Scrooge Quotes Flashcards
‘Are there no prisons,’ ‘Are there no workhouses’
‘If they would rather die they had better do it and decrease the surplus population’
1) Scrooge believes money is the most essential thing in life and if you don’t have that you are worthless.
2)
3) Dickens uses scrooge to highlight the attitude of the rich in Victorian England - many of them did not consider the lower class to be humans with feelings
‘Humbug’
1) Scrooge refuses to believe that the ghost is real. A common theme for scrooge is his disbelief in good things - love, family, generosity, The Christmas Spirit just as he does not believe in Marley who ironically makes him believe in all of these by the end.
2)
3)
‘A solitary child neglected by his friends’
1) Scrooge was not always purposely lonely and makes the reader feel sympathy for him. It builds a connection with Scrooge and helps the reader to understand why he evolved into the person he is now.
2)
3) Gives the reader a hint about why scrooge ended up as a solitary man with no friends - he had no love apart from his sister.
4) The reader may also wonder why he has chosen to be lonely in his adulthood if he had such a terrible childhood
‘External heat and cold had little influence on scrooge.’
‘No warmth could warm him nor wintry weather could chill’
1) This proves how he is cold-hearted and unfeeling.
There is a lexical field of the cold and this shows how he is presented as this stereotypical archetypal villain.
The ‘heat’ could symbolise the love and compassion scrooge refuses to embrace therefore it has ‘little influence’ on him.
‘Solitary as an oyster’
1) Dickens presents scrooge as lonely. This simile suggests underneath all that cold exterior he may have a fragile and kind nature.
An oyster has a hard shell and a pearl inside and perhaps the pearl is his true heart just waiting to he opened up.
Scrooge is physically hard to break down.
‘Spirit’ said scrooge with an interest he had never felt before ‘tell me if Tiny Tim will live’
1) Scrooge sees the bond that Tiny Tim and his father have and seeing that their is a possibility that Tim may die, awakens an empathetic part of scrooge that we have never seen.
2) This allows scrooge to see the importance of FAMILY and FATHERHOOD as he is seen to take on the role of Tiny Tim’s second father being concerned for his welfare. He wishes to have a second chance after failing to maintain a family with his fiance Belle.
3) Dickens intended to inform the middle class audience of the amount of innocent children that die a preventable death as a result of their ignorance and greed.
4) This ‘interest’ could perhaps demonstrate the shocking realisation that Scrooge could prevent this death from happening as he could increase the salary of Bob Cratchit and help pay for Tiny Tim’s medical bills.
‘The spirits of all three shall strive within me’
‘I am not the man i was’
1) Shows how scrooge has genuinely heeded the lesson and advice gifted by the spirits. Contrasts how at the start of the novella, he was so reluctant to listen to the spirits and emphasises his change for the better.
Scrooge is self-aware of how he was portrayed as before and is now working towards being a better person which demonstrates huge progress.
2) It appears that THE CHRISTMAS SPIRIT and SUPERNATURAL are the main influence to Scrooge changing and connotes the power of them.
3) Dickens hoped that people would start to embrace the teachings of Christmas and take on the values such as being generous to others.
4) The 3 ‘spirits’ have Biblical references to the Trinity and this shows how God is forgiving as he was a ‘covetous sinner’ and destined to hell.
