Charles Dickens – Dear Liza

Dear Liza,

Christmastime always makes me think of Charles Dickens. In the 1800s, he wrote stories about life in London. Great Expectations, A Tale of Two Cities, and Oliver Twist made him popular all over the world.

But to me, his greatest work is a novella he wrote in a hurry just before Christmas in 1843 because he was out of money. This was A Christmas Carol, in Prose, Being a Ghost Story of Christmas. Starting with the eerie line, “Jacob Marley was dead, to begin with” , he weaves a tale of greed and regret, love and loss and redemption, that warms my heart every time I read it.

When I was teaching third grade, I used this story as the basis of of our literature lessons in December. I would read an abridged version of the story aloud over the course of several days. We would brainstorm words to describe Mr. Ebenezer Scrooge and then track his movement on Christmas Eve from reality to dream-like state, then back to reality. The story follows a classic Hero’s Journey, with the unlikely hero returning to real life with his reward of self-awareness and the joy of redemption.

For art lessons during those weeks, we learned about drawing faces to illustrate personality traits. Scrooge’s anger showed in pinched lips and wrinkled brows; Tiny Tim’s eternal optimism shone from his thin face.

And, in my humble opinion, the best re-telling of this story was made in 1992 by Brian Henson and his team of geniuses, The Muppets. Yes, the Muppets, Jim Henson’s puppets that we know and love. So, after we had analyzed and explored the story, we would watch the movie!

Human Michael Caine plays Scrooge to Kermit the frog’s Bob Cratchit, Gonzo’s Charles Dickens and a cast of mice, cows, and Christmas ghosts. The silliness of the Muppets softens the grim tale of Scrooge facing his greatest failings and his greatest fears all in one evening.

And because the Muppet version of the story includes songs, we interpreted lyrics. We noticed that songs sung by Bob Cratchit and Tiny Tim have mostly words like “gift” and “light”, where the song describing Scrooge is heavy with words like “grim”, and the painfully true line, “There’s nothing in nature that freezes your heart like years of being alone.” I would write the songs out on long sheets of paper and circle words as we discussed them, creating a ‘Found Word’ poem in the process.

And of course, the overall message of hope for the future shows that while we cannot undo mistakes of the past, every day (in this case, Christmas Day) is ours to grasp and move forward with.

As you can tell, I loved teaching this story. Seeing students who were struggling with English grasp a new word because of its emotional impact, or hearing small groups singing the lyrics at our class party, brought tears to my eyes.

I recommend The Muppet Christmas Carol to anyone older than 7 and on this side of the grave.

Love,

Grandma Judy

Dear Liza,

I want to tell you about a show we went to see in December. We are all great lovers of “A Christmas Carol”, a wonderfully spooky Christmas ghost story by Charles Dickens, so Grandpa Nelson got us tickets to go out and celebrate our 43rd wedding anniversary.

First we went to Henry’s Tavern, a restaurant on the corner of NE 12th and Burnside. This is an old brick building with high ceilings because it used to be the Henry Weinhard Brewery, where beer (and root beer, during Prohibition) was made for almost a hundred years. The character of the bricks and history made the building feel very special, and the food, wine and beer, were good, too. I had a Peanut Buster Burger, a hamburger with peanut better on it, which was surprisingly very good!

After we were full, we walked a few blocks to The Armory, a theater made out of, well, the 1891 Armory, where the Oregon National Guard used to train and store their weapons and equipment. It is now several theaters in one building.

Dickens stage cartoon.jpg — **Stage set at Twist Your Dickens**

Twist Your Dickens was almost ready to start, but before the show there was a short class on improvisational theater. Twist Your Dickens is performed by the Second City Production Company from Chicago, a group which is famous for having launched the careers of Chevy Chase, John Belushi, Steve Martin, and dozens of other comics and actors. They practice improvisation using the “Pillars of Improvisation”, developed by Viola Spolins back in the 1960s.

My favorite pillar is “Yes, and…” where, as an actor, you accept whatever thing your partner presents, for example, “Here is the rabbit you asked for” and add to it, such as, “It’s about time, the wedding is about to start!” This allows you to create a scene that is funny, fast, and unexpected. It is fun to do as a game, too. Try it with friends!

There was another unexpected element in this performance, a few people who stood on the side of the stage and performed the show in American Sign Language. Their gestures and facial expressions were wonderful to see, and as entertaining as the rest of the show.

ASL at Dickens.jpg — **ASL signing at Twist Your Dickens**

I didn’t take any photos during the performance, because that’s just rude, but I got a few the stage and the women signing. This photo is from the show’s website.

scrooge at Twist.jpg — **Scrooge meets Marley Photo credit: Twist your Dickens**

The play follows the outline of “A Christmas Carol”. We meet Mr. Scrooge, who is greedy and hates Christmas, and who is visited by four spirits who help him realize his awful ways and become a better person.

But with improvisation, characters sometimes make up their own lines, and other characters have to accept the new information and make it work (see “Yes, and..” above.) This lead to hilarity where the actors sometimes got so tickled they couldn’t say their lines…this is one of my favorite things about improv!

The lightning-fast costume changes went off without a hitch, with the seven actors playing hundreds of characters in the 90 minute show. By the end, when Scrooge buys the giant turkey and celebrates with the Cratchit family, we were all laughing and exhausted. We made our way out of the theater, to the bus stop and home, each of us breaking into laughter as we re-played scenes in our heads.

What a wonderful anniversary!

Love,

Grandma Judy