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Stories That Change Us
A lively discussion between four friends and authors as they breakdown the most popular fiction from the last century. Join us as we identify the key aspects of storytelling, character development, and social analysis that have caused these stories to resonate through the decades and, in doing so, help novice and seasoned writers craft bestselling fiction of their own.
Stories That Change Us
Episode 5: A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens
Charles Dicken's, A Christmas Carol, has resonated across the ages as a holiday favorite! Today, let's breakdown the iconic moments, characters, and themes to reveal where Dicken's excelled at the craft of storytelling that has perpetuated a deep love of this Yuletide tale.
Question: what is a story that has changed your life?
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Well, welcome you guys to our sixth episode of Stories That Change Us. My name is Kat Lewis, and I am a, speaker and thriller author, and I'm here with some of my writer friends, to discuss that Christmas classic, A Christmas Carol. by Charles Dickens., I'll be honest, I was not excited to read this book.
Laurel:You're so funny. We think there must be a blasphemous term for you.
Kat:I know, I know. I realized the last few books I've not been excited to read. But you know, what's crazy is to read these books that have generational significance really does open your eyes to how and why these authors. Crafted these stories so well. So, some fun facts about A Christmas Carol is I didn't realize that it took only six weeks to write. For all of my friends who just got done with National Novel Writing Month, aka. NaNoWriMo. I'm sure you feel the pain and the blood and the sleeplessness of that. But as Laurel, you were saying, Dickens was a working writer. He was not this crafty enigma who was, you know, in his mansion, writing the things for the heck of it. This is how he put food on the table. And I think that that's actually really relatable to us as modern writers who, you know, we're not necessarily doing this because. To get these poignant ideas out to the world, although we want the world to have these poignant ideas. We do. We're, we're like, I mean, if we can make money with it as well, sure. So, really cool, but also, Micah, one of the things that you had just mentioned is that This novel has been adapted over a hundred times in various forms. Movies, plays, spinoff stories. Again, I'm shocked. Um, but again, it just speaks to the longevity of the story. And apparently, apparently he did something successfully.
Micah:Well, it's really amazing if you think about it. This is Micah Leidorf. I'm I think it's amazing that a character that Dickens created in this little, you know, comparatively to his novella, compared to his other, you know, tomes of David Copperfield or whatnot, of Scrooge is universally known and understood. So he did something right in creating this character, um, and I guess that's what we're going to explore today in Stories That Change Us and what these Storytelling techniques and tactics that he used. Now, Melissa, you were the one who suggested this book. So
Kat:why? Why? Why would you want me?
Melissa:Um, I, I love it. It's, it's, There's a reason it has lasted for 150 years,
Kat:did you suggest this book because it's one that you find yourself perennially reaching for? Or did you suggest this book because you kind of wanted to dive in for yourself? What is it about this story that has made it a holiday favorite?
Melissa:It's the, it's the, because I don't know how many times I've read it and it still made me cry. That is, that's why, and,
Micah:If you guys could, if you could only see Cat's face, If you could only see Cat's eye roll,
Melissa:She just lost all respect for me. If she had any at all, it's gone now.
Laurel:No, you just turned it back on her. Okay, where is your heart?
Melissa:Where is your heart, Kat? Can you really just see Tiny Tim and not cry?
Laurel:It's so funny.
Kat:I will say, I did cry in the, the film adaptation that was done. What was it called?
Melissa:The Muppet Movie.
Kat:Oh no!
Laurel:The Man Who Invented Christmas. The Muppet Movie.
Kat:I just got dissed by the Muppets over here.
Micah:That's one of the most popular adaptations of the Muppets Christmas Carol.
Kat:No!
Micah:Yes it is.
Kat:From the film adaptation, The Man Who Invented Christmas, I did actually cry looking at the just kind of the similarities between the character's arc and his own arc. I thought that was so beautifully done and I just thought, you know what, if it doesn't matter to us as writers It's not gonna matter to our readers. And so while I haven't cried reading this story I do remember saying man when you bleed on the page There's just something powerful about you know about being vulnerable enough to let that happen. And I think that we can say that with the books that we've read so far, that there has been an element of the author really kind of opening up their soul. On the page, and I wonder if that's one of those little
Micah:And I would just say since especially our main audience is writers If you have not seen the movie The Man Who Invented Christmas, you are missing out. You would love it It was made for us.
