“It’s enough for a man to understand his own business and not to interfere with other people’s” Word choice of business, corporate, cold highlights Scrooge’s economical stand point in life. Shows Scrooge’s lack of empathy and unwillingness to be a part of human society.

Scrooge: “solitary as an oyster”

“church” – constant references to religion in the text (mortality/ heaven and hell)

“church whose gruff bell” – the word choice of gruff has negative suggestions, it has suggestion of being unpleasant, of being harsh to those in its presence and of being cold.

(AO3 – 19^th Century Christian Britain)

“the church…whose gruff old bell was always peeping slily down at Scrooge” The word choice of peeping

Word choice- words all have a denotation (literal meaning), and some have a connotation (suggestions)

 

Example – She walked into the room

She strolled into the room

She meandered into the room

She ambled into the room

She marched into the room

All above words  the same denotation = walk

However their connotations (suggestions) are all different.

Words are often chosen for their connotations and not for their denotations.

The word choice of…has suggestions of (3)

The word choice of ambled suggests she is not concerned with the event she is attending, she is relaxed and not worried.

What does that word suggest about the way in which the action is performed and what does it say about the person doing it.

The corpse lay cold.

The word choice of corpse is associated with the horror genre, is clinical and has suggestions of a lack of feeling towards the victim.

 “the church…whose gruff old bell was always peeping slily down at Scrooge” The word choice of peeping

Peeping – watched

The word choice of peeping has suggestions of watching without wanting to be noticed, of being sneaky and being invasive and unwanted. Furthermore by describing the church bell as “peeping slyly” Dickens uses the bell as a symbol of religion therefore suggesting that religion/ God is ever present in Scrooge’s life even if it is unwanted.

The word choice of slily…

Along with religion, Dickens also frequently includes the Gothic element e.g. “phantom” “Gothic window”.

Here is a list of some common elements found in Gothic novels: Gloomy, decaying setting (haunted houses or castles with secret passages, trapdoors, and other mysterious architecture) Supernatural beings or monsters (ghosts, vampires, zombies, giants) Curses or prophecies