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History This Week, December 27th, 1853.
I'm Sally Helm.
Charles Dickens likes to prepare for a reading with a series of rituals aimed at protecting his voice and maybe loosening up for the performance.
For breakfast, he'll have two tablespoons of rum with cream.
At tea time, a pint of champagne.
And soon before he steps on stage, he'll gulp down a raw egg beaten with sherry.
Delicious.
On this cold night, two days after Christmas, Dickens is preparing for the first public reading of one of his best-known works A Christmas Carol, the story of Tiny Tim and of the Christmas villain Ebenezer Scrooge.
When A Christmas Carol was first published in 1843, ten years before this reading, it sold out in three days.
Charles Dickens has become a literary superstar.
On this night at the town hall in Birmingham England, 2000 people gather to hear him read the story aloud.
The newspaper reports that the drawing room is decorated with wreaths of holly, that the lights are brilliant, that the people are lively and happy.
Dickens steps out in front of the crowd and settles himself into an armchair.
He's dressed in holiday splendor, complete with a purple waistcoat and a diamond-studded evening jacket.
His reading takes three hours, but people are rapt.
Dickens doesn't just read.
He acts out the parts.
He leans forward.
He twirls his mustache.
The newspaper writes that the audience was quote Dickens will go on to read A Christmas Carol aloud many times.
On his tour of New York.
Years later, some people will sleep outside to make sure they get a spot to hear him, the way they do for Saturday night live recordings or big pop performances today.
And since Dickens' death the story has been performed hundreds of times by high school theater kids, by radio broadcasters, by the Muppets.
And today on this podcast, we've got a special holiday episode for you, something a little different.
We're going to play a piece of history itself the 1949 version of A Christmas Carol starring silver screen legend Vincent Price.
So you can decide for yourself.
What is it about this story that has captivated audiences for decades?
And now A Christmas Carol, the classic version that aired on TV sets across the country on Christmas Day 1949.
Gilbert K Chesterton once said in everybody there is a thing that loves children, fears death and likes sunlight.
And this thing enjoys Charles Dickens.
Before I tell you about the Christmas Carol, let me read to you what Charles Dickens himself wrote about this story.
I have endeavored, in this ghostly little story, to raise the ghost of an idea which shall not put my readers out of humor, with themselves, with each other, with the season or with me.
May it haunt their houses pleasantly.
Charles Dickens.
To begin with, Jacob Marley was dead.
There is no doubt about that.
You will therefore permit me to repeat emphatically that Marley was as dead as a doornail.
Did Scrooge know that he was dead?
Of course he did.
Ebenezer Scrooge and he had been partners for I don't know how many years.
Scrooge never painted out Marley's name.
And so there it stood seven years afterwards above the warehouse door.
Ebenezer Scrooge.
Oh, but he was a tight-fisted old sinner.
Hard and sharp as flint.
The cold within him froze his features because he always carried his own low temperature with him.
And he didn't thaw one degree.
Not even at Christmas.
Merry Christmas.
Merry Christmas, Uncle.
God save you.
Christmas.
Humbug.
Christmas?
A humbug?
Uncle, you don't mean that, I'm sure.
What reason have you to be merry?
You're poor enough.
What right have you to be dismal?
You're rich enough.
Humbug.
What's Christmas to you but a time for finding yourself a year older but not an hour richer?
Every idiot that goes about with Merry Christmas on his lips should be boiled in his own pudding.
Now, Uncle, I know you... Now, you keep Christmas in your own way, Fred, and I keep it in mine.
Be off now.
This is a place of business.
Don't be angry.
Come dine with us tomorrow.
No.
Caroline will be happy to see you.
Why did you ever get married?
Because I fell in love.
Love?
That's the only thing in the world more ridiculous than a Merry Christmas.
Good afternoon, nephew.
Uncle, I'm sorry with all my heart to find you like this.
Merry Christmas, Bob.
Merry Christmas, sir.
Let me hear another sound from you, and you'll keep your Christmas by losing your situation.
Ahem.
Uh, you'll, uh, you'll want all day tomorrow, I suppose, Crescent.
Quite convenient, sir.
It's not convenient.
But it's only one day in the year, sir.
A poor excuse to pick the pocket of your employer every 25th of December.
But be here all the earlier next morning.
I will, sir.
And a Merry Christmas to you, Mr. Scrooge.
Thank you.
Christmas.
Nonsense.
Humbug.
And while most of London was jovial and full of glee in honor of this Christmas Eve, Scrooge had taken his melancholy dinner at his usual melancholy tavern.
