They could've added 10