A Christmas Carol- 1843

Charles Dickens (1812-1870)

Romantic/Victorian ContrastsRomantic Era Victorian Era

Idealism Visionary/Utopian Sober/Utilitarian

View of Kind/Harmonious Harsh/Cruel

Nature

Focus Inward/Individual Outward/Nation

Common man Middle class Imagination/ Reality/work

introspection

Dickens’ concerns

• Christmas a holiday of wonder and abundance capable of transcending both sanctimonious Puritan abstinence and the dispiriting single-minded utilitarianism

• To deny the pleasures of this world to oneself or others to deny the beneficence of creation.

• To value industrialization above human industry and treat one’s fellows as cogs in the commercial machine to impoverish the spirit and the body of the community that were the lifeblood of progress.

• To pursue profit at all costs to deny one’s basic humanity and jeopardize, not only one’s place in society, but the survival of society itself.

• A “Carol philosophy” “cheerful views, sharp anatomisation of humbug, jolly good temper . . . and a vein of glowing, hearty, generous, mirthful, beaming reference in everything to Home, and Fireside.” In place of business, mechanization, and utilitarianism, Dickens celebrated imagination, family, and fellow feeling. In place of self-denial and renunciation, Dickens celebrated abundance, hospitality, and the pleasures of life.

Social/economic context• The Poor Laws (sponsored by the Benthamites) debtors and the jobless to prisons or

workhouses where families were separated and engaged in the unrewarding labor of breaking rocks or picking strings from old rope to make insulation. They were fed a diet of thin gruel designed to sustain them, barely. Children were 'apprenticed' to industries where they became a source of cheap labor.

• Utilitarianism"the greatest happiness of the greatest number" . This phrase represents the heart of Utilitarianism (or Benthamism), which attempted to reduce decision-making about human actions to a "felicific calculus" by weighing the profit, convenience, advantage, benefit, emolument, and happiness that would ensue from the action against the mischief, disadvantage, inconvenience, loss, and unhappiness that it would also entail.

• Thomas Malthus human population would inevitably grow faster than agriculture's ability to feed it, and so the poor must be restrained from breeding.

• War and famine legitimate forces that helped keep down population size. • Just two years after Dickens published "A Christmas Carol," the Irish population was reduced

25% by the potato famine that killed nearly a million people and the emigration caused by the terrible circumstances that remained afterwards

Utilitarianism

• The belief that the value of a thing or an action is determined by its utility. • The ethical theory proposed by Jeremy Bentham and James Mill that all action should be

directed toward achieving the greatest happiness for the greatest number of people.• Though the society tried to maintain a moral face, underneath was a heartless philosophy.

Chesterton calls this great gap between theory and practice the Victorian Compromise. • Responsible for "atheist industrialism" and the worship of wealth. Utilitarianism was

already whispering about breeding the poor, hinting at infanticide and murmuring at "the folly of allowing the unfit to survive."

• It was in this context that the great writers of the Victorian era wrote. Almost all of them reacted against Utilitarianism, but from a variety of perspectives and with a variety of results. They knew something fundamental had been lost from their society, and they were trying to grasp it.

Structure• Title: Dickens saw his tale as one to be heard and shared, as Christmas

carols spread joy and bring people together• The Staves- part of the musical imagery, each chapter is a stave• A carol is a song of joy or praise. It is often intended to teach

something. In this case, the praise is of Christmas and how it is able to make people forget their troubles, and of Scrooge because he changes his ways. A stave is a section of the music where the mood is all the same. At each stave, there is a different mood. This is the case in A Christmas Carol, where each stave has a definite message and mood.

• Point of View Mainly in the third person, with a touch of a first person narrator.

• Setting London and Scrooge’s cold, dark house.

• Time is very important in A Christmas Carol, which is structurally centered around distinct elements of Past, Present, and Future. But, the time scheme of the story itself seems to make little sense. On Christmas Eve, Jacob Marley's ghost tells Scrooge that he will be visited by three ghosts on three successive nights. On Christmas morning, Scrooge awakes, having already been visited by all three ghosts.

• The three nights seem to be compressed into a single night. The presence of the spirits apparently bends the normal flow of time. A view further supported b y the fact that Scrooge goes to bed at two o'clock in the morning after Marley's visitation and awakes at midnight the same night--two hours after he fell asleep. Dickens uses the temporal inconsistencies to emphasize the supernatural powers of the spirits--when they are around, normal earthly standards, including the flow of time, have no effect.

• Allegory A narration or description usually restricted to a single meaning because its events, actions, characters, settings, and objects represent specific abstractions or ideas.

• Each stave has a fixed meaning: • Scrooge greed, selfishness, indifference, and a lack of consideration for

one's fellow man• Ghost of Christmas Past memory• Ghost of Christmas Present charity, empathy, and the Christmas spirit• The reaper-like Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come the fear of death• A Christmas Carol moral ideals associated with Christmas: generosity,

kindness, and universal love for your community-and of Victorian England in general.

