Theme of the Supernatural in Charles Dickens' Novella 'A Christmas Carol': Critical Essay

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Theme of the Supernatural in Charles Dickens’ Novella ‘A Christmas Carol’: Critical Essay

One of the key themes in the novella A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens is the theme of the supernatural because it symbolizes all the aspects and the allegories of the two social problems of life.

One aspect of the theme supernatural that the writer focuses on occurs at the beginning of the novel. Stave 1 embodies how the Ghost of Christmas Past doesn’t want to be outlined as youthful or old as he portrays everyone. This is stated in the line It was a strange figure like a child: yet not so like a child as an old man. The noun child evokes an innocent appearance that Scrooge is anxious to wipe out, which suggests his refusal to change. The juxtaposing comparisons evoke a sense of how the ghost is drawn to describe ‘like a child’, and ‘like an old man’ which reflects one’s past is often distant and old, yet also new as new memories are made and old memories continue to remain and can be uncovered. Figure demonstrates that for Scrooge his impression is real. On the other hand, it could also reflect Scrooge’s different periods of his life or could demonstrate how Scrooge’s memories are new to him as he rediscovers his past and finds truth in them. He takes Scrooge back to his times of innocence. Another interpretation is that the ghost represents two vulnerable members of society: the young and the elderly. Through this, Dickens presents the Ghost of Christmas Past as a personification of the nature of memories. Dickens is also suggesting that could apply to anyone to intimidate everyone reading into thinking whether they need to change their ways too. Thus, Dickens presents the ghost as an innocent, supernatural occurrence to stress how we all are innocent at the beginning and must make a choice to help others.

Interestingly, the featured extract occurs in the middle of the novella. Here it represents cheerful and contemplated joy in the moment, he is complementary and authentic. This is stated in the line &its cheery voice, its unconstrained demeanour, and it’s joyful air. The listing adjectives jolly are all semantic fields and are used to represent a solid big and ‘joyful’ character, in contrast to the vague Ghost of Christmas Past. This is to reinforce the different stages of humanization and growth of aspects. This symbolizes the scale of generosity and shows his benevolent nature, similar to that of the image of God. It seems like the ghost is a representative of benevolence and is trying to imply the importance of Christmas by his appearance so he could demonstrate Scrooge’s distastes. This is to reinforce what Scrooge is missing in his life eternally. Alternatively, Dickens could be criticizing the wealthy upper classes who are blind by the happiness of Christmas.

We see progress in this where the Ghost of Christmas Present reflects Scrooges immorality and selfish choices. It reveals the theme of the supernatural because the ghost’s unnatural occurrences symbolize Scrooges lack of empathy towards the needy. When the Ghost of Christmas Present states The boy is ignorant the girl is wanted. The ignorant represents the attitude of the rich to the poor in Victorian society. Dickens uses ignorant and want to describe those children who are both pitiful and frightened, and how they are two allegories of the two social problems of life. They are the personification of mans ill-ignorance and want. They symbolize all the deprived children living in Victorian England. Ignorance embodies the wealthy upper classes who are ignorant of what they must do to help. On the other hand, it could be argued that ignorance contemplates the lack of education of the poor. The Ghost of Christmas Present is a prominent ghost because he’s used to verbalizing Dickens’ message about education and how important it is. Dickens asserts that ignoring poor peoples problems is actually worse than ignoring the problem itself. Dickens considers ignorance the worse because it leads to wanting.

We see more progress where the supernatural has a great effect on the novel in Stave 4. The Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come is a metaphor because it symbolizes Scrooges future. The Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come is a great catalyst for Scrooge, changing him in many ways, fearful ways. When the character is described as Its mysterious presence filled him with a solemn dread, sets the atmosphere of mystery and tension straight away. The pronoun ‘it’ is used to add to the feeling of an enigma, which consequently adds to the strain and dread being created. ‘Filled’ can be interpreted as something being loaded, it usually means it starts low and builds up. The word ‘dread’ shows the forecasting of something bad happening, which makes him even more frightened as he is expecting the worst. Alternatively, without this ghost, Scrooges abrasive character would still lead him to be immoral. The supernatural builds reality for the Victorian audience about the fear of the future and the fear of death. Victorian readers would’ve recognized this as a symbol of approaching death. Dicken portrayed this particular ghost to demonstrate what the ghost would look like to the ignorant upper classes.

Summing up, in his novella A Christmas Carol Dickens uses the supernatural as a catalyst to cause a change in Scrooge and to always let the readers know that everyone has the capacity to change. Thus, Dickens is trying to confess selfish people to question their faults so they can change their ways before it gets worse.

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