Advance Booking

IN THE SPIRIT OF CHRISTMAS

This is a book that comes out of its musty corner on the shelf every Christmas. I loved this book as a kid, and it's a Christmas tradition of sorts, to read this book.

On Christmas Eve, seven years after the death of miserly Ebenezer Scrooge's partner Jacob Marley, three Christmas ghosts visit him during the course of the night. The Ghost of Christmas Past shows Scrooge his boyhood, stirring in him dormant tender emotions. The Ghost of Christmas Present takes Scrooge to the home of his nephew Fred and his underpaid but overworked clerk Bob Cratchit. The Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come shows him his bleak lonely future if he did not learn his lesson and become a kinder man.

I started off with reading the illustrated children's version of the story, and then progressed to the original. This book is said to have played a major role in transforming Christmas from a sombre occasion it was into the merry festival it is today. Dickens incorporates themes of generosity and goodwill into his narrative, while at the same time, showing the condition of the poor working class in those times. We get a look into the mindset of rich English gentlemen who selfishly dismiss the poorer class as fit only for a prison or a workhouse.

The character I love most in the novel is Tiny Tim. Seldom do you get to meet such an endearing character to whom your heart goes out. He symbolized hope and cheer even in the face of adversity, and you feel really happy near the end of the story when you get to know that Tiny Tim got better and Scrooge became a second father to him. I also liked Scrooge's nephew Fred, a jolly, kind man who invites his miserly uncle to Christmas every year, despite his uncle giving him the cold shoulder.

A Christmas Carol is an incredible book about the spirit of Christmas, and I think that it's message should be remembered throughout the year, not just during Christmas.