Characters

• Belle Scrooge's old girlfriend. Years ago, she broke her relationship off with him because she felt that he had changed for the worse.

• Bob Cratchit Scrooge's assistant, a loyal and diligent employee. A child at heart, Cratchit truly enjoys carrying Tiny Tim around town, and is a loving family man.

• Tim Cratchit Bob Cratchit's youngest son. Never complains about his handicap. Scrooge does donate money for Tiny Tim's medical treatment.

• The Ghost of Christmas Past The first spirit to visit Scrooge is The Ghost of Christmas Past. With him, Scrooge is able to see himself as a younger man and remember a time when he was more open and hopeful about life.

• The Ghost of Christmas Present The second spirit is loud and boisterous, a large man who shows up with a mountain of food and drink. His purpose is to show Scrooge how his friends and family are celebrating Christmas without him.

• The Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come This ghost does not speak, but shows Scrooge a bleak future (his death and Tiny Tim”s).

• Jacob Marley Marley is Scrooge's late business partner. Dead for seven years, he comes back to haunt Scrooge and warns him that he is wasting his life. He is bound around the waist with a chain, "the chain I forged in life," made of "cashboxes, keys, padlocks, ledgers, deeds, and heavy purses wrought in steel." He informs Scrooge that he will be visited by three ghosts.

• Old FezziwigFezziwig is Scrooge's old employer. A large and genial man, he throws a huge Christmas party with food and music and dancing and drinks and good cheer all around. He provides a contrast to the kind of employer Scrooge turns out to be: parsimonious and cold.

• Ebenezer Scrooge a miser, a defender of utilitarianism and Thomas Malthus.Learns to treasure humanity through the glimpses that the ghosts of Christmas Past, Present, and Future give him into his own life. He is relieved to find that he still has a chance to change the course of his life, and he does it: he becomes generous and good-humored, a positive force in the community, and good friends with Tiny Tim.

Themes• 1) Guilt and Innocence Scrooge’s guilty: he is mean and tight-fisted with

his assistant, Bob Cratchit; dismissive of his nephew, Fred; miserly and cold with the men from the local charity association; and nasty to the little caroler that he chases away from his keyhole with a ruler the innocents. Marley’s ghost raises the question of guilt directly, explaining that he himself is forced to walk the earth as a ghost because he was a heartless, self-involved man.

• 2) Redemption Scrooge is redeemed because he learns how to let his spirit walk among his fellow men. He shows this by becoming a better man, and a better master. He shows his redemption slowly by his actions, reactions and emotions.

• 3) Fear of the world and relationships, fear of death.• 4) Wealth and Poverty gap between the rich and poor.

Bob Cratchit can barely feed his family, but is happy on Christmas time.A Christmas Carol does not equate poverty with cheer and wealth with misery, however. The party at Fred's house shows people who are wealthy having a good time

• 5) Ignorance and Want even though people like the Cratchits can laugh in their poverty, it is still a serious and life-threatening matter.

Works Cited

• Moore, Landsay. “Magical Realism.” Magical Realism. Fall 1998. 16 May 2006 <http://www.english.emory.edu/Bahri/MagicalRealism.html>.

• “Padama Lakshmi.” Model of the Week. IGN Entertainment. 15 May 2006. <http://www.askmen.com/women/models_200/224_padma_lakshmi.html>.

• Rushdie, Salman. “The Prophet’s Hair.” The Norton Anthology of English Literature. Ed. M. H. Abrams, et al. 7th ed. Vol. 2. New York: Norton, 2000. 2843-52.

• “Salman Rushdie.” 12 May 2006 <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:SalmanRushdi2.jpg>.

• “The Satantic Verse." Wikipedia: The Free Encyclopedia. 12 May. 2006, 02:53 UTC. Wikimedia Foundation. 15 May. 2006 <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Satanic_Verses_%28novel%29>.

The Prophet’s Hair

By Salman Rushide

Presented by Daphne, April, Hector & Yvonne

Salman Rushdie 魯西迪 • Born Ahmed Salman Rushdie on June

19, 1947, in Bombay India, now living in NYC.

• Cathedral and John Connon School in MumbaiRugby School in Warwickshire

then King's College, Cambridge in

England.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:SalmanRushdi2.jpg

Salman Rushdie• Married for the fourth time to an

Indian model and actress— Padma Lakshmi.

