Dr. James Emery White has an interesting article on crosswalk.com titled, "The Real Christmas Carol."
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Get this line from Emery's post, "when I first read the novel itself, after viewing various editions of the movie, I was shocked. Scrooge was not the buffoonish, almost cartoon-like character some of the movies made him out to be. He was genuinely evil. Cruel. Malicious. He was a dark and sinister. The story actually reads more like a Stephen King novel."
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I've been noticing connections between the two authors for years. And while Christmas Carol is a ghost story, understand the exact connection Emery is making -- it's an important one. He is not saying that the novel is like a Stephen King novel because it's a ghost story, but because of the strong characters.
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Redemption?
.There's another connection that is buried deeper in the article. In fact, I don't know if Emery means to be making this connection, but it has to do with redemption. As Christmas Carol is a story of redemption, many of King's stories are also redemptive in nature.
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However, while Dickens shows us a man turning from evil to the Light, King's redemption is usually a bit different. Redemption in a King novel has more to do with the innocent finding freedom or justice. It is rare in the Stephen King universe for a truly evil person to see the error of their way and turn. Of course, even Dickens had to employ three ghosts in order to get Scrooge to turn.
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If there is one story in the King cannon that offers Christmas Carol like redemption, it would have to be the Dark Tower. On the second journey, will Roland once again betray Jake? Will he continue to make the same mistakes? Or has he been changed? I don't think villain in the dark tower is not so much Walter or any other monster -- it is Roland himself. he is capable of both great wrong and good. He is strong, and for an unknown reason, is given a second chance at his journey. Wouldn't we all like that!
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Get this: I'm saying that in the S.K. universe, Luke is more likely to go over to the darkside than Anakin turn from evil.
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Not so redemptive:
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Of course, the message of Christmas Carol has a dark side. Not just ghost appearing to Scrooge, but Marley is chained in death, weighed down in a miserable pit. Or, at least, that's what the Disney movie conveys! I didn't exactly get that from the book.
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