Description Of Scrooge In A Christmas Carol

A Christmas Carol Characterization In A Christmas Carol Charles Dickens describes his main character Ebenezer Scrooge in a direct characterization manner . Dickens begins to describe him directly to the audience as; “..secret, and self-contained, and solitary as an oyster.” and also describes him as: “...a squeezing, wrenching, grasping, scraping, clutching, covetous, old sinner!” and lastly describes him as “... a tight-fisted hand at the grindstone, Scrooge!” in page 8. Here Dickens introduces a greedy, self contained and penny-pinching character. Dickens chooses to reveal Scrooge through direct characterization to inform the audience about of Scrooge's way of thinking, like what he admires and dislikes, giving us a better picture of the character. The effect is that the reader begins to understand how the character is and what decisions a character might make.

In page 13 Dickens sets up a scene in which two gentlemen come visit Scrooge seeking charitable help for the poor but Scrooge refuses to help and says; “If they would rather die,” said Scrooge, “they had better do it, and decrease the surplus population.” meaning that if people would rather die than join the institutions he supports then they should. In this passage we learn that Scrooge is a very cold man, and a man unwilling to help. The effect of revealing the character traits indirectly is that it brings up examples of ones personality at play, like Scrooge actively showing how self contained he is and how he has a cold hearted personality by not helping