries. In superimposing his secular vision of the holiday, Dickens influenced many aspects of Christmas that are celebrated today in Western culture, such as family gatherings, seasonal food and drink, dancing, games, and a festive generosity of spirit. This simple morality tale with its pathos and theme of redemption

16. significantly redefined the "spirit" and importance of Christmas, since, as Margaret Oliphant recalled, it "moved us all those days ago as if it had been a new gospel“ and resurrected a form of seasonal merriment that had been suppressed by the Puritan quelling of Yuletide pageantry in 17th-century England.

17. Marley’s Visithttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Christmas_Carol The tale begins on a "cold, bleak, biting" Christmas Eve exactly seven years after the death of Ebenezer Scrooge's business partner Jacob Marley. Scrooge is established within the first stave as "a squeezing, wrenching, grasping, scraping, clutching, covetous, old sinner!"

18. who has no place in his life for kindness, compassion, charity or benevolence. He hates Christmas, calling it "humbug," refuses his nephew Fred's dinner invitation, and rudely turns away two gentlemen who seek a donation from him to provide a Christmas dinner for the Poor. His only "Christmas gift" is allowing his overworked, underpaid

19. clerk Bob Cratchit Christmas Day off with pay - which he does only to keep with social custom, Scrooge considering it "a poor excuse for picking a man's pocket every twenty-fifth of December!“ Marley warns Scrooge to change his ways lest he undergo the same miserable afterlife as himself.

20. http://quietube5.com/v.php/http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=62R8Du6Id1Uhttp://quietube5.com/v.php/http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=62R8Du6Id1U Scrooge is then visited by three additional ghosts—each in its turn, and each visit detailed in a separate stave—who accompany him to various scenes with the hope of achieving his transformation.

21. Ghost of Christmas Past The first of the spirits, the Ghost of Christmas Past, takes Scrooge to Christmas scenes of his boyhood and youth, which stir the old miser's gentle and tender side by reminding him of a time when he was more innocent. They also show what made Scrooge the miser that

22. he is, and why he dislikes Christmas. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1_GXTuOlGKk http://quietube5.com/v.php/http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e-1lpYarzTs

23. Ghost of Christmas Present The second spirit, the Ghost of Christmas Present, takes Scrooge to several differing scenes - a joy-filled market of people buying the makings of Christmas dinner, the celebration of Christmas in a miner's cottage, and a lighthouse. A major part of this stave is taken up with the

24. family feast of Scrooge's impoverished clerk Bob Cratchit, introducing his youngest son, Tiny Tim, who is seriously ill but cannot receive treatment due to Scrooge's unwillingness to pay Cratchit a decent wage. The spirit and the miser also visit Scrooge's nephew's party.

25. Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come The third spirit, the Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come, harrows Scrooge with dire visions of the future. These include Tiny Tim's death as well as scenes related to Scrooge's own death including a conversation among business associates who will only attend the

26. funeral if lunch is provided. Scrooge's charwoman Mrs. Dilber, Scrooge's laundress, and the undertaker steal some of Scrooge's belongings and sell them to a fence named Old Joe. Scrooge's own neglected and untended grave is then revealed, prompting the miser to aver that he will change his ways in hopes of changing these "shadows of what may be."

27. Redemption Scrooge awakens on Christmas morning with joy and love in his heart, then spends the day with his nephew's family after anonymously sending a prize turkey to the Cratchit home for Christmas dinner. Scrooge has become a different man overnight and now treats his

28. fellow men with kindness, generosity and compassion, gaining a reputation as a man who embodies the spirit of Christmas. The story closes with the narrator confirming the validity, completeness, and permanence of Scrooge's transformation. http://quietube5.com/v.php/http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b7Um603B2lI

29. A Character’s Evolution A universal character development throughout literature includes three stages: • Innocence • Experience • Redemption

30. Innocence • All People are born innocent babies • As children we play, pretend, enjoy, imagine and dream. • Life is grand and exciting. • Curiosity stimulates our learning. • However, outside factors begin to shape our lives.

31. Experience • As we grow into adulthood, our experiences form our behaviors. • Our responses to experience whether good or bad are influenced by our younger past. • Sometimes positive character traits come forward while other times negative ones do.

32. Our lives are steered by these character traits. • All too often when the negative traits come forward, other people are hurt. • If negative traits dominate our adult lives, much harm can be produced. • Some never realize this fact, but others eventual face the true value of life.

33. Redemption There are times in an individual’s life when self-reflection and self-awareness illustrate to us the consequences of our actions, good and bad. We are enlightened us as to what really makes us happy.

34. This ultimate awareness of what makes people truly happy always deals with kindness and compassion for others. • This is what happens to Ebenezer Scrooge. • This is why A Christmas Carol has had such great impact.

35. Assignment #1 Write a paragraph that defines “the Christmas spirit” for you. First, define the “Christmas Spirit.” Next, explain your definition and give an example. Then, analyze your example showing how it reflects the “Christmas Spirit.” Last, conclude your paragraph.

36. Assignment #2 Identify the major holiday in your family’s year. Then make a list of all the traditions and activities that you follow that day or days. More than likely food is involved, so make a list of the foods that would be at your meal. Share with your classmates.

37. English 12 - Mr. RinkaLesson #46 A Christmas Carol By Charles Dickens