A Christmas Carol !
It is a heartwarming , beautiful and one of the most popular stories written by the Victorian era writer Charles Dickens whose writings were said to reveal the very pulse of life. Inspired to write a Christmas Story to encourage people to help, he wrote this story by contemplating while taking 10-20 mile walks in London and completing it in merely six weeks. He published this story on 19 December 1843 and it was an instant best seller with all 6000 First edition copies sold out by Christmas Eve.
A Christmas Carol is a morality tale of a bitter old miser named Ebenezer Scrooge.
Scrooge holds much of the world in contempt and has sacrificed love and friendship to the worship of money. Running his business with tyrannical authority , the oppressive boss is cheerless and refuses to show Bob, his underpaid employee any quarter even on Christmas Eve.
Scrooge is visited by the ghost of his former business partner Jacob Marley and the spirits of Christmas Past , Present and Yet to come . After their visits , Scrooge is transformed into a kinder, gentler man.
Dickens use of the phrase “ Merry Christmas “ popularized it among Victorian public even though it was first used in 1534.
The term “ Bah! Humbug!” uttered by Scrooge entered popular use in English language as a retort to anything sentimental or overtly festive while “Scrooge “ was added in Oxford Dictionary in 1982 meaning “ miser” .
Also the very first Christmas Card was designed and published in London in 1843, the very same year Christmas Carol was published. Dickens also created a new Genre “ Christmas Books” by publishing this masterpiece.
