Brilliantly simple and simply brilliant

Inspired by seeing the 1951 film version on television on Christmas Eve, I've just re-read Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol.

It was written in 1843, and took Dickens a mere six weeks to complete, apparently because he was under pressure to deliver it in order to pay off an old debt. It never ceases to amaze me how an impending deadline can bring out the best in people. Of course, it helped that Dickens was one of the best writers ever but still.

Its popularity has ensured its familiarity and this tale of revelation, realisation and redemption seems almost too straightforward by today's storytellling standards. But in fact, it is the simplicity of the story that makes it the classic that it is.

Dickens has an exquisite turn of phrase and also displays a wicked sense of humour, even, or perhaps especially, when the tone is dark. Here, Scrooge is awaiting the second spirit.

"... he was ready for a good broad field of strange appearances, and that nothing between a baby and rhinoceros would have astonished him very much... All this time, he lay upon his bed, the very core and centre of a blaze of ruddy light... and was sometimes apprehensive that he might be at that very moment an interesting case of spontaneous combustion without having the consolation of knowing it."

Towards the end of the story, we meet the spirit of Christmas yet to come, who does not speak but simply points to what Scrooge should observe.

"The spirit stopped; the hand was pointed elsewhere.

'The house is yonder,' Scrooge explained. 'Why do you point away?'

The inexorable finger underwent no change."

The idea of a finger being inexorable is brilliant but is also so simple and so apt.

A Christmas Carol also proves that you don't need to write a lot in order to
create an impact. At just under 100 pages in length, it's short but emphatic in its message, something a lot of modern writers across all media would do well to imitate.