family

• dickens had a complicated relationship with his own family
• as a child, dickens was forced to live apart from his parents and work in a warehouse while his father was in prison, which made him deeply ashamed
• when his father was released, dickens' mother argued that he should be sent back to work in the warehouse anyway
• dickens' feelings of neglect and rejection by his parents may have influenced the scenes of young scrooge alone at school in a christmas carol
• as an adult, dickens raised a large family of his own and in 1843, when a christmas carol was released, he already had 4 children and his wife was pregnant with a fifth (they eventually had ten children, which was not uncommon at the time)
• he constantly struggled for money to support his family
• in a christmas carol, dickens presents an idealised and sentimental view of family in which love and companionship are more important than wealth
• in real life, though, dickens was disappointed in almost all of his children and annoyed by the financial burden they caused him throughout his life