Continuing the Christmas theme, I ensure I do something related to Charles Dickens’ story A Christmas Carol every year. That includes usually reading the story, as well as watching various adaptations on TV, or going to the theater for one of the many annual productions. (This year I’ll be seeing Christopher Eccleston as Scrooge at The Old Vic).

Interestingly, Dickens wrote other Christmas stories following the 1843 publication of A Christmas Carol – presumably feeling he’d hit on a successful strategy with the first one – with The Chimes and The Cricket on the Hearth, and The Haunted Man all having similar plot elements to the original story.

One of the reasons I like reading the story each year is to try and learn from it for my own writing. And I figure that studying an author and story that have had such success and longevity is probably a decent place to start.