And having read all the newspapers, he went home to bed.
Scrooge lived in the chambers which had once belonged to Marley, his ex-partner.
And as I have remarked before, Marley is dead these last seven years.
Dead as a doornail.
Ebenezer Scrooge?
How now?
What do you want of me?
Much.
Who are you?
In life, I was your partner, Jacob Marley.
You don't believe in me?
I... I don't.
What evidence would you have of my reality beyond that of your own senses?
I don't know.
Then why doubt your senses?
Because a slight disorder in my stomach could make my senses cheat me.
You might be an undigested bit of beef, a blot of mustard, a fragment of underdone potato.
Humbug, I tell you.
Humbug.
Mercy on me, dreadful apparition.
Now do you believe in me or not?
I do, I do.
But why do you come to plague me?
And why do you wear that ponderous chain?
I made it, link by link in my life, as you are doing for yourself on earth.
It is now a part of my penance.
And I am here tonight to warn you of a fate such as mine.
But, Ebenezer, if you change your ways, you have a chance of escaping my doom.
You were always a good friend to me, Jacob.
Thank you.
Thank you.
You will be haunted by three spirits.
Without their visits, you cannot hope to shun the path I tread.
Expect the first tomorrow when the bell tolls one.
Expect the next on the following night at the same hour.
And the third on the next night when the last stroke of twelve has ceased to vibrate.
Couldn't I take them all at once, Jacob, and have it over with?
And look to see me no more.
And look to try your own sake.
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Scrooge tried desperately to say humbug to the strange happening, but the word stuck in his throat unuttered, for it was highly probable it was not humbug.
He went straight to bed without undressing and fell asleep in an instant.
A few hours later.
Are you the spirit whose coming was foretold to me?
I am.
Who and what are you?
I am the ghost of Christmas past.
Long past?
No.
Your past.
What business brings you here?
Your welfare.
I have things to show you which are the shadow of the things that have been.
Rise.
And walk with me.
The ghost of christmas past led scrooge down the road which he had forgotten for so many years.
He told him a christmas day in the past which was a happy one for most children, but not for one lonely schoolboy ebenezer scrooge.
Do you know that boy?
Yes yes, I do.
It is I as a boy.
Oh, I remember that Christmas well.
I felt so lonely.
My playmates, they didn't like me.
It was because you had shunned them?
Oh, poor boy.
I wish... What is the matter?
There was a boy singing a Christmas carol on the street last night.
I should have liked to have given him something, that's all.
Shall I show you another Christmas, 40 years ago, when a fair young girl released you from your marriage contract.
No, no.
Because she discovered you had ceased to love her.
Your greed, avarice, and desire for wealth had killed the love she had for you.
No, no, spirit, show me no more.
Leave me.
Haunt me no longer.
Awakening in the middle of a prodigiously tough snore and sitting up in bed to get his thoughts together.
Scrooge had no occasion to be told that the bell was again upon the stroke of one.
Scrooge!
I am the ghost of Christmas presents.
Look upon me.
Yes, spirit.
Conduct me where you will.
I went forth last night on compulsion and I learned a lesson which is working now.
Tonight, if you have ought to teach me, let me profit by it.
Touch my robe.
Look.
Belinda, bring the plates.
Belinda, there's a great deal of work to be done.
Help your sister.
I came by outside.
I could smell the sage and the onion.
You knew it was off?
Oh, I certainly did, boy.
Peter, set the chair.
Can I put some chestnuts on the fire, Mother?
No, your father will do that when he comes.
What has gotten your precious father?
And your brother, Tiny Tim?
And Mars, who wasn't as late last year by half an hour.
This is the house of your clerk, Bob Cratchit.
But he has hardly a penny to his name.
I, the ghost of Christmas present, have blessed his house.
Here comes Bob now with another member of his family, Tiny Tim.
And a Merry Christmas, everybody.
And there you are, Tiny Tim, right in your own chair.
Merry Christmas, Bob.
And Martha.
Yes, here I am again.
Christmas wouldn't be Christmas without Martha coming to visit us.
And how did Tiny Tim behave today, Bob?
Fine.
He told me coming home that he was glad he'd been to church, because it's pleasant to remember that the day is called Christmas after he who made the lame to walk and the blind to see.
Oh, what a beautiful Christmas table.
It would be more beautiful if we had a turkey.
But we'll manage.
Of course we will.
See what a happy family your clerk has on only 15 shillings a week?
Tiny Tim.
