Dickens’s tale has proven timeless, as it works with universal themes revolving around wealth, poverty, charity, and happiness. It gives us a self-interested rich person to hate and the working poor — and their helpless children — to sympathize with. That was relevant back in the 19th century, and it’s certainly still relevant now. The same subjects appear in most of Dickens’s fiction, but in “A Christmas Carol” they’re delivered with great concision, and with an entertaining supernatural element, the ghosts. The story of Ebenezer Scrooge, Charles Dickens’s “A Christmas Carol,” was first published in December of 1843. Since then,...