A Christmas Carol

I spent a wonderful Sunday afternoon watching the City Circle Community Theater's production of 'A Christmas Carol' at the lovely Coralville Center for the Performing Arts--and I highly recommend it--the performances yet to come are this Friday-Sunday. It is a fabulous space, and there is something really cosey about community theater. Those are people we know up there doing such a great job performing classic stories for our entertainment. The Dickens tale, set in Victorian England, still resonates today. Why? It is a classic redemption tale, and we Americans are complete suckers for redemption. What does that mean? Here is a general definition: A redemption theme is a story paradigm for fiction that centers around a fundamental moral arc within the main character from bad to good. At the start of the story the character will be deeply flawed in a way that reverberates throughout the story, reflected by the character’s choices and actions. By the end of the story the character has undergone a “trial by fire” that results in a Phoenix experience of rising from the ashes, a totally new, more powerful and more whole person. Yes indeed. This story fits that to a tee. In fact, Scroodge has become a big name over the past 100 years. The story is well known, and has been told a number of different ways in recent years ('Scroodged' is my favorite modern verison of the story). The scare tactic is the central agent of the change from bad to good--plus a gentle reminder in the midst of it all that at one time Scroodge was in love himself, that he gave that up for the pursuit of wealth, and perhaps he has some regrets about that. The story seems particularly poignant this year, as the gap between rich and poor is as great as it was in Victorian England and the Occupy Wall Street and others have reminded us that the rapid accumulation of wealth by a few has come at the expense of many in the middle class. And it has been remorselessly acquired. Sound familiar? Time for the ghosts of Christmas past, present, and future to start paying some visits to the robber barons of our time.