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Tiny Tim is a character in A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens, known for his wisdom and illness. He represents the plight of sick children in Victorian England and serves as a symbol for social justice. Some speculate his illness was polio, kidney disease, or tuberculosis. Dickens hoped to inspire change in his audience and promote reasonable treatment of the poor. The novel ends with Tiny Tim’s famous line, “God bless us all,” emphasizing the need for compassion for all sick children.
Tiny Tim is a character in the novel A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens. He is the Cratchitt’s son and the character Scrooge knows the child through his visit to the Cratchitt house with the gift of the Christmas Spirit.
Many have accused Dickens of blatant sentimentality towards Tiny Tim. He is crippled and seems wise beyond his years of him. The boy is also threatened with death, as Scrooge discovers. Indeed, Scrooge’s intervention on behalf of the Cratchitt family is the only way the child can be saved.
Some call Tiny Tim a classic Dickens character, a portrait of the wise child who will soon come out of the earth. He bears his infirmities and his illness in a way that most children think he would not be tolerated by most children, even if they are sick. Dickens lived in a world where children died, however, and while Tiny Tim’s illness and behavior may seem overtly sentimental, they can also be accurate.
With fewer cures for disease in the Victorian period, there were many children like Tiny Tim and many families who could easily understand the threat of losing one or more of their children. Indeed, for many families today, the boy still strikes a chord of sadness. There are still illnesses that push children away prematurely, and any parent with a sick child is likely to see some truth in the way he is portrayed.
In fact, some research has been done that suggests what might be causing the boy’s mysterious illness. Some suggest he suffered from polio, while others suggest kidney disease or tuberculosis. In one of the latter two cases, proper medical care may have arrested the disease. These potential hints make the child’s situation more real.
Many argue that the boy is largely symbolic of a problem Dickens wanted to drive home. There were families all over England who had sick children who could have lived without poverty. Tiny Tim is symbolic not only of these children but as a catalyst for change. Dickens probably hoped to convert more than one Scrooge by the end of A Christmas Carol.
The evidence in most of Dickens’ novels points to his continued pursuit of social justice and reasonable treatment of the poor. Tiny Tim is not just a pitiful dying child, then, but represents Dickens’ point of view. If Dickens had succeeded in making his audience understand the many empty seats left by children who could not afford medical care, he had succeeded in arguing that there was much for the poor to do.
The novel ends not with Scrooge’s words, but with those of Tiny Tim, “God bless us all.” This again suggests that the boy is, in many ways, an allegory for a fundamental argument for social justice. He does not ask for blessings only for his family, but for everyone.
While some may accuse Dickens of appealing to emotion in arguing a point, it’s a plea that still rings out. Tiny Tim simply offers the reader an opportunity to consider the many children who still have no cure for disease or money to stay well. Dickens, many would argue, would look at today’s sea of sick children and suggest that they deserve sympathy and are entitled to treatment.
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