Themes: Poverty

Question 1

How does Dickens demonstrate poverty and the effects of poverty?

Answer 1

From the start of the novella, Dickens highlights the contrast between rich and poor.He does not mask the harsh reality of the effects of poverty - describing all facets of life

Question 2

How does Dickens use the effects of poverty in Scrooge’s transformation?

Answer 2

The looming death of Tiny Tim serving as a catalyst for Scrooge’s transformation.

Question 3

How does Dickens use humour to portray the attitudes to the poor from Wealthy victorians?

Answer 3

Scrooge’s interactions with the charity workers in Stave One are laughable, yet this epitomised the attitudes of wealthy, right wing Victorians- The poor are ‘idle’ and belong in the workhouses and prisons.

Question 4

Quotations which express poverty

Answer 4

Many can’t go there [the workhouse]; and many would rather die.’(Charity worker, S1)
They [Cratchits] were not well dressed…their clothes were scanty; Peter might have known, and very likely did, the inside of a pawnbroker’s. (S3)
The ways were foul and narrow; the shops and houses wretched. (S4)
The whole quarter reeked with crime, with filth, and misery. (S4)
Alleys and archways, like so many cesspools, disgorged their offences of smell, and dirt, and life, upon the straggling streets. (S4)