50 Books to Read Before You Die

words to inspire before you expire

Tag: Charles Dickens

A Christmas Carol

December 21, 2016 /

Merry Christmas, class!

Celebrate with me—I’ve made it through four months, 10 books, and 50 posts! The finish line may not be exactly close, but I must profess (haha) that I’m having fun. I hope you are as well, students.

A Christmas Carol is one of those classics that everyone sort of knows. Charles Dickens’ novel helped define modern Christmas traditions in Western cultures, and the story and characters are instantly recognizable—especially Ebenezer Scrooge, the 19th Century Grinch who loves money and hates people.

Ebenezer Scrooge and Marley’s Ghost

The fantasy elements—Ghosts of Christmas Past, Present, and Future, as well as Marley’s Ghost—are grounded by religious themes and societal struggles. Dickens isn’t afraid to get dark—he portrays hunger, poverty, disability, grief, and greed in the Christmas season. A Christmas Carol doesn’t let the joy of Christmas diminish the needs of society, but uses Christmas to represent joy with societal needs in mind…all while redeeming the grumpy old Scrooge.

Scrooge isn’t as much of a “scrooge” as society makes him—he isn’t a stereotype. For one thing, it’s clear from the beginning why he dislikes Christmas: his friend and business partner Marley died at Christmas-time several years ago. He used to enjoy Christmas, but by the beginning of the story, Christmas is nothing but hardship for him, and he has no patience for generosity.

Generosity just happens to be his problem—he plays by the rules of money and capitalism, and giving away money goes against the rules. If everyone fended for themselves, it would be a better world for him. In fact, he could have lived out his days that way, storing up his treasures on earth, had it not been for Marley’s Ghost.

Scrooge in A Christmas Carol (2009)

The intrusive spirit does Scrooge a favor and shows him the true meanings of Christmas—love, family, friendship, giving, joy. Scrooge is shown what Christmas used to be, what Christmas could be if he doesn’t change, and what Christmas is to the people he claims to hate. Scrooge learns the lesson and is reborn, and (spoiler alert) finds a happy ending.

A Christmas Carol is a transparently humble story—it doesn’t claim to be anything more than what it is. It’s as short as it is humble, and it’s separated into staves (musical sections) rather than chapters, making it more “carol” than “novel.” Dickens’ writing style is particularly unique—long sentences that build up to important points, bleak form and bleak content, etc.—but it rarely sounds dull or dated. Reading the novel feels simultaneously familiar and fresh; it bursts at the seams with originality, but always resembles the ghost of a song we already know.

If you have time this holiday season, I recommend reading it. It’s a quick read and a timeless classic. In our time, when Christmas seems too rushed or commercialized, having fallen prey to money and capitalism, A Christmas Carol is a good way to remind us what this sacred time is really for.

I’ve already started my next read, Life of Pi by Yann Martel, which is one of my favorites. Unlike A Christmas Carol, which lightly reminds readers of religious themes and topics, Life of Pi hits religious topics with full force. Post #51, here we come!

Until then, enjoy your holidays,

Prof. Jeffrey

December 19, 2016 /

“‘I will honor Christmas in my heart, and try to keep it all the year. I will live in the Past, Present, and the Future. The Spirits of all Three shall strive within me. I will not shut out the lessons that they teach.'”

–from A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens

December 16, 2016 /

“It is a fair, even-handed, noble adjustment of things, that, while there is infection in disease and sorrow, there is nothing in the world so irresistibly contagious as laughter and good humor.”

–from A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens

December 12, 2016 /

“‘But I am sure I have always thought of Christmas-time, when it has come round—apart from the veneration due to its sacred name and origin, if anything belonging to it can be apart from that—as a good time; a kind, forgiving charitable, pleasant time; the only time I know of, in the long calendar of the year, when men and women seem by one consent to open their shut-up hearts feely, and to think of people below them as if they really were fellow-passengers to the grave, and not another race of creatures bound on other journeys. And therefore, uncle, though it has never put a scrap of gold or silver in my pocket, I believe that it has done me good, and will do me good; and I say, God bless it!'”

—from A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens

December 9, 2016 /

“I have endeavored in this Ghostly little book, 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, and no one wish to lay it.”

—Preface to A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens

Off-Topic: Novels I’m Thankful For

November 23, 2016 /

Happy Thanksgiving, class! In theme with the holidays, I have created a list of the novels I am most thankful for. This time, students, it’s personal.

