A Christmas Carol

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So, is Ebeneezer Scrooge an Aspie?

From what I know about the character:
* had only one friend (Jacob Marley, the dead business partner)
* before he was visited by the Ghosts of Christmas Past, Present, and Yet to Come, he cared only about money, not people

He might be an Aspie or he could just been greedy.

When he was younger, he knew love, but felt it more important to apply himself to his studies, in order to impress his father. This is common among NTs as well, and tends to make people misanthropic.

Weird, I'm in that play right now.

I don't think he had Asperger's. He was just a money-obsessed prick. He probably would have liked Ayn Rand, that's for sure.

He wasn't an Aspie, or Jewish for that matter. Scrooge was just overly greedy.

By Ayn Rand fan, I meant that she advocated greed (although I do remember reading somewhere that some people have said that he was Jewish and hence the book was anti-Semitic). I agree though. Saying that he had AS would really, really be reaching.

I don't know. Maybe he turned to greed because he didn't feel empathy towards other people and couldn't function very well with social relationships.

I don't believe that Scrooge is Jewish because in both the book and movie productions there was no mentioning of Hanukkah at all. He said "Bah humbug" to Christmas, not Hanukkah. The Jewish moneylender is a stereotype.

Also, have many of you actually read the book?

No, Scrooge was not meant to have AS or to be Jewish. The story was meant to address social issues at the time it was written, mainly the plight of the impoverished British working class created after the Industrial Revolution. Scrooge is a personification of the wealthy, prosperous classes who were indifferent to their misery. He even makes reference to the "Poor Laws," which were enacted at the time.

The only reason anyone thinks he's Jewish is because the original illustrations featured him with a hooked nose, but a lot of English people have hooked noses.

I never said that he was Jewish. Some people thought that he was Jewish. I am not one of them, I would assume that he was apathetic to religion.

Also, am I the only one who thinks that we're reading way much into fictional characters?

No, you're not... I find most people's suggestions of "possible Aspie characters" to be ridiculous.

But in the end, it was shown that Scrooge could feel empathy and have social relationships. He was never incapable of it... he just needed to be "enlightened."

Not at all. First it was that guy from those stupid Twilight books and now Ebenezer Scrooge. There's porbably more
I'm forgetting. People have got to understand that fictional characters are not real. They don't have life beyond the pages.

Also, the Scrooge/Ayn Rand comparison was pretty apt. Her philosophy was not all that different from the kind of things Scrooge talked about.

My favorite Scrooge that I never get sick of is the 1951 version with Alastair Sim. I can relate to the way he feels about life in general after losing his sister and having a neglectful dad. I don't think it has anything to do with him being aspie and I don't see so much of the importance on Christmas aspect of it. I kind of see a guy who's learning more about himself and how his actions affect him in many ways.

There's just a lot I can relate to in the his story. Here's a short example of one classic I think was well done even for its time. They have another version of it in color.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5DAib6LwKAQ[/youtube]

Nah, give me Michael Caine any day! Don't think he was AS, just a b-word!