Time, Loneliness, Isolation

• Themes in A Christmas Carol

  • Loneliness and isolation
  • Use of time
• Scrooge rejects offer from Fred to spend Christmas with his family


  Returns to his cold house all on his own
• Scrooge chooses his own isolation
• Scrooge: '"It's enough for a man to understand his own business and not to fear with other people interfere with other people's"'
• Scrooge has isolated himself, it's not that others have constantly pushed him away
• Fred is determined to invite Scrooge to Christmas dinner every year


  Even if Scrooge keeps refusing
• Scrooge meets the ghost of Christmas past

  Taken back to his childhood and days at school when he was a lonely child
• Scrooge learns that love and compassion rather than money brings people happiness
• How time is handled in A Christmas Carol

  1. Moving from present to past to future and back to present

  2. Spirits are time travelers who enable Scrooge to be reminded of his past and warned about his possible future

  3. Pace increased by threat of Tiny Tim's death and Scrooge's own death

  4. Clock strikes to emphasise little time left for Scrooge to change

  5. Time manipulated by Dickens so Scrooge can return to Christmas Day
• Scrooge initially concerned with time being linked to money
• Scrooge learns time with family and friends is most important for a happy life