From the Bookshelf of Never too Late to Read Classics…

A Christmas Carol

Charles Dickens

Start date: December 1, 2017

Finish date: December 31, 2017

Discussion: Lesser Know/Wilderness Classics

Why we're reading this: Tells the story of a bitter old miser named Ebenezer Scrooge.
Genre: Novella

[close] Tells the story of a bitter old miser named Ebenezer Scrooge.
Genre: Novella

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Lesser Know/Wilderness Classics

* 2025 Must Read Lesser Known Classics: Scheduled Reads
By Lesle , Appalachain Bibliophile · 72 posts · 196 views

last updated Sep 06, 2025 07:14AM

Wilderness Classics
By Lesle , Appalachain Bibliophile · 78 posts · 113 views

last updated Sep 26, 2025 05:58PM

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What Members Thought

Oct 10, 2011 midnightfaerie rated it it was amazing

Shelves: favorites, classics, rory-gilmore

The Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens was an absolute delight! I was anticipating a dull read but was pleasantly surprised. Because I liked this storyline so much, I could finally fully appreciate Dickens style of writing. And it was superb! I can see now why he is so talked about through the ages. When he described the food scene with the second ghost, I felt like I was there, smelling the sounds, my mouth watering. The delicious descriptive detail that this man can write is astounding and pur The Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens was an absolute delight! I was anticipating a dull read but was pleasantly surprised. Because I liked this storyline so much, I could finally fully appreciate Dickens style of writing. And it was superb! I can see now why he is so talked about through the ages. When he described the food scene with the second ghost, I felt like I was there, smelling the sounds, my mouth watering. The delicious descriptive detail that this man can write is astounding and pure talent. If you’ve lived under a rock your whole life, you might have not heard about this story. But the basic premise is a selfish, greedy man is visited by his longtime dead business partner to tell him that he will be visited by three ghosts. These ghosts are of the past, present, and future, and show this man how things truly are and the error of his ways. They also show him the possible future if things don’t change. He wakes up on Christmas day a new man and ready to right his wrongs. Truly a classic tale that is written very well. There are hundreds of movie remakes of this book out there, but I will mention only two here. The first is a Christmas Carol starring George C. Scott. It was the first and best adaptation of the play and deserves to have more recognition. The second is A Muppet’s Christmas Carol. The reason I mention this one is that out of the hundreds of adaptations I have seen (and trust me, being the Christmas freak that I am, I have seen hundreds), this is by far one of the most accurate according to the book. I was amazed and some of the dialogue that came directly from the book and even the creations of the ghosts in relation to how they were described in the book. And of course Michael Caine is one of my favorite actors. It was definitely worth watching. If you like Christmas and are in the mood for something festive, read the actual book. It will absolutely go on my Classics list and comes highly recommended.

---------Update---------------

I took out "Christmas stories" and this was the first story in it. I was going to skip it, since I've already read it, but I was in a holiday mood and it's my very favorite Dickens...the man who invented Christmas, after all. I enjoyed it so much, I endeavored to read it every year at Christmas time.

"Really, for a man who had been out of practice for so many years, it was a splendid laugh, a most illustrious laugh. The father of a long, long line of brilliant laughs!" ...more

19 likes · Like · see review

Feb 14, 2017 Shirley (stampartiste) rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: read-classics, golden-girls-book-club, favorite-author-dickens-charles

What a treasure this beloved classic is! For 20 years or more, I used to read it every December, and then I kind of fell off the wagon incorporating it into my Christmas traditions. But I picked it up again this year (I own a beautiful illustrated edition) and decided to listen simultaneously to an audiobook version of it read by the late Frank Muller. I rarely listen to audiobooks, but oh, what a combination of experience this turned out to be! Muller brought so much life to the tale, and by co ...more

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Dec 12, 2019 Antonomasia rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: christmas, 19th-century, 2019, 1001-books, 2018, childrens, film-and-tv, divine-comedy-booklovers, pre-1988

Read in Penguin Classics' A Christmas Carol and Other Christmas Writings.

This article on Dickens and Christmas nudged me into re-reading A Christmas Carol. The introduction to this Penguin edition even starts with the same anecdote, about the costermonger's daughter who asked “Mr Dickens dead? Then will Father Christmas die too?”

I rarely re-read books, not least because there are too many classics I wish I'd read, and which I haven't yet read once, to launch myself into a project of re-reading. ...more

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