I didn't know he was sick and a cripple.
Mr. Scrooge.
I give you Mr. Scrooge, the founder of the feast.
The founder of the feast, indeed.
I wish I had him here.
I'd give him a piece of my mind to feast upon.
My dear, it's Christmas Day.
It should be Christmas Day, I'm sure, when one drinks the health of such an odious stingy hard, unfeeling man as Mr Scrooge.
My dear, it's Christmas.
Very well.
I'll drink his health for your sake, and because it's Christmas.
Long life to him.
A Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.
A Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.
God bless us, everyone.
Tell me, Tiny Tim, will he live?
I see a vacant seat and a little crutch without an owner.
No, no.
Say he will be spared.
My life on the globe is very brief.
It ends tonight.
Tonight?
The time is drawing near for me to go and for your third visitor to appear.
I am in the presence of the ghost of Christmas yet to come.
Ghost of the future, I fear you more than any specter I have seen.
But lead on, I want to know.
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Well, I'm letting go of the worry that I wouldn't get my new contacts in time for this class.
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I met a very kind young man today who asked after you.
Mr. Scrooge's nephew, whom I scarcely know.
I told him about Tiny Tim and he said, I'm heartily sorry for you and your good wife.
By the by, how he ever knew that, I don't know.
Knew what, dear?
That you were a good wife.
Oh, everyone knows that.
And he said, if I can be of any service to you at any time, pray come to me.
He's rather unlike his old Uncle Scrooge, isn't he?
If you must torment me, be quick.
Take me to what else you have to show.
The End I don't know much about it either.
I only know he's dead.
When did he die?
Last night, I believe.
What had he done with his money?
I haven't heard.
But he'll have no use for it where he's going.
It's likely to be a cheap funeral.
For upon my life, I don't know anyone to go to it.
Suppose we make up a party and volunteer.
When I come to think of it, I'm not at all sure that I wasn't his most particular friend.
For we used to stop and speak whenever we met.
I don't mind going to his funeral if lunch is provided.
Tell me what man they are speaking of.
Who is it that lies dead?
God.
No, hear me.
I am not the man I was.
Assure me I yet may change the shadows you have shown me.
I will honor Christmas in my heart and try to keep it all the year.
Tell me I may sponge away the writing on this stone.
Marley!
Marley!
Jacob Marley!
Heaven and Christmastime be praised for this.
I will live in the past, the present and the future.
The spirit of all three shall thrive within me.
Ha, ha, ha.
Boy, oh boy!
Yes, sir?
What's today?
What, sir?
What's today, my fine fellow?
Today?
My Christmas Day, sir!
It's still Christmas?
And I haven't missed it?
For a man who had been out of practice for years, Scrooge gave a most illustrious laugh.
The father of a long line of brilliant laughs.
Thank you.
And Scrooge dressed himself all in his best and at last got out into the streets, wishing everyone he met a Merry Christmas.
Mr. Fred, come in.
Come in.
Have you room at your table for some friends?
Oh, you're very welcome, Mr. Fred, sir.
And you too, ma'am.
I only hope that our lonely feast is to your liking.
Now, don't fret about provisions.
We've brought plenty for all.
Merry Christmas, Bob.
Mr. Scrooge.
And Mrs. Cratchit, for you.
Mr. Scrooge.
My dear, that's for you.
Darling, for you.
For me.
And you, Sam.
Oh, Mr. Scrooge, I don't know how we can ever thank you.
Don't.
And I'm going to raise your salary and help your large family in every way possible.
And tiny Tim.
I saw a friend of mine at church just a little while ago.
A famous surgeon.
You and I are going to see him tomorrow.
And he's going to be your friend, too.
Mr. Scrooge!
Scrooge won his word.
He did it all and infinitely more.
And to Tiny Tim, who did not die, he was a second father.
Scrooge had no further dealings with ghosts.
But it was always said that he knew how to keep Christmas well.
If any man alive possessed the knowledge, may it truly be said of us and all of us.
And so, as Tiny Tim observed, God bless us, everyone.
The first, Noel the angel did say, Was a certain poor shepherd in fields that lay lay.
Thanks for listening to history this week.
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This episode was produced by McKamey Lynn.
History This Week is also produced by Julie McGruder, Ben Dickstein, and me, Sally Helm.
Our editor and sound designer is Dan Rosato, and our researcher is Emma Fredericks.
Our executive producers are Jesse Katz and Ted Butler.
Don't forget to subscribe, rate, and review History This Week wherever you get your podcasts.
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