The 24th Annual Book Report Competition for secondary school students
Class: 4C
Student: Hung Pui Yan, Ada
Title of the book: A Christmas Carol
Author: Charles Dickens
Publisher: Black Cat
Scrooge was a cross, miserable, mean old man. But he was a clever businessman. He hated Christmas very much because he did not earn any money on that day. Scrooge and his working partner, Marley, had a company. Marley died seven years ago. In his company, there was a clerk called Bob Cratchit. He got very little money a week. Since Scrooge was only interested in money, he never spent any money and gave any away.
On Christmas Eve, there were three spirits, the Ghost of Christmas Past, the Ghost of Christmas Present and the Ghost of Christmas Yet To come, came to visit him and took him traveling the past, present and future. Each spirit taught him a different lesson. The Ghost of Christmas Past brought him back to the place where he was born and reminded him of his lonely childhood. Then Scrooge was brought to Fezziwig’s office where he had worked as apprentice. He found out how good Fezziwig had treated his clerks and he felt ashamed of having treated his clerk bad. The Ghost of Christmas Present brought him to Bob Cratchit’s home and let him see how enjoyable the Cratchit’s family was at Christmas even they were poor. And then the spirit took him to his nephew’s home. Scrooge found that his nephew was still very concerned about him. He felt very sorry to his nephew because he had told him to go away. The Ghost of Christmas Yet To Come showed the apathetic attitude of people towards his death and led him to see a grave with his name carved on.
After the three spirits visited him, he learnt a lesson that he would never forget. Also, he realized that he still had a chance to change his future and eventually he changed his life.
From reading the story, I learnt two things. We have to treasure what we have now and grasp our chance. Money is not the most important thing in our life. Although we can buy many things with money, we cannot buy true love and happiness from our friends and family since true love and happiness are invaluable.
In the story, notwithstanding Scrooge earned as much as money he wanted, he still did not satisfy with himself. I think he was lack of friends and no one appreciated his success and felt proud of him. Before he changed, he had no friends in his life. Money was his only friend. He could not share his emotion with money. It made him become more self-centred. This shows that we will be miserable if we have no friends. For happiness, no matter you are rich or poor, you can make yourself living happily. ‘Helping others is the basis of happiness.’ We are glad to see people smile after they are being helped. A little greeting can also give people a warm consolation.
When we die, we cannot take money away. But the love and memory will still be in our mind. Therefore, we should treasure what we have now. Treasure our friendship, treasure our family and treasure our time to help more people. Then, we can have a great memory in our mind forever and we won’t regret about that.
In the story, Scrooge had a chance to change his life and realized that money couldn’t buy happy life or peaceful death after the three spirits came to visit him. In fact, no spirits will come to visit us and tell us what we have done wrong and then give us a chance to change. But we are the same as Scrooge – we cannot change the past, but we can change the future.
When we are born, many chances are waiting for us. But when we are growing, the chances, which are waiting for us, become fewer. Contrarily, we have to grasp the chances by ourselves. ‘Time and tide wait for no man’. Chance does not wait for us too. We ought to grasp the chance and change our future. We also have set targets for our future.