Kat:Go right now! And rented on Netflix. Twice. It's amazing.
Micah:It is about the process of Dickens writing this book And it shows probably better than almost any other Film depiction, the writing process, it's like, Oh my gosh, I am seen. It does. Somebody understands me. That's so good.
Laurel:And you have to say that, you know, if you look at character arc, would you say there's a little bit of a character arc in this story?
Kat:You know, okay, so, you, I'm just saying, okay, let me read you this statement. There's such a severe character arc in this.
Laurel:Okay, I know, don't go there not yet. Okay, here's his statement. Okay, this is Scrooge. Every idiot who goes about with Merry Christmas on his lips should be boiled down with his own pudding and buried with a stake of holly through his heart. He should. What's wrong with that, Kat?
Kat:Well, it lets us know where he's at emotionally. I'll tell you that. No, Laurel, thank you for, you kind of launched us into our first question, which is,"What is a quote that stood out to you as an excellent example of tension, author's voice, or character development"? And without a doubt, that statement right there lets us know where Scrooge is at with the world, with himself, and it does such a great, you know, job of creating this backdrop. For us to, to launch into the story with. So, Melissa, Micah, what else is a quote that stands out to you as, high significance for the story?
Micah:Well, the quote I chose was not from Scrooge, but from Marley, who is Scrooge's dead business partner. So he kind of sometimes gets a short shrift because we think about the three ghosts that came to visit Scrooge, but we forget that he was visited by Marley. First, and Marley has these, um, he's covered in these chains, and what, the quote I have is,"I made it, link by link, and yard by yard. I girded it of my own free will, and my own free will, I wore it, and by my own free will I wore it". So, basically, you know, Marley comes to warn Scrooge. He comes out of friendship to say, this is your chance, buddy. Don't be like me. And, in my own writing, as you guys know, I like, like a little bit of the, um, that idea of, opening up our eyes to, to the truth. That by the deception, like he thinks he's building this life for himself and he doesn't realize that he is, enslaving himself for eternity. So, I liked that quote.
Kat:Wow. Melissa?,
Melissa:Well, mine is from Bell, his fiance that breaks up with him. And when she does, I just felt like it was, character exposition, like developing Scrooge's character. I don't know if that, if those two words go together or not, but just, tells us something about him that, um, she goes, I release you with a full heart for the love of him you once were". So it shows who he was in the past. It's a long passage, so I won't read it all, but it's, about how he's got a new love and that love is money and she says, I can't compete with that, but, I love how she says, I release you with remembering who you were remembering the man I fell in love with because it just showed that, that he is redeemable, that he did it once have a heart...
Kat:and that no, I'll, I'll tell you what Dickens does really, really well as far as, foreshadowing is he really creates such a great skeleton of the Scrooge that was, and he does a great job of creating a lot of questions in the reader's mind of how did we get to this point Scrooge? Like, cause there's all these little touches, You weren't always this money harboring, you know, bitter, nasty, bent over old man. And he does a lot of great, you know, there's all these little hints of the life before. And it kind of, to Micah's point, it draws you into this question of, you know, how did he get there? And how, how do we as people get there? So,
Melissa:Well, I think that, that this scene with Belle is very much a, a crossroads for him where he can say, I'm sorry, I value you more than money. I value relationships more than money. Or he can, close off that part of his heart. And that probably was where he may, you know, I can see the character saying, okay, I'm gonna make a sharp turn to to really embrace this mistress that you have, that you think I've chosen, I'm really going to choose it. And I'm going to try to find my comfort there.
Kat:Yeah. Yeah. Name a moment in the story that stands out with visceral relief and explain the storytelling techniques that the writer used to make this a successful scene?
Micah:So I'm just gonna go with the super obvious. I mean, you know, again, if the only version of this movie that you've ever seen is the, you know, the Muppets version. It doesn't really matter, whatever version it is.
Kat:Millennials have only seen the Muppets version of Micah.
