Comparing A Christmas Carol And Dante's Inferno

A cold chill runs down your spine as you walk through the mountain passes. This odd feeling causes you stop for a moment to rest and look around. You see nothing out of the ordinary so you continue on with your journey. Once again this chill hits you and the hair on your stands up and goosebumps pop up over your body. This time you stop and see a hazy figure standing behind you. The figure looks at you and says that it has a journey planned for you. This parallels what the main characters would have felt in A Christmas Carol and Dante’s Inferno. The main characters set out on a journey and many main points in these stories to each other. The main points shared between A Christmas Carol and Dante’s Inferno abide by the supernatural elements, the implications of choices, and compassion.

In A Christmas Carol the supernatural demonstrates a punishment toward a few people that stand out as dishonorable people. Dickens mentions “Every one of them wore chains like Marley’s Ghost” (Dickens Stave One). This shows that Dickens has chose to punish these sinners by forcing them to drag chains around in the afterlife. This punishment of sinners parallels much of what occurs in Dante’s Inferno. Dantes writes “THROUGH ME THE WAY INTO THE SUFFERING CITY, THROUGH ME THE WAY TO THE ETERNAL PAIN.” (Canto 3, Dante). This hung on a sign above the entrance of hell, showing that all sinners receive punishment and made to suffer. A main difference in these two stories represents how the spirits take in their treatment. In inferno the spirits receive punishment in different ways depending on what sins they committed. In A Christmas Carol all the spirits have the same punishment and many of them carry the guilt of the same sin, showing that Dante condemns more people than Dickens. Many of the spirits represent the implications of