Seven is also in the New Testament quite a bit. The Book of Revelation has 7 all over it - it’s written to Seven churches in Asia, Seven Seals, Seven Spirits of God, etc, etc.
I agree with you that it is considered an important mystical number, hence that’s why I think he comes back 7 years later.
I have been digging, including in my book, Dickens of London, and apparently Charles Dickens had a nephew with a disability who was the model for Tiny Tim (who went through a number of name in various drafts of the manuscript). I cannot find out how old he was at the time the novella was written, though.
OT, but Tom’s disposition was not unrealistic. I actually knew a kid like him. I worked with him when I worked in community living for disabled people, and he was the ringbearer at my wedding. He was extremely bright, and always in a cheerful mood. He had CP, and used an electric wheelchair. He was one of the coolest kids I ever knew. He’s about 24 now. I haven’t seen him in a while, but I get his mother’s Xmas letter every year, and I always send her a card acknowledging it. He’s in grad school now.
Well, yeah, that’s always a possibility. The “Spirit of Christmas” may be an abstract within us all, and it just burst forth from Scrooge’s mind one day at random.
Maybe Hamlet never spoke with his dead father. Oh yeah, Horatio and the others saw something, but only Hamlet had a secret dialog. And wouldn’t cha know – dad’s ghost says just what Hamlet suspected. How convenient.
You can apply a rational explanation to (almost) any M. Knight Shalyman movie, if you believe the protagonist is a freaking loon who’ll distort their own reporting to the viewer to suit themselves.
Didn’t Slartibartfarst say, “Oh that’s just paranoia, everyone in the universe has that.”
There’s stuff associated with the time to be sure. Another example: Bob Crachit’s son is now old enough to apprentice to Scrooge’s nephew – at a high wage. Scrooge may have heard that elsewhere, and it may have rankled him – while simultaneously reminding him of good times with Fezzywig (damn, that sounds dirtier than I meant it to.) And he may suspect Crachit’s eldest daughter is due for marrying and starting her own family soon. This is the last “workhouse holiday” she’ll get.
Nobody’s mentioned Seagram’s 7.
The solution is obvious - Scrooge is a replicant.
Oh, I’m not arguing for a totally rational explanation of this (or any other) literary work. But it was rather clever of Dickens to leave the option open for a purely psychological explanation of the events. Again, I think the subtlety is often overlooked when it is produced for other media.
Later in the play, Hamlet refers to death as the undiscovered country that no traveler returns from. Which is a strange line for somebody who recently talked to a ghost.
Monica Geller: “Seven! Seven! Seven! Seven! SEVEN!!!”
Huh. I never interpreted it that way when I read it before, but you are correct.
“Spirit,” said Scrooge, with an interest he had never felt before, “tell me if Tiny Tim will live.”
“I see a vacant seat,” replied the Ghost [of Christmas Present] , “in the poor chimney-corner, and a crutch without an owner, carefully preserved. If these shadows remain unaltered by the Future, the child will die.”
“No, no,” said Scrooge. “Oh, no, kind Spirit! say he will be spared.”
“If these shadows remain unaltered by the Future, none other of my race,” returned the Ghost, “will find him here. What then? If he be like to die, he had better do it, and decrease the surplus population.”
(bolding and brackets mine) The Ghost of Christmas Present lives but one year. And the other Ghosts only see Christmases. So if this Ghost is the last who will see him, then Tim will die by next year.
7 of 9
Well, I know for sure that my middle school production got it right, because I was Scrooge, and in the whole play there was all of about six seconds when I wasn’t on stage. I and the kid who played Bob Cratchitt also noticed that, between the two of us, we had the entire play memorized, because every single line was either delivered by one of us, the cue for one of us, or cued by one of us. In retrospect, I’m a little surprised that a middle school would pick a play that sits so heavily on the shoulders of one or two kids.
Huh, I thought the GC-Present lived only one day (i.e. December 24th, expiring at midnight) but in skimming the text I see some potential contradictions:
Early in the story, at the counting house:
During Marley’s visit:
Later, after the three Spirits have passed:
Bolding added. I’d always assumed (and the various film adaptations seem to agree) that the story begins on the 24th, and that Marley and the Spirits visit Scrooge on that night, with the GC-Present ending his visit (and expiring) at midnight and GC-Future arriving around 1 a.m. on the morning of the 25th. Marley says the visits will be on subsequent days (the 22nd-24th of December?) but other passages don’t match.
Or maybe Scrooge does experience them one per night over the course of three nights, but those three nights (and the intervening joyless days) all occur between the clock starting to strike midnight and finishing on Christmas Eve. The supernatural doesn’t need to conform to the rules of our world.
I think it more likely Dickens screwed up and his editor didn’t catch it. Marley should have visited at around 9 p.m. (on the 24th) and warned of spirits that would stop by at 10, 11, and shortly after midnight.
No. When Scrooge awakes from the dream, and calls to the boy down in the street he says:
“What’s to-day, my fine fellow?” said Scrooge.
“To-day!” replied the boy. “Why, Christmas Day.”
“It’s Christmas Day!” said Scrooge to himself. “I haven’t missed it. The Spirits have done it all in one night. They can do anything they like. Of course they can. Of course they can. Hallo, my fine fellow!”
So, Chronos has it right!
mc
I can see why Scrooge might think he was with the spirits for days (especially the first one, since it involves traipsing through multiple events of Scrooge’s past over a period of decades) and the whole experience is so discombobulating that he might lose track of time completely, but the earlier conversation with Cratchit clearly takes place on the 24th. Further, here is the transition from the visit of GC-Past to GC-Present:
Good God, this is overly wordy. I read it as Scrooge falls asleep after GC-Past disappears and wakens a little later, at 1 a.m. on the morning of the 25th, to be accosted by GC-Present. What follows feels like a day to Scrooge, ending with the clock striking midnight and GC-Present “dying” and being near-immediately replaced by GC-Future:
Simplest explanation is that Marley spoke of virtual days rather than literal ones (there’s certainly no indication of normal days passing between the visits), and given the necessary magic involved… why not? Personally, I think it would have been simpler for Marley to predict and for the Ghosts to each take an hour over the night of the 24th-25th, then have Scrooge be all shocked that so little time has passed during each visit.
Yeah, that’s right. I’m editing Dickens. Humbug!