Charles Dickens's A Christmas Carol December 2, 2009

Dickens's original manuscript of 'A Christmas Carol,' on view in Mr. Morgan's Library, serves as the centerpiece of the Morgan's holiday programs. Charles Dickens wrote 'A Christmas Carol' in a six-week flurry of activity, beginning in October 1843 and ending in time for Christmas publication. He had the manuscript bound in red morocco as a gift for Thomas Mitton, his solicitor. It passed through several owners before Pierpont Morgan acquired it during the 1890s. Visitors to The Morgan Library & Museum can view the original manuscript by Dickens in a special presentation in the museum's famed McKim Building. The manuscript reveals the author's method of composition: the pace of writing and revision, apparently contiguous, is rapid and boldly confident. Revisions are inserted for vividness and immediacy of effect.