Micah:You, everybody knows Tiny Tim. Everybody can remember the last scene where, you know, he goes, you know, opens the windows, you know. Celebrates, you know, lifts him up on his shoulder. Now, but why does that scene have so much power? It's because it's basically, it feels like the whole story's been building up to that moment, right? Like every single quote from the quote you first said, which, okay, you're gonna stick the holly in his heart. Okay, he's gonna, he's gonna circle back. So as authors, a lot of times, I don't know if there's like a what the rule is in stone, but basically it's the idea that usually you want your opening credit to match your closing. So you want to, you know, start where you finished and you know what they, and so that's exactly what we do. We have him, you know, just being so miserly, so cold to being just the exact opposite to embracing this little boy, you know, instead of saying, Where are the workhouses? You know, where are the, you know, the poor houses? Do, do they not, do they not have prisons anymore? Like, that's where the poor people should go. To instead saying, okay, I'm going to do everything I can in lavish. So again, I, so I, that's the, Obvious scene to me. I go for the obvious.
Kat:Well, mimic the, the technique that you're referring to here, Micah, there's this idea that, um, at some point you want, or, you know, you want your hero to identify the little boy or little girl that once was, and you want to give that, that person like a moment to really come forth and shine. And like, that's where like the healing happens and all things. So I think that Dickens does a great job of Literally, if Scrooge is this hurt little boy who was poor and struggled, Tiny Tim is like the redeemed aspect of that and I think that's why it's so triumphant for Scrooge, is he's like, Oh, I've, I've regained my youthfulness. I've regained that innocent perspective of the world that I had lost scrounging. And I think that's why that scene is so powerful. What else? What other scenes stand out?
Laurel:Yeah, I mean, Save the Cat talks about the opening image and the final image. I think it's Save the Cat. But it, you know, basically that contrast of, you know, Marley is so important that he comes first. Because he states the whole direction of the novel. It's like, look, you are adding every link to that chain. It was so cool when Marley was coming into the house because he hears him open the door and he hears him walking up the stairs and the clank of that, those chains that, you know, Marley had, but you know, it, what I remember is you build the links. We built the links for our own lives. Will they be chains or will there be like in the final image generosity? And open hands and open arms to life and to people and to what matters, basically.
Micah:So, Laurel, you referred to the book, Save the Cat, which for those who don't know is a very famous and very, excellent. Guide for screenwriters screenwriters and also the Save The Cat Writes A Novel so for books But the concept is that in early in the story The main character does something like saves a cat that kind of clues you in to who like So what do you think was the save the cat? Is that what you read? I felt like that was what you're referring to
Laurel:No, I was like, okay. Oh like the opening image and the final image, okay are like contrasts. Yes. But it's so important that they're shown and not said.
Kat:So I'm a big, chiastic structure girl. Basically, it's the structure that C. S. Lewis used to create Chronicles of Narnia. It's the structure that J. K. Rowling used to create, Harry Potter. And, she says that in chiastic structure, the opening image and the final image are mirrors of each other, right? They're not contrasts, they're exact mirrors. So, you know, and we can even see this in, like, most clearly, I think, in Chronicles of Narnia, where, like, we start the journey in the wardrobe and we end the book with Lucy trying to get back to Narnia through the wardrobe. Like, it's a, it's this full picture of this Journey that's been complete. So I mean just just food for thought like
Laurel:but often often opening and final image can show character arc in a big way. Oh, yeah So, you know the whole fact that we're seeing tiny Tim embraced and held up on you know Scrooge's shoulders that That was what I was talking about. So it, it, it is a mirror. It is a situation, but it reflects transformation. Yeah. If there's a positive character arc. And again, you know, Save the Cats, not the only craft book in the world. So it's just a, it's a cool technique that you can use and it can be effective.
Melissa:It's a short story. It was written as a commentary on the time where the wide gulf between the people who had money and the people who were poor and, Dickens himself, his family was poor and he had experience with his father was sent to debtor's prison and, he had to quit school because of that. So he is writing something that he feels very passionately about. But, in his, um, his conversation with Marley, Scrooge says,"But you were always a good man of business, Jacob". And"Business," cried the ghost, mankind was my business. The common welfare was my business, charity, mercy, forbearance, and benevolence were all my business. The dealings of my trade were but a drop of water in the comprehensive ocean of my business". And I loved how he, very quickly, you know, it's a short work, very quickly got the, theme out. Obviously, you know, very obvious, but at least he did it, you know, through the mouth of a ghost. You know, he did it in a way that was action and that, actually I liked that.
