Scrooge- Christmas 2017 |
"One of Dickens’s real insights into Scrooge, and by extension us, is that any benefit we derive from pettiness is terribly short lived. By being so small toward others, we diminish ourselves in numerous ways. It crimps our personalities and our vision. Scrooge is proud and miserable and terribly shortsighted. He has his money and his pride and a razor tongue—and that’s about it. With the exception of his nephew, most of the living have given up on seeing him as anything other than something like a ravenous loan shark."
Yep! in closing we'll just reiterate this:
"Scrooge’s story may be extreme, but his experience is not alien to us. That’s one reason why Dickens’s story was such a hit. As this time of year, perhaps encouraged along by one of the many adaptations of A Christmas Carol, many of us take some to reflect on how we have behaved. We make a sort of moral inventory: What did we do right? What did we miss? What can we do better?"
"Let me suggest that pettiness ought to be on that list of vices that we consign to the Ghost of Christmas Past. Do you say “Yes!” or “Bah! Humbug!” to that?"