Homework 1

“A Christmas Carol”, is a novella by Charles Dickens, first published in London by Chapman &
Hall in 1843 and illustrated by John Leech. It tells the story of Ebenezer Scrooge, a miserly and
cold-hearted businessman who is visited by the ghost of his former business partner and the
Ghosts of Christmas Past, Present, and Yet to Come.
The main characters
Ebenezer Scrooge
The miserly owner of a London counting-house, a nineteenth century term for an accountant's
office.
Jacob Marley
In the living world, Ebenezer Scrooge's equally greedy partner. Marley died seven years before
the narrative opens.
Bob Cratchit
Scrooge's clerk, a kind, mild, and very poor man with a large family.
Tiny Tim
Bob Cratchit's young son, crippled from birth.
The Ghost of Christmas Past
The Ghost of Christmas Present
The Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come
Summary
A Christmas Carol opens on a bleak, cold Christmas Eve in London, seven years after the death
of Ebenezer Scrooge's business partner, Jacob Marley. Scrooge, an ageing miser, dislikes
Christmas and refuses a dinner invitation from his nephew Fred. He turns away two men who
seek a donation from him to provide food and heating for the poor.
Later that evening, after returning to his dark, cold apartment, Scrooge receives a visit from the
ghost of his dead partner, Jacob Marley. As punishment for his greedy and self-serving life his
spirit has been condemned to wander the Earth weighted down with heavy chains. Marley
hopes to save Scrooge from sharing the same fate. Marley informs Scrooge that three spirits
will visit him during each of the next three nights.
The first spirit, the Ghost of Christmas Past, takes Scrooge to Christmas scenes of Scrooge's
childhood, reminding him of a time when he was more innocent. The scenes reveal Scrooge's
lonely childhood at boarding school, his relationship with his beloved sister Fan, who died
young while giving birth to Fred, and a Christmas party hosted by his first employer, Mr
Fezziwig, who treated him like a son.
The second spirit, the Ghost of Christmas Present, takes Scrooge to a cheerful market with
people buying the makings of Christmas dinner. Scrooge and the ghost also visit Fred's
Christmas party. Scrooge finds out Bob Cratchit's youngest son, Tiny Tim, is ill and will die
unless the course of events changes.
The third spirit, the Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come, shows Scrooge a Christmas Day in the
future. The silent ghost reveals scenes involving the death of a disliked man whose funeral is
attended by local businessmen only on condition that lunch is provided.
Scrooge awakens on Christmas morning a changed man. He makes a large donation to the
charity he rejected the previous day, anonymously sends a large turkey to the Cratchit home for
Christmas dinner and spends the afternoon at Fred's Christmas party. From then on Scrooge
treats everyone with kindness, generosity and compassion, embodying the spirit of Christmas.
"A Christmas Carol" has been adapted into numerous film adaptations over the years, including
both live-action and animated versions. Some notable film adaptations include:
Film adaptations
Scrooge, or, Marley's Ghost (1901), a short British film that is the earliest surviving screen
adaptation.
A Christmas Carol (1908), with Thomas Ricketts as Scrooge. Lost film.
A Christmas Carol (1910), a 13-minute version of the story starring Marc McDermott as Scrooge
and Charles Ogle as Cratchit.
Scrooge (1922), an 18-minute version of the story directed by George Wynn.
Spirited (2022), a modern musical comedy re-imagining focused on the perspective of the
Ghosts, with Will Ferrell as the Ghost of Christmas Present and Ryan Reynolds as the person
visited by the ghosts.
Homework 2
Miss Havisham is a character in the Charles Dickens novel Great Expectations (1861). She is a
wealthy spinster, once jilted at the altar, who insists on wearing her wedding dress for the rest
of her life.
Physical appearance
She was dressed in rich materials- satins, lace and silks, all of white. Her shoes were white. She
had a long white veil dependent from her hair, and bridal flowers in her white hair.
More information
She never leaves the house and has stopped all the clocks so that she is unaware of time
passing. She always wears her wedding clothes and has left the prepared wedding feast to
decay in one of her rooms. As a result of her experiences, Miss Havisham hates humanity,
particularly, men. She has adopted a young girl, Estella, and is training her to be cold and cruel
so that she will break men’s hearts. Miss Havisham invites the young Pip to the house so that
Estella can practice on him. He mistakenly believes that Miss Havisham wishes them to have a
future together.
Although she eventually regrets what she has done and her character starts to change, it is too
late. In a tragic accident, Miss Havisham is horribly burned when her wedding dress catches fire
and she dies shortly afterwards.
What is love?
“I'll tell you,” said she, in the same hurried passionate whisper, “what real love is. It is blind
devotion, unquestioning self-humiliation, utter submission, trust and belief against yourself and
against the whole world, giving up your whole heart and soul to the smiter—as I did!”
What does Miss Havisham symbolize?
Miss Havisham is often seen as a symbol of the destructive power of pain and the dangers of
holding onto the past. Her character represents what can happen when someone is unable to
let go of a traumatic experience, in her case, being jilted at the altar on her wedding day. She
becomes a recluse and raises Estella to become a heartbreaker, all as a way to seek revenge on
men for what happened to her.