Close Readings Novel Approaches: 'A Christmas Carol' by Charles Dickens
Dec 24, 2025
Clare Bucknell, a literary scholar from All Souls College, Oxford, and Colin Burrow, a fellow critic and contributor to the London Review of Books, delve into the complexities of Dickens’s 'A Christmas Carol'. They explore whether Dickens ruined Christmas through his commercial ventures and how his dark narrative critiques Victorian social issues. The discussion highlights the unsettling mix of sentimentality and social commentary, questioning what keeps this ghostly tale in holiday tradition despite its eerie undertones.
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Dickens Recycled A Pickwick Christmas
- Dickens recycled a Christmas episode from The Pickwick Papers to shape A Christmas Carol.
- He deliberately packaged it as a luxury, illustrated five-shilling book to earn money quickly.
A Commercial Phenomenon With Thin Profits
- The book sold 6,000 copies in six days but Dickens made little profit due to production costs and piracy.
- The commercial success established Dickens's lucrative pattern of annual Christmas books despite mixed quality.
A Political Rebuttal To Malthus
- The novella responds to 1830s social debates about the Poor Law and Malthusian population theory.
- Dickens argues scarcity stems from hoarded wealth, not excessive population.