Christmas Carol -- Charles Dickens

Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens is a story about Ebenezer Scrooge, a miser living in London England in the mid 19^th century.  He lives for nothing but his money and is cruel to everyone he deals with.  Scrooge is tight fisted and has a despising attitude for other people, especially poor people.  One Christmas, however, he experiences certain ghostly visitations which profoundly alter his outlook on life.

This particular Christmas in the latter part of Scrooge’s life, his business partner Marley – Jacob Marley – having passed away some years before,Ebenezer Scrooge spends his Christmas Eve at the office in his usual way.  He worked until closing time and made himself thoroughly unpleasant to several well wishers who stopped by to sing a Christmas carol, invite him to dinner, or to contribute to a collection for the poor.  He rounded things out with spiteful comments to his clerk regarding having the day off the next day.

On his arrival home, he experiences a bit of a shock when the knocker on his front door changes shape to resemble the face of his dead partner.  But Ebenezer Scrooge is not one to let things like this disturb him, so he heads upstairs to his rooms and carries on with his usual evening routine (but he does thoroughly lock himself in).  His second shock comes when a horrid series of noises from cellar to ceiling announce the arrival of his partner in person – or should one say, “in spirit”?
The appearance of the ghost in his rooms terrifies Ebenezer Scrooge, but Marley assures him that he has come for Scrooge’s own good.  He warns that their grasping ways and disregard for others had brought him to an unhappy end and would be Scrooge’s undoing, too, except for the one chance Marley had gotten for him Scrooge is interested until he learns that the chance consists of visits from three more ghosts.  But Marley insists there is no other way.
The first ghost to visit is the ghost of Christmas past.  It takes Scrooge on a journey where he sees poignant glimpses of Christmas scenes from his youth.  Scrooge begins to forget his grumpiness and become quite enthusiastic upon reviewing some of these scenes.  By the time he arrives back in his room with the ghost, though, he’s still not one hundred percent comfortable in the company of the spirit and squelches it with relish and sinks into his own familiar bed.
All too soon, another spirit visits, this time the ghost of Christmas present.  Scrooge travels with this ghost around the city and even abroad, allowing him in to view the Christmas carols and celebrations of others – including his own nephew and clerk – without being seen. Ebenezer Scrooge looks views with new eyes the happiness he is missing, and even sympathizes with some of the sorrows he sees bravely put aside for the sake of the holy celebration.
Finally, Scrooge receives a visit from the ghost of Christmas future, a grim and silent specter, who does not speak.  Scrooge witnesses the death of a man whom no one in the city mourns and even servants deride and steal from the body.  He fears to ask who it is, and the ghost at his request shows him a different scene, a death which is lovingly mourned.  It is his own clerk’s family, losing a small son.  Scrooge is so moved by this that he goes back on some of the things he’d said himself on Christmas Eve before Marley came.  But the grim ghost is not finished.  He at last reveals to Scrooge the identity of the man whom no one mourned by showing him the name on the headstone: Ebenezer Scrooge.
This is the last straw for the poor man, who falls at the ghost’s feet sobbing and begging for it not to be true, pleading for a chance to change his ways.  He awakes on Christmas morning, alive and well, and never so happy to find himself alive and well!  Ebenezer Scrooge was simply giddy with joy.  He was a completely changed man who vented his happiness in extravagant gifts to his clerk and the man collecting for the poor, then surprised his nephew by coming merrily to the dinner he’d refused to attend before.  And the change lasted, so that for the rest of his life, Ebenezer Scrooge was known as the kindest and happiest man around.  And at Christmas time, he certainly knew how to keep it, better even than most people.