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/04/25/fashion/weddings/25VOWS.html?ex=1398225600&en=74f2b7b35010f09c&ei=5007&partner=USERLAND

http://www.askmen.com/women/models_200/224_padma_lakshmi.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indian_subcontinent

Salman Rushdie 魯西迪• an author, novelist, essayist and sometime

critic• narrative style, blending myth and fantasy

with real life, has been described as magical realism– magical realism: literary genre in which

magical elements appear in an otherwise realistic setting

Rushdie’s Works

• Grimus (1979)

• Midnight’s Children (1981)

• The Satanic Verses (1988)—– best known criticized book

Midnight’s Children (1981) 《午夜之子》

• loose allegory for the events in India after the independence and partition of India, which took place at midnight on 15 August 1947

• a major milestone in Indian writing. • won the 1981 Booker Prize • later awarded the 'Booker of Bookers'

Prize in 1993 - being the best novel to be awarded the Booker Prize in its first 25 years.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Midnight%27s_Children

The Satantic Verses (1988) 《魔鬼的詩篇》

• caused much controversy • many Muslims considered that it

contained blasphemous references • India was the first country to ban this

book• Supreme Leader of Iran, then issued a

fatwa which called for the death of Rushdie

• the book gained great critical acclaim • Fatwa was lifted in 1998, but his life is

still in constant threat

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Satanic_Verses_%28novel%29

The Prophet’s Hair (1981)

• invokes the Prophet un-controversially in early works

• “The Prophet’s Hair” is at once a moral fable in the tradition of The Thousand and One Nights.

Summary

“The Prophet’s Hair” is based on story of the theft of the Prophet’s hair. Miraculous but also disastrous events befall whoever comes into contact with it. Hashim found the stolen hair, but he didn’t return it. Under its influence, Hashim becomes a religious hypocrite from a secular person. His son, Atta, tries to return the hair back to Mosque, but fails.

Summary

His sister, Huma decides that the relic will have to be stolen by hiring a thief; then they are able to get out of the curse of it. At the end of story, Hashim accidentally kills his own daughter. The thief is hunted and shot by the police, but the thief’s four crippled sons and blind wife have miraculously been cured by their contact with the relic. 

Characters

Hashim self-satisfied hypocrite • “… he was not a godly man he set great store by

‘living honorably in the world.’ … ‘to teach these people the value of money; let them only learn that, and they will be cured of this fever of borrowing borrowing all the time …’” (2845)

Characters

Hashim self-satisfied hypocrite • prides himself on inculcating “the virtues of thrift,

plain dealing and a healthy independence of spirit.” (2846 L1)

• “… the Prophet would have disapproved mightily of this relic-worship. … I see it purely as a secular object of great rarity and blinding beauty.” (2846-47)

Characters

Hashim intolerant and violent religious fanatic “… the moneylender looked swollen, distended. His

eyes bulged even more than they always had, ...” (2847)

“… he had filled up with some spectral fluid which might at any moment ooze uncontrollably from his every bodily opening.” (2847)

Characters

Hashim intolerant and violent religious fanatic

carelessly destroyed the harmony in the family. (2847)

setting fire to books, except Qur’an. (2848)punish debtors who are not able to pay interest of

installment. (2848)

Characters

Atta Huma –smart, careful, cool, bravedesperate Atta and Huma’s mom – go insane The burglar - sin - disadvantaged people in the society - crippling his children to ensure their lives with sympathy

from society (2850)

Genre

1. Parable 2. Magical Realism3. Parable: to check human desire & follow natural cause

Magical Realism

• 2 conflicting perspectives:1) based on a rational view of reality2) acceptance of the supernatural as mundane

reality

• set in a normal, modern world with authentic descriptions of humans and society 

Theme

• To mock at idol worship religion: a powerful tool in the hands of rulers

• Superstition-- deities or objects: Similar to Dh Tyuo (舍利子 ), Matsu palanquin (媽祖神轎 )

• superstition, extremity

Hazratbal, Mosque

Entrance of the Sacred Relic Chambers

Entrance Door of the Sacred

Relic Chambers

Interior View of the Sacred Relic Chambers

Some hairs from the beard of the Prophet Muhammad

Ironies

• What Hashim says and what he does are opposite.

• He likes to say that he sets great store by living honorably in the world (2845, par 2 from the bottom) 

• He desires the silver vial more than the hair. (2846 last par )

Symbols– The Prophet Hair

• the sacred image of the Prophet Muhammad

• a religious relic— sacred image of the Prophet Muhammad(2846 par 5~6)

• secular object— the relocation of the relic changes the hair's meaning(2846 last par).

Symbols– Hair as a human heart

• the desire of human beings

• the great rarity of beauty

• the truth of inner parts of human beings (2847 par 5~end)

Recognition

• Atta reveals the truth of possessing the relic. (2849 par 2)

• Huma realizes the dilemma because of the hair. (2849 par 5 from the bottom)

Climax

• While the thief, Sin, was approaching Hashim, Atta started to scream wildly. (2851 par 5-6)

• The catastrophe of Hashim’s family (2851 last par)

Ending mixed with irony

• Sheikh Sin’s doom (2852 par 4)

• The four sons’ fury (2852 par 2 from the bottom)

• The regained sight of Sheikh’s widow (2852 last par)

Questions

• Why did the relic play such a significant part in Hashim's life?

• What did Atta die for?• Why did Huma want to hire a thief to steal the hair?• Point out the symbolic meaning of the hair.• If you were Hashim, would you return the Prophet's

Hair? Why or why not?