
The Man Who Invented Christmas
How Charles Dickens's A Christmas Carol Rescued His Career and Revived Our Holiday Spirits
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Narrated by:
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Jonathan Davis
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By:
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Les Standiford
As uplifting as the tale of Scrooge itself, this is the story of how Charles Dickens revived the signal holiday of the Western world.
Just before Christmas in 1843, a debt-ridden and dispirited Charles Dickens wrote a small book he hoped would keep his creditors at bay. His publisher turned it down, so Dickens used what little money he had to put out A Christmas Carol himself. He worried it might be the end of his career as a novelist.
The book immediately caused a sensation. And it breathed new life into a holiday that had fallen into disfavor, undermined by lingering Puritanism and the cold modernity of the Industrial Revolution. It was a harsh and dreary age, in desperate need of spiritual renewal, ready to embrace a book that ended with blessings for one and all.
With warmth, wit, and an infusion of Christmas cheer, Les Standiford whisks us back to Victorian England, its most beloved storyteller, and the birth of the Christmas we know best. The Man Who Invented Christmas is a rich and satisfying listen for Scrooges and sentimentalists alike.
©2008 Les Standiford (P)2017 Audible, Inc.Listeners also enjoyed...




















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Interesting history of a great author
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Getting to know Dickens
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If you are simply looking for a novelization of the Hollywood film, then you might want to go elsewhere...then again, I fell asleep while watching the movie, so maybe I am not the best judge of how close it follows the book.
But let's be serious. if you're actually reading this, you're the type of person that knows that the book is better.
Better Than the Movie that I fell Asleep During
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Yet, I did have some problems with the production. For the first time I have encountered, this audible production had issues such as pieces of audio that you can tell were added later. I cannot tell if this is because they made a mistake while recording one day and had to re-record lines, or what, but there are times when the narrator speaks one or two sentences with a noticeably different audio quality to them. This does bring it down for me.
Overall, this was a good book if you want to know more about Dicken's famous tale.
Great Story with a few audio issues.
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Enjoyable Book
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A great historical Christmas listen
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Great book!!
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Too much about publishing
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The narrator is very professional (despite the occasional mispronunciation). Perhaps a British narrator might have felt more appropriate for the subject, but i can hardly fault this gentleman for that. I WAS distracted by the obvious changes in audio quality for the many segments where he was obviously called back to the studio (perhaps a different studio?) to re-read portions that must have contained errors.
Despite these gripes, I appreciate the context this author has provided to Dickens' beloved tale, and I'm pleased to understand more about the life, times, and circumstances of Charles Dickens before, during, and after his creation of "A Christmas Carol".
More Scholarly than Entertaining
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4.25 stars
Concise Summary . . .
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