To clarify: I’m not listing the best novels, or even my favorite novels. These are simply novels that have changed my life. If it made me who I am today, it qualifies. I’m also including works that are kind of novels, but I’m excluding anything that clearly is not a novel. Hamlet and The Bible are on the “50-Books” list, but neither of them are novels, so they aren’t here.

Here’s the list, in unbiased alphabetical order:

  • The Boxcar Children Series by Gertrude Chandler Warner

These are the first books I remember reading. Warner’s kid-friendly mysteries involved four siblings, always dealing with personal struggles, but always outsmarting their own situations by working together. The Boxcar Children started me on a path of reading with desperation—to find out how it ends, to solve the mystery, to discover the twist. It was also a series that I started reading with my mom and older sister, so it tends to bring emotional roots to the surface. Eventually, though, I started reading ahead of them. They were going too slow.

  • Citizen: An American Lyric by Claudia Rankine

On the opposite end of the spectrum is a profound and challenging kind-of-novel. Citizen is a lyrical portrayal of the kind of racism the modern American experiences. With hodgepodged prose-poetry and powerful pictures, Rankine describes American citizenship in the context of the racism that still plagues our country. I put it on this list because nothing has helped me understand modern racism and white privilege more completely, as well as the distance we have yet to travel as a society in order to achieve equality.

  • The Harry Potter Series by J. K. Rowling

Sometimes, I use this series to define me, as well as the generation I’m a part of. The Boxcar Children taught me to read desperately, and the first time I read these books, I missed the subtleties as I flew through each chapter. The Harry Potter movies revealed what I had missed, and then the books showed me what the movies had missed—Harry Potter taught me the value of rereading, so much so that I’ve lost count of how many times I’ve read each book. It’s also just plain awesome.

Read my previous post on Harry Potter to learn more!

  • Oh, The Places You’ll Go! by Dr. Seuss

Surprisingly, this book had more meaning as I grew up. As a child, I don’t remember reading it, but I picked it up again for a strange assignment in college (I’ll spare you the gory details). But suddenly, with my career choices ahead of me and my future in question, this book made all kinds of sense. Dr. Seuss’ works have a way of speaking to the soul, bypassing the mental challenge of reading entirely. Though I could have chosen any of his other soul-speaking works, this one gave me the best advice, and I’m particularly grateful for that.

  • A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens

This is one of those novels that isn’t really my favorite. I like it, certainly, but it took me two tries to really get into it. My first try reading this novel was a catastrophic nightmare (again, I’ll spare you the gory details), but when I read it again, there was a moment that sticks with me to this day. I was speaking to my dad about parts of the novel that impressed me, and about the characters, and the symbolism, and this cool part over here and that cool part over there…when he stopped me and asked if I had ever considered being a teacher.

That conversation changed my life. On one hand, it gave me the inspiration to discover the passion and empathy I have with children, and the beauty in that incredibly important job. On the other hand, it has caused me more strife, anguish, and panic than I have ever experienced. As odd as it seems, I am thankful for both the good and the bad that came of it.

  • Ulysses by James Joyce

I’ll be saving most of my Ulysses discussion for the blog post dedicated to it, way off somewhere in the future, but it would be a disservice not to mention it. Everything I’ve read since reading Ulysses feels different. My own writing feels different. Ulysses taught me to see differently, to question even the most fundamental truths, and to understand the everyday human experience as an epic journey out into the world and back again. I finished it almost a year ago now, and I still fell a swell of awe and beauty remembering the heroes of Joyce’s Dublin.

  • Wicked by Gregory MaGuire

My last selection is a complicated choice, but I ultimately chose it for the same reason Harry Potter impacted me. Harry Potter grew up, and the series grew up with him, and I grew up with the series. Wicked did something similar—it took a story I knew and made it more adult (by that, of course I mean it was more chaotic, more complicated, and less censored than the original). Excluding classroom literature assignments, I think this is the first truly “adult” book I ever read. It entered me into a world I didn’t really like, but couldn’t look away from either, and it’s deliberate non-structure, harsh political themes, and challenging ideas about evil strained my previously held notions.

You knew this question was coming—what books are you thankful for? Let me know in the comments.

I won’t be able to post next week—class is officially cancelled (and I LOVE that I have the power to do that). For the month of November, I have been participating in NaNoWriMo, or National Novel Writing Month. If you’ve heard of it or tried it, you’ll know the immense joy and suffering I am experiencing during the month of November. It just so happens that the last day of the month is on a Wednesday, when I would usually have my blog post ready to go. I will instead dedicate the last week of November to my own fantasy fiction.

Enjoy your Thanksgiving and your November!

Prof. Jeffrey

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