Until I read it.
Very easily, I got to thinking about Dickens' A Christmas Carol. It is outrageous that we are moving backwards, not just in our view of the moral status of indebtedness, but in the legal approach toward debtors as well. Three years ago I got in to a discussion concerning A Christmas Carol with a right-winger. It was . . . interesting to say the least. At this point let me just point out the backdrop to the creation of the story. In the late summer of 1843, Dickens was given a tour of an orphanage, and was outraged at what he saw. His first instinct was to write a pamphlet, but when nothing would come, he was encourage by one of his benefactors to write a story. A Christmas Carol was written, edited, and published in white heat, just a few short weeks.*
The entire project, then was conceived and carried through as a form of literary protest against the legal structures that kept the working class not only working, but incapable of doing much of anything else. While one can make too much of the protest, one should also not make too little of it either. Dickens was not simply encouraging charity; even more he was trying to raise awareness not only of the pitiful condition under which millions lived and died, but expose to a supposed "Christian nation" the way its attitudes created structures in which charity simply wasn't enough. Through the ringing voice of Marley's ghost, and most especially the Ghost of Christmas Present, he hear not only the promise of what our life should be about.
"Mankind was my business. The common welfare was my business; charity, mercy, forbearance, and benevolence, were, all, my business. The dealings of my trade were but a drop of water in the comprehensive Ocean of my business!"We also hear, in the Second Spirit's sarcastic quoting back at Scrooge his own words of contempt for the poor, the judgment upon all who believe that material success curries some special favor.
"Man" said the Ghost, "if man you be in heart; not adamant; forbear that wicked cant until you have discovered What the surplus is, and Where it is. Will you and such as you decide what men shall live, what men shall die! It may be, that in the sight of Heave, you are more worthless and less fir to live than millions like this poor man's child. . . ."It is truly revolting that we have slipped this far. All the same, with the Christmas season just around the corner, we shall all have a reminder of the social cost of rampant avarice, not just upon our persons, but upon our whole society. I do so hope that there are ears to hear, once again, the lesson Dickens conveys in his "ghost of a tale".
*This information is included in John Mortimer's Introduction to the Facsimile Edition, published by Yale University Press to commemorate the sesquicentennial of the original publication.
