How does Dickens use Light in ‘A Christmas Carol’?
Dickens uses light to portray happiness and understanding. For example, in Stave 2, the Spirit of Christmas Past was a light, radiating warmth and relaxation: ‘For as its belt sparkled and glittered now in one part and now in another, and what was light one instant at another time was dark, so the figure itself fluctuated in its distinctness,’. The spirit is also described as ‘the crown of its head there sprung a bright clear jet of light.’ The spirit took Scrooge to his past which was a slightly good time in his life, it showed him when he was younger, all alone. But, it then shows him Fan coming to see him and instantly what was once sad is now happy. The spirit shows Scrooge being happy and spending time with the people he loved.
After the other two spirits had passed, Scrooge is hopeful. The settings that Dickens once described as dull and gloomy are now bright and all is good. Dickens makes out as if Scrooge is a changed man and he shows this by his description. For example he writes, ‘he was so fluttered and so glowing with his good intentions.’ ‘Glowing’ connotes light and therefore Dickens uses it as a source of good.
Article written by Lucy Brigdale
How does dickens use darkness in ‘a Christmas Carol?’
Dickens uses a range of examples to get the point of darkness through in 'A Christmas Carol'. Dickens uses darkness and relates it to death and the supernatural.
Stave one:
· The reason for this is because a character called Marley died in the first Stave of the Christmas carol.
· Also throughout the book Dickens makes Scrooge symbolises darkness. The reason for this is because in the first Stave of the book Dickens has put Scrooge in a dark room with only a few candles. The darkness is symbolic of Scrooge's ways.
· The weather is dark and a pea-soup fog. Also there is no light in the streets. Until Scrooge realises that he has to be jolly and not hate Christmas and then it all gets lighter.
· He also says ‘there had not been light all day’
· ‘Meanwhile the fog and darkness thickened’
· ‘Darkness is cheap, and Scrooge liked it.’ This shows that Scrooge is mysterious and nyctophilic this means that he loves darkness.
Stave two:
· ‘He was endeavouring to pierce the darkness with his ferret eyes’
· ‘The darkness and the mist had vanished with it, for it was a clear, cold, winter day, with the snow upon the ground.’
Stave three:
· ‘deep red curtains, ready to be drawn to shut out cold and darkness’
· ‘It was a great surprise to Scrooge, while listening to the moaning of the wind, and thinking what a solemn thing it was to move on through the lonely
Stave four:
· ‘And separate it from the darkness by which it was surrounded.’
· stave four is full of light and happiness.
Article written by Charly-Louise Higgs