Micah:I think I'm, I'm know, I'm probably skipping ahead a little bit, but you know, we like to talk about what the authors do, does extremely well, and that's what I think Dickens does extremely well is and why this may be part of why this story. Is, been told so many times this perennial popularity is that is so original. It doesn't seem original to us now because we've seen it a hundred times, but this way of telling where you have this ghost and the past and present and future, it's so original. It's so different that everyone's like, Oh yeah, let's copy that. That like that, you know, it's, it's succinct, it's short, but it conveys this huge message. It gives all this opportunity to, to tell about, you know, His beginning life and his end life just in such a, entertaining and succinct way. Like, I mean, it's from everything from the Muppets to, I don't know if you saw the Ghost of Girlfriends past was Matthew McConaughey, right? So, when somebody does something that was really original, then everybody else copies it, but you forget how original it was. Um, in the beginning. So that's what I think he did so well here.
Kat:Yeah. Well, let's pivot and let's go there. What aspects of this book, revealed or introduced or helped you relearn an element of storytelling craft, that just really, really stood out to you? And I'll tell you, you know, if we're talking about Princess Bride, is this over the top? Humor. There was something about the humor in A Christmas Carol that, felt like, like actual things you would say in the moment Like it didn't feel like part of this fantasy story. It felt like a true extension of the characters and the humor is what surprised me.
Micah:The humor surprised me as well. I guess I haven't read Dickens in a while. Like, I don't remember Dickens being funny.
Kat:Exactly.
Micah:It just being sad.
Kat:I just remember it being heavy. Oh my gosh. Yeah, the humor really stood out to me, sometimes I think as authors, we are tempted to make it funny, but not authentic to the character. And he does a really fantastic job of making all these little snide comments, From, you know,
Melissa:You're more gravy than grave.
Kat:You're more gravy than grave. Yes. And I think what's interesting about the whole Scrooge thing is this is internal commentary that he's having. It doesn't seem like that because the ghosts are interacting, but these are his own ghosts. He spends a lot of the novel talking to himself, right? In this sassy kind of sarcastic way. And that was revelation to me. But what else, what other crafts of storytelling do you think was, were done exceptionally well in this novel?
Laurel:It has to be says that he's a, he's a master at historical novels. He wrote Tale of Two Cities. A Christmas Carol is his world. But then he wrote A Tale of Two Cities, which was obviously not his world.
Micah:Right.
Laurel:But he, he weaves that setting, and really that emotional setting, into his stories in a way that, wow, it's just beautifully done. We know the story of a family who has nothing, who has a crippled child, you know, because Bob Cratchit works for, for Scrooge. So you know, he reveals so much about that historical, which I don't know that that's really what has endured, but it, he does it in a way that we read it and we go, yeah, We've never lived in that part of, of England. We've never lived in that time frame, but we're totally connected which is not easy to do.
Kat:Yeah, I was listening to another literary analysis of the story and it was talking about like the details that Dickens weaves in without explanation, kind of assuming that, he wrote it for people of that time. He was talking specifically about the ribbons on Mrs. Cratchit's dress and in the Cratchit household over Christmas, talking about how, he's like, these people couldn't afford ribbons, like, ribbons were the best they could do for a holiday spirit, but like, that's never explained in this book. All these things, he doesn't explain intent and motive necessarily in the story. He just lets it ride and he's like, the reader will figure it out. So that's what I kind of took away as like a great lesson is like, don't over explain the significance of a thing just yet. If you build the character arc strong enough. They'll get it and those are the juicy little tidbits that when we read it for the third and fifth and ninth time we're like, I totally missed the fact that he was hoarding the coal box in his office and Cratchit was too terrified to go ask for more heat.
Melissa:Yeah, I feel like that's kind of a high skill level like that's that's that's something to work on and aspire to I, I like books that think I'm smart. I like books that leave a little something for me to say, Oh, okay, I can put that breadcrumb with that breadcrumb and get there without it having been overly explained. And I feel like that, you know, the very first time I wrote, the manuscript for the first thing that I wrote. I would show it and then I would tell it or I would tell it and then show it and it was like, you can cut so many words by just
Laurel:telling us the name of that book that you wrote, right?
