A Christmas Carol in Around the World in 80 Books

Dec 29, 2018 Karen rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

This is a re-read. I always have the intention to read this every year, but I often don't get the opportunity to read more than a couple of pages.

12/4/2023: I finished this again. I read this rather slowly so that I could really enjoy it. ...more

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Apr 10, 2016 Jen Pratt rated it it was amazing

Charles Dickens is a master! I have reread this classic many times and it never fails to inspire and entertain. I think nearly everyone is familiar with the plot, but those who have only watched the movie or play miss out on some of the fantastic descriptions and humor. Here are just a few:

“Mind! I don't mean to say that, of my own knowledge, what there is particularly dead about a doornail. I might have been inclined, myself, to regard a coffin-nail as the deadest piece of ironmongery in the tr Charles Dickens is a master! I have reread this classic many times and it never fails to inspire and entertain. I think nearly everyone is familiar with the plot, but those who have only watched the movie or play miss out on some of the fantastic descriptions and humor. Here are just a few:

“Mind! I don't mean to say that, of my own knowledge, what there is particularly dead about a doornail. I might have been inclined, myself, to regard a coffin-nail as the deadest piece of ironmongery in the trade. But the wisdom of our ancestors is in the simile; and my unhallowed hands shall not disturb it, or the Country's done for. You will therefore permit me to repeat, emphatically, that Marley was as dead as a doornail.”

“You may be an undigested bit of beef, a blot of mustard, a crumb of cheese, a fragment of underdone potato. There's more of gravy than of grave about you, whatever you are!”

“‘Ha ha!’ laughed Scrooge's nephew. ‘Ha ha ha!’
If you should happen by any unlikely chance to know a man more blest in a laugh than Scrooge's nephew, all I can say is, I should like to know him too. Introduce him to me, and I'll cultivate his acquaintance.
It is a fair, even handed glorious adjustment of things that while there is infection in disease and sorrow, there is nothing in the world so irresistibly contagious as laughter and good-humour.”

There are many more sprinkled throughout this short read. Of course it is also inspiring!

“Scrooge was better than his word. He did it all, and infinitely more; and to Tiny Tim, who did not die, he was a second father. He became as good a friend, as good a master, as good a man as the good old city knew, or any other good old city, town, or borough in the good old world. Some people laughed to see the alteration in him, but he let them laugh, and little heeded them; for he was wise enough to know that nothing ever happened on this globe, for good, at which some people did not have their fill of laughter at the outset.”

“Mankind was my business. The common welfare was my business; charity, mercy, forbearance, benevolence, were all my business. The dealings of my trade were but a drop of water in the comprehensive ocean of my business!”

“I will honor Christmas in my heart, and try to keep it all the year. I will live in the Past, the Present, and the Future. The Spirits of all Three shall strive within me.” ...more

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