How To Love Lit Podcast

Charles Dickens - A Christmas Carol - Episode 2 - Ghosts, Innocence, Redemption And The Conclusion!

Hi, I’m Christy Shriver and we’re here to discuss books that have changed the world and have changed us. 

I’m Garry Shriver and this is the How to Love Lit Podcast. This is our second episode discussing Charles Dickens and his classic Christmas tale, A Christmas Carol. Last episode we began our discussion talking a little bit about Dickens’ life and the early experiences in Victorian England that shaped his career and his understanding of the world in general- in particular, the year he spent at the age of 12 as an outcast on the streets of London working in a blacking factory. We talked about the governmental report on the conditions of the over 30,000 urban poor children that inspired the tale. Finally, we discussed the blended choice of genres in which he chose to communicate his message of social responsibility and personal redemption- a carol, in prose, as he called it, but also a ghost story- an unusual combination.  We ended where we want to start today, talking about the man who has charmed the world with his miserly ways, Ebenezer Scrooge.