Melissa:Yes. Well, it's, it's not out, but under a far away sky and one of these days, one of these days we'll be out there, but, that, to me, that is something that, a skill to acquire by reading and by seeing how other writers do it, like you said, to
Laurel:Masters.
Melissa:Masters.
Kat:Yeah. I think there's, the word that came to my head was relaxed. Just as an author, he relaxed into that process. And even though I think that this is a very preach heavy book, if you walk away not terrified about the weight of your past choices and how they're building this cycle in the store. If you're not terrified about like clinging to crap and money, like you, okay. Read it again, slow down. But, you know, I think about how, he just kind of relaxed maybe into the art, into the craft, and he relaxed into not feeling like, I think that there's so many. rules out there for, you know, for writing really great books. And it's so easy to get so in your head about the rules that you just forget to just relax into the ease of the process.
Laurel:And I, I mean, having to have, a book published for money to feed your family is a great motivation. Sure. Yeah. So I wouldn't call it relaxing as much as highly motivating because It's true.
Micah:Well, you know, the way we all four know each other is we were originally in a fiction critique group together that met monthly and It's so funny to hear Kat say, oh you just need to relax You know, there's so many different personalities here. You have like, you know, you hear Melissa and she's still like, I'm still perfecting it, I'm still getting it just right, I've written it through. And Kat's like, yeah, I whipped this out in two hours before I got here. But it was awesome! It was awesome! Because she's great!
Kat:I had 29 days to write this, and I did it in two hours.
Micah:And we're like, this is awesome, Kat! Like, yes, there's some misspellings and things, but you know. The dialogue is like snappy and the action is great and we're loving it. So there's lots of different ways. Everybody's different. You know, we all, like they say, writing is easy, just open a vein and bleed all over the page. So, you know, it costs us all but, you know, it, but there's different ways to do it. We probably can all learn from one another and, we can definitely learn from Dickens. Again, like deadlines are very effective ways of getting words on the page.
Kat:Exactly. Next question, ladies. What are truths about society or the human experience that are explored, confirmed, or challenged in this novel. And I feel like this is kind of the meat and potatoes of this story.
Laurel:Yeah. I, I think so much of it is, you know, the chain thing. You build your own chains. And I think, you know, Marley was like, yeah, it didn't. It didn't just happen, these chains that trail all the way down the stairs and out the door, you know, they were forged and they were forged by my decisions over and over and over because I believed, acted on the fact that money was everything and, and yet look at what I have now. I have nothing. I have chains.
Micah:As much as we're so familiar with this story and as much as everybody's heard it and everybody can tell you what the point is, it's like, we still don't open our eyes because you know, this is not written to us. This is written to, you know England to London, like, the corrupt and child labor and all those things. It's like, but is it just as much or even more true now? In America? Today? Like, we don't think about it, but practically every decision we make is made. It's financial. Like, I mean, for a lot of us, like, everything we do is motivated by money. I think that we can't be reminded of that too often. I mean, just to go back to scripture, you know, and the, It's easier to go through, the eye of the needle than for a rich man to, a camel to go through the eye of the needle than a rich man to go to heaven and think, Oh, yeah, that's just the scripture. But is that really true? Like, no, we're all trying to be rich. You know?
Laurel:It's so interesting that you would say that, because I think that we build chains in different ways. You know, we can, we can build a life of isolation in a lot of ways. And basically that's, you know, what happened with both Marley and Scrooge. Yes, they were pursuing money, but they were building a life of isolation. They didn't realize that, but that's what they were doing. And of course, so what opens a life is people. And yet how does a life open to people? It, it opens by generosity. It, it opens by releasing what you have and who you are for people.
Kat:So Laurel I think that's actually that ties hand in hand with the kind of thematic element that I took away from the story. Cause I thought that personally, I'm so sick of this idea of like rich people are bad because it's kind of like, as Micah said, like at some point, we're all, to some degree, we're all striving for financial stability because we recognize that, like,
Laurel:Well, money's not bad.
