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Jackie Pascoe's avatar

I randomly picked the page in the Christmas Present stave, where Scrooge observes how the Cratchit family spend Christmas. It’s the scene that contains Tiny Tim saying “God bless us every one!”

https://www.themorgan.org/collections/works/dickens/ChristmasCarol/42

My overall takeaway is that the changes increase emotional intensity, empathy, compassion – and sentimentality.

BTW -- In an excellent recent episode of In Our Time with Melvyn Bragg about A Christmas Carol, the panel of academics had an interesting discussion about sentimentality – rescuing it I think from our usual deprecation of the idea. The link is to the BBC page but you can get it wherever you download podcasts.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m0012fl5

First draft version, complete text I examined:

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He sat beside his father <close?>, <illegible word>. Bob held his withered <strikeout>hand<strikeout> little hand in his, as if he <illegible> wished to keep the child and feared <he> might be taken from him.

“Spirit,” said Scrooge, with an interest he had never felt before. “I hope <the boy?> will live?”

First published edition version:

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He sat very close to his father's side upon his little stool. Bob held his withered little hand in his, as if he loved the child, and wished to keep him by his side, and dreaded that he might be taken from him.

"Spirit," said Scrooge, with an interest he had never felt before, "tell me if Tiny Tim will live."

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My comments:

1.

From: He sat beside his father <close?>, <illegible word>...

To: He sat very close to his father's side...

“He sat very close to his father’s side": intensifies loving connection between Tiny Tim and Father.

2. Addition of " upon his little stool."

An introduced object - such a tender diminutive for us to rest our eyes on. Tim needs that stool because he’s lame. I bet no other child in this very poor family has their own stool--or begrudges Tim his. We need the stool to help our tears to flow.

3. Quick intensification of heart rending tenderness

Bob held his withered hand

Bob held his withered little hand

Dickens made this change in-line – swiftly – as he wrote. He knew immediately what to add.

4. Different tone of Scrooge’s question re Tiny Tim’s fate:

“Spirit,” said Scrooge, with an interest he had never felt before. “I hope <the boy?> will live?”

"Spirit," said Scrooge, with an interest he had never felt before, "tell me if Tiny Tim will live."

What a difference! – first draft he goes for a fearful, tentative question. Scrooge is afraid to ask, afraid of the answer

Second draft – a demand! Scrooge is full of passion – compassion – he can’t bear the thought of Tim dying now.

Bonus material:

And of course the ghost pushes the dagger deep into Scrooge’s heart – skewering him with his former heartless words -- I’ll just put what comes next in the first edition text here to give you the pleasure of it:

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"I see a vacant seat," replied the Ghost, "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."

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Bryce Taylor's avatar

Starting a band called “Gust of Maleness.” Who’s in?

Funny you mention Merton—I was thinking of the “apophatic” tradition of Christian spirituality, which approaches God through negation. We might approach writing in the same way, negating “dogmas” (or our limited sense of them) to get at what is real and fresh.

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