Christmas Stories (commemorative edition)

It has been said that Charles Dickens invented the celebration of Christmas as we know it, and perhaps no other writer has so masterfully evoked the simultaneously joyful and elegiac spirit of that time of year. Inspired by the 1852 English edition, this volume brings together the celebrated "A Christmas Carol" and four other Christmas-themed stories: "The Chimes," "The Cricket on the Hearth," "The Battle of Life," and "The Haunted." Throughout, the main themes of the Dickensian universe are prominent: charity, childhood, folk legends, social inequalities, dreams, and personal redemption.

This edition includes an introduction by Michael Slater, Emeritus Professor of Victorian Literature at Birkbeck College, University of London, and one of the world's leading experts on the life and work of the English author. Thanks to his notes, the beauty of this essential work of fiction is enhanced by a precise understanding of an entire era.