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GCSE AQA English Literature 'A Christmas Carol': Fear Essay.
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Explore how Dickens present Scrooge’s fears in ‘A Christmas Carol’.Write about:
How Dickens presents what Scrooge is frightened of in this extract.
How Dickens presents Scrooge’s fears in the novel as a whole.
Fear is an essential part of ‘A Christmas Carol’ and Dickens exploit the emotion of
fear to encourage the middle-class capitalistic readers to change their miserly,
misanthropic behaviour. Through presenting the novella as a microcosm, Dickens
uses Scrooge to represent the Victorian capitalists to encourage the middle classes
to accept their social responsibility to the poor and, therefore, he presents Scrooge’s
fears as something that the readers could relate to. Dickens shows that Scrooge
takes a journey of redemption. Through the rest of the novel, the ghosts, including
Marley, visit Scrooge and make him confront his fears; many of these would have
been shared with the middle-class readers.
In his presentation of Marley’s ghost, Dickens’ purpose was to show the terrifying
consequences of capitalism and greed in the Victorian era by showing how it can
lead to isolation and alienation in both life and death. By starting the process of
Scrooge’s transformation, Marley’s ghost is important for expressing Dickens’
Christian belief that every person has an inherent capacity within them to change
their lives for the better. Overall, Dickens uses fear as a catalyst to cause his
transformation from a selfish Victorian businessman to a philanthropist with a social
conscience and sense of responsibility. The supernatural miracle of Scrooge’s
transformation acts as an allegory for extolling Dickens’ belief in the importance of
the Christian values of mercy and charity at a time when society was becoming more
fragmented and echoes his belief everyone has inherent goodness and capacity to
change.
Initially, in the extract, we see a pivotal moment in the novella and Scrooge’s
reaction to the Phantom. When the Phantom approaches Scrooge, ‘Scrooge bent
down upon one knee’. Scrooge’s action symbolises his fear of the Phantom and also
the verb phrase ‘bent down’ exposes his repentance, which highlights that he is
showing regret for his misanthropic behaviour and miserly ways. Furthermore,
Dickens wants the Victorian readers to see that the Phantom has a terrifying
message for Scrooge. Dickens uses a triad of adverbs ‘slowly, gravely, silently’ to
describe the movements of the spirit. These adverbs build the tension and cultivate
fear in the readers. Many Victorians believed in Ghosts and the Supernatural and
they would be terrified that this could happen to them.
Dickens heightens the anxieties of Scrooge by using the semantic field darkness. He
uses nouns like ‘gloom’, ‘black’ and ‘darkness’. This unsettles Scrooge and
subsequently unsettles the reader. Dickens conveys that Scrooge is disorientated
and frightened of the unknown. Both Scrooge and the readers are unable to see the
spirit as the verb ‘concealed’ shows that it is hidden by the ‘deep black garment’.
Perhaps, this represents the future and could imply that the future is unknown and
concealed. Therefore, we see that Scrooge is fearful of his future.
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