A Christmas Carol
by Charles Dickens · first published 1843
29% recommend67% neutral5% critical
Why HN recommends it
Short, warm story about greed turning into generosity, cited when arguing for kindness, time off and life beyond work. Works well read aloud, since Dickens performed it, and suits holiday rereading.
Summarised by Claude from recommending comments
A reprinting of the 1843 first edition, complete with the original illustrations, is supplemented by over eighty related sketches and annotations on and analyses of the text and historical notes on the writing of "The Christmas Carol."
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…everyday without a day off, it is better to have a little time off. Do you really think that things will "succeed or fail" if they don't have that time off? You should read or watch the Charles' Dickens' A Christmas Carol. Enjoy your life. Not everything has to be about work and making money all of the time. I mean... it's nice to do and a lot of people have accomplished that dream, but it's also okay to enjoy the holidays…
on “Ask HN: What's wrong with me? Ideal idea, my co-founders can't skip summer” ↗Probably my favorite to read out loud that way is A Christmas Carol. Dickens originally wanted to be an actor, found fame as a writer instead, and brought the two passions together by ging public performances reading/reciting his stories. You can really tell that A…
on “The Lost Pleasure of Reading Aloud” ↗…the sample I've experienced personally but it's over 90%. You need to read a wider selection of books, then. Try, say, The Great Gatsby, Pride and Prejudice, Of Mice and Men, Frankenstein, Jane Eyre, A Christmas Carol, The Grapes of Wrath, The Time Machine, Dune, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, the Foundation series, anything by Ray Bradbury... there's a very long list of books that are not driven by simplistic…
on “novelWriter – open-source plain text editor designed for writing novels” ↗"A Christmas Carol" by Charles Dickens.
on “Ask HN: What's the most thought provoking short story you've read?” ↗Read Bartleby the Scrivener. Or A Christmas Carol.
on “Bring back private offices” ↗A Christmas Carol is also not a real story but it is a great masterpiece helping us think about life. PS. I'm Bulgaria born, I know very well what it is like being under Russian influence or Western influence but thanks…
on “Bad behavior is almost always good politics (2021)” ↗…jobs." Fundamentally, this is the reason the rich don't stimulate the economy - we've tried that in the past (trickle down, anyone?) it doesn't work. Anyone else up for a holiday reading of Dickens' "A Christmas Carol" ?
…speaker, so avoiding Dickens as a teenager was trivial); it would have given me the wrong impression. His works are great, but require increasingly more cultural baggage to fully enjoy (excepting the Christmas Carol, which is kept in the public consciousness by various factors, including muppets). I can't imagine assigning his novels to minors unless accompanied by lessons providing a lot of context — from historical…
on “Mutual Friends: The Adventures of Charles Dickens and Wilkie Collins” ↗…other classic works. A good teacher assigns works which lie just outside of the pupil's comfort zone, but not so far out there as to make reading a chore. Want to assign Dickens? Go ahead and read the Christmas Carol at this time of year; it's short and not too hard to grasp, and with enough hooks to go into Victorian society and other related topics. But assign David Copperfield? Great book, but for teenagers way…
on “Mutual Friends: The Adventures of Charles Dickens and Wilkie Collins” ↗…up for you: You could be even richer if you were kinder. If you do so, you'll find other forms of richness as well (not just financial). To help you on your journey I suggest you read (or watch) The Christmas Carol, I like the Muppets one. It's not a religion thing (I'm not), it's a kindness benefits everyone, including yourself, thing.
on “I joined landlord groups to persuade them to be better people to their tenants” ↗…(Dick) The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy (Adams) Dracula (Stoker) To Kill a Mockingbird (Lee) The Count of Monte Cristo (Dumas) Romeo and Juliet (Shakespeare) The Wind in the Willows (Grahame) A Christmas Carol (Dickens) Alice's Adventures in Wonderland & Through the Looking-Glass (Carroll) Watership Down (Adams) Gulliver's Travels (Swift) Animal Farm (Orwell)
on “Ask HN: What book had a big impact on you as a child or teenager?” ↗"A Christmas Carol" will never be a great novel, but there is a reason it is beloved the world over for what it is.
on “I like 'em thick OR: an apology to my English teachers” ↗I have very few holiday traditions, but one is I listen to his one man show reading of a Christmas Carol. It's a great 1 hr and 45 min spent during the holidays: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B000JCE3CU
on “Patrick Stewart has died” ↗…universe? If I forgo a few sunsets, but make a thousand people's lives better, did I really do it wrong? When it comes to regrets, the literary image that stays with me comes from Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol. This part is usually omitted from popularizations and films. Marley's ghost has delivered the warning about the three spirits, but also shows him a vision of spirits wandering the earth: The air was…
on “Regrets of the Dying” ↗…without patents would look like? Actually, you can. Visit China. During the Industrial Revolution, the US was the world's cesspit of IP violation. Charles Dickens had to do his US book tours to promote _A Christmas Carol_ because it was so widely pirated, there was no hope of capturing all but a small sliver of profits from book sales. However, this ended up making Charles Dickens pretty well off.
on “Validity of software patents goes on trial today at Supreme Court ” ↗