Charles Dickens a Christmas Carol

Tonielle Jackson
Dr. Manson
English 351-01
March 13, 2013
Charles Dickens: A Christmas Carol
During the year of 1843 employer/employee relations were known to be horrible and no one thought it would change for the better. Charles Dickens’s novella A Christmas Carol gives a great description of how the relations were carried out. In his novella, Dickens reveals the harsh conditions and lack of relationship between the employer and employee. Through this novella we can see that the relationship was strictly business, no emotions involved, and harsh. The novella describes how Scrooge was all about money and he didn’t care about anything or anyone else. The conditions were harsh and it gives Scrooge a reality check and advocates the kind of chivalry of work that Carlyle promoted. In the novella the employer/employee relations start off being harsh from the beginning. Scrooge is the employer and the abused, underpaid clerk Bob Cratchit is his employee. Bob is working in a harsh environment; he barely has any heat in his so called office to keep him warm. Bob symbolizes poor working conditions, especially long working hours. He doesn’t fuss or complain about the situation because he knows that it’s the only way he can provide for his family. After working alongside Scrooge he knows deep down inside what type of person Scrooge really is and Bob realizes that there is nothing he can do to change Scrooge. Second, the novella gives Scrooge a reality check. He begins to see that the way he is treating his employee is wrong. He comes to this conclusion after being visited by The Ghost of Christmas Past. The ghost leads leads Scrooge on a journey into some of the happiest and saddest moments of Scrooge’s past events that would largely shape the current Scrooge. The Ghost of Christmas Past shows Scrooge how he used to love Christmas and that it was never about the money. He haunted him in order to prompt him to repent and the Ghost did so to demonstrate to Scrooge how he should change his ways. The Ghost of Christmas Past showed Scrooge his old boarding school where he stayed while his schoolmates returned to their homes for the Christmas holidays and he showed him the day when his beloved younger sister Fan repeatedly asked their father to allow his return. It was only about how the master would treat his employee. Bob states “He has the power to render us happy or unhappy; to make our service light or burdensome; a pleasure or toil” (1395). At this point he realizes that he has been treating his employee horribly. Lastly, the novella is used to depict the employer/employee relations by being an advocate of the kind of chivalry of work that Carlyle promoted. This novella shows that the working conditions were horrible just as Carlyle said. Many employers were all about the money and not worrying about their employee’s feelings or family and their living conditions during that time. Scrooge asks Cratchit, “You don’t think me ill used, when I pay a day’s wages for no work? A poor excuse for picking a man’s pocket every twenty-fifth of December!” (1382). This quote shows that money mattered over everything to most employers and that the employee didn’t. Employers just wanted their employee’s to work under their rules and or conditions without any complaints. This novella proved that those conditions can be changed if you just see things for what they truly are and that money doesn’t mean everything. A Christmas Carol is a great depiction of employer/employee relations. It really proves that some employers really didn’t care for their employees or their well-being outside of working for them. It also shows that anyone can change if one just sees that happiness is better than money. Scrooge saw his faults and changed, Scrooge states, “A merrier Christmas, Bob, my good fellow, than I have given you, for many a year! I’ll raise your salary, and endeavor to assist your struggling family and we will discuss your affairs this very afternoon” (1424). Scrooge not only sees everything differently he acts differently as well. He is shown by the Ghost of Christmas Past, Present and Yet to Come that he can live a better life and to let go all of the past things and reflect on the present things to live a happier life. He learns about the spirit of Christmas and that kind and compassion towards people can cause change that is beneficial for him as well as help the poor. He is basically given a second chance at life and is transformed emotionally; he is reborn again. “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 in the outset; and knowing that such as these would be blind anyway, he thought it quite as well that they should wrinkle up their eyes in grins, as have the malady in less attractive forms” (1425). Scrooges describes how is so happy after his huge transformation and how he is satisfied with the person he has become. He also makes a point to express how he cares less about what others think or feel about the person he had turned into. Scrooge embraced his rebirth and he lived upon the “Total Abstinence Principle” forever and that is how others remembered him.