Kat:Money, money in and of itself is not bad, but I think about this idea of, in a Western culture, where we have a wealth of resources, a wealth of accessibility, a wealth of blessings that the convenience of those things has caused us to pursue isolation over community So we think about like the fact that, you know, even a hundred years ago, our ancestors were, they spent all their time trying to grow crops, and all their time trying to, sustain their families and very physical, hard labor. We think about the fact that, you know, they would ride miles to go and help their friend raise the barn, or drive miles into town for church to be around people versus today, we're so used to the convenience of this wealth, right? That we choose fake community. We choose a dating app versus going, you know, out and meeting people in the real way. We choose like virtual quote unquote community. And I just think about, for me, don't let the convenience of some of these things. Cause you to inadvertently isolate yourself, right? Same idea of isolation and community. I just think that we have a choice these days about whether or not we engage with people because I can order my groceries on walmart. com and I can have, you know, I can play video games with my friends online, but you know, we think about the skyrocketing levels of depression and anxiety and suicide and just like nothing. Really can, replace that human to human interaction and getting back to where we value that interaction over the convenience of
Laurel:Well, I think the whole thing is, you know, the whole miser. So, do you have to be rich or poor to be a miser? Will I open my heart and give with generosity or will I be a miser and hoard? What I have, whether it's, I mean, anything, maybe it's my peace and my, my time. Maybe I don't want to share my time. Maybe I'd rather be alone. Thank you very much.
Micah:No, I, I think you're exactly right, Laurel. I think that, like that's what you see in Scrooge, right? Like he is, he's saying, no, I don't want, I don't want friendship. I don't care about community. I don't care about anything else. I just, me and mine, I'm going to just take care of my little bubble right here. And that is just very, apropos to today. And it's like, I'm not going to risk. I'm not going to make myself vulnerable. I'm not going to open my heart. I'm just going to be in my own little insular, society. So I think that is very true, but then also I think again, we're so different. We're so removed from this point is that we are all rich, right? Like every single one of us is, As Americans. We are the one, we are all the 1 percent of the world. Like, so we all have clean water. We can go get it out of drinking fountains. We do not have to dig wells and walk for miles. And that puts us like in a whole different class than a huge part of the world. So when we, like I say, there's these people who try to make these class divisions, but the truth is as Americans in the 21st century, we have. So much more.
Laurel:So you would say the crux of the issue is, are we stewarding the blessings that we have?
Micah:Or I would say it's what you said. It's, are we generous of heart? open to one another to share our lives, to share our time, to share our peace with one another.
Melissa:Just listening to all this discussion and I just I think it's all just right on point, but it makes me think of there was this one sentence in, the early part of this book that we're talking about Scrooge and his coming into his house. And it says,"Darkness is cheap and Scrooge liked it". It just jumped off the page at me for, and I thought, okay, it's a good literary device that he has all these just complex, long, flowery sentences. And then that one, and it made it very powerful. And it also really did just encapsulate his character.
Laurel:Mm hmm. That's good.
Micah:Yeah. Yeah. This whole book is much, much shorter than his normal books. Just again, like you said, he uses those devices to convey so much in, for him, a much shorter amount of, of time and words. Yeah, I think, I think that's part of the reason why, why this one stands out.
Kat:You don't have to sludge through Nicholas Nickleby and pray that you make it out alive. All right, ladies. Well, let's wrap things up with our character roulette, where we throw a bunch of characters into a hat and then we pull a name out and kind of explore their significance to the plot, their character development, all the things. So, in the hat today, we've got, of course, Scrooge himself. We've got the ghost of past, present, and future. We've got good old Tiny Tim, Mr. Cratchit, Mrs. Cratchit. Marley, his nephew. I like Belle, his fiance. She was a character that I totally forgot about in the story. So let's just shake this, shake it up like a maraca. And, let's see, the name that we pull out is,
Melissa:Bob Cratchit.
Laurel:Perfect.
Melissa:Let's talk about Bob Cratchit.
Laurel:Perfect.
Kat:Oh, Bobby boy. Alright. Bob was A very subtle yet important character in the story and I think that compared to the ghost or even Tiny Tim, it's easy to kind of step over Bob to get to some of the bigger characters. So what is it about Bob that stands out to you as a character of importance?
