Victorian period | The period in English history (spanning from 1837 to 1901), commonly called the Victorian period and named after Queen Victoria who reigned for most of this century (64 years). Literary texts written at this time are jointly called Victorian Literature. |
working class | The social group consisting of people who are employed for wages, especially in manual or industrial work. This group in society were notoriously exploited by the wealthy middle class in Victorian England. |
social justice | Social justice is the equal access to wealth, opportunities, and privileges within a society. Charles Dickens' key objective of writing fiction was to promote social justice by confronting and condemning the glaring inequalities in the victorian society. |
poverty | This refers to the complete lack of the means necessary to meet basic personal needs such as food, clothing and shelter. Unlike the wealthy few, majority of the Victorian society lived in poverty and this is one of the themes of 'A Christmas Carol'. |
Christmas | A key theme of 'A Christmas Carol', this festive season in which Christians celebrate the birth of Jesus was made popular across England by Dickens' ideas in this novel. |
Industrial revolution | The Industrial Revolution began in the 18th century in Great Britain. It was only It the first stepping-stone to the modern economic growth that is still growing to this day. While the nation was changing, so was the way that literature was written. |
Transformation | A key theme of the story: The huge change (from selfish and cold-hearted to generous and kind-hearted) experienced by Scrooge, the central character, after a series of terrifying, ghostly, night visitations at Christmas. |
isolation | One of the key themes of 'A Christmas Carol'. This is the state of being alone or feeling lonely and without friends or help. It also means being in a place or situation that is separate or disconnected from others as Scrooge is at the start of the story. |
Charity | The voluntary giving of help, typically in the form of money, to those in need. This is also a key theme in Dickens' 'A Christmas Carol'. |
novella | A novella is a text of written, fictional, narrative prose normally longer than a short story but shorter than a novel, somewhere between 7,500 and 40,000 words long. Unlike 'To Kill a Mockingbird' which is a novel, 'Of Mice and Men' is a novella. |
Protagonist | The leading character or one of the major characters in a play, film, novel. |
Sociopath | A person with a personality disorder manifesting itself in extreme antisocial attitudes and behaviour. |
Narcissist | A person who has an excessive interest in or admiration of themselves. |
Contrast | A difference between people or things that are being compared |
Epistolary novel | An epistolary novel is a novel written as a series of documents. The usual form is letters, although diary entries, newspaper clippings and other documents are sometimes used. Recently, electronic "documents" such as recordings, blogs, and e-mai |
To dehumanise | To treat / think of someone as if they are no longer a person |