Micah:Love that he does not seem resentful at all, despite the abuse that is heaped on him. How counter cultural is that for today? But you know, he invites Scrooge over. He doesn't seem like he probably bad mouths Scrooge behind his back. You know, he just is doing his best. And living his life, and like you say, trying to provide for his kids, but he does not seem like he has, this chip on his shoulder or this bitterness. And one thing I love about that is, so, I think it was Gandhi who said that bitterness, or no, I think it is, like, bitterness is like drinking poison and expecting the other person to die. We don't believe that. Like, we, we have these, you know, we're mad, we're angry. It's like, you know who that's hurting? That's hurting you. It doesn't hurt the other person. And so I think Bob Cratchit realizes that, like, in the way he lives. That he's like, I don't need to judge Scrooge. I don't need to, you know, be mad at him. I'm just going to be me, be at peace.
Melissa:I think, I hate to be the cynic and I usually am not the cynic, but
Micah:Let's hear it. Let's do it.
Kat:She's taking a villainous turn here.
Melissa:But I think, I think that he is written as a stereotype for, the long suffering, you know, I, I see him as a literary device of, you know, showing. Okay, Scrooge, horrible miser, you know, Bob Cratchit, this wonderful person who, you know, has no flaws and is just diligently working and things like that. But also Dickens made him more than that with his family. Like he could have just left him there, but he gave him Tiny Tim. He gave him a wife with an attitude. He gave him he gave him children that all had, you know, kind of, they were lively and had a personality. And um, I like that because I, I do feel like he, he felt like he needed to communicate something it's an expose, it's a, it's a, well,
Laurel:It's a sermon
Micah:It's a sermon.
Melissa:And, but he, he was pretty generous to Bob Cratchit and given him.
Kat:Melissa, I am, I kind of agree with your assessment, of this maybe continued message of like wealthy people are unpleasant and stingy. Whereas. Poor people are, long suffering and inherently kind and all these things. And going back to what you were saying, Laurel, about the fact that, no, you can be poor and miserly, you can be rich and kind, like, you know, so I can see how somebody can make a counter argument for the, appropriateness, if you will, of like having this stereotypical poor character who is this, kind of forebearing force. But I think that, as a character who moves the plot forward, I think that without Bob Cratchit's welcome, Scrooge really would not have had the permission to change. Because everybody in Scrooge's life knew him as. this unpleasant person, right? Except for the man who probably sees Scrooge at his worst, right? On the daily, this man who Scrooge is literally freezing out, right? In the other half of the office. He's like, no, come on in to Christmas. And, and so just this idea of like, Be the open door that allows somebody to change because it's so easy to get locked into our cycles.
Laurel:That's so good, Kat. That's lovely.
Kat:But what else? Why is, why else is Bob Cratchit, a character to make note of here?
Melissa:Well, Tiny Tim. I mean, you know, we can't talk about Bob Cratchit without talking about Tiny Tim. And, you know, he's an even more Stereotypical stereotype, you know, the, he's even more of an angel, even, even more powerless, even more of an angel. But, um, it works, it all works, even, and it still works. Even though we're so far removed from that culture.
Kat:This is just a thought, but I just wonder that when you are writing such a pointed message in a story if you have to rely on such undisguised stereotypes. One, so that way people are not so busy trying to figure out what is the point of this character. Like, they can just follow the story as it's unfolding and they're not trying to figure out, okay, what's being shadowed in Tiny Tim. And, I think that when you are, you have such an undisguised message, I don't know if you have got time for people to be unraveling the why behind Tiny Tim, you know?
Micah:This is a novella. This is not, you know, your, your epic
Kat:tome. It's a thick novella though, I'll say.
Laurel:Yeah, but I mean it's endearing and it's enduring for a lot of those reasons I mean, and you know, even when you look at Christmas in in our culture and when you go into Walmart in December like anytime in December and you sense the The panic and the tension and the, you know, like it, we always are going to have an opportunity to either be a miser or to be a giver.
Micah:So what a good message to end on as we are about to enter the Advent and Christmas season of being either miserly of heart or generous of heart with whatever situation we're at. Whether someone's asking for some of our time. For our attention or our money. So I'm glad you chose this one, Melissa. Thank you.
Melissa:Oh, all right.
Kat:Good pick. I say that with much, much
Micah:difficulty.
Kat:Difficult, difficult. Yes. Yes. So we will see you guys strong and bright in 2024 and in the meantime, check us out on Instagram, come in and follow us and hang out with us. And, you guys have a blessed, new year. Absolutely.
Laurel:Bye.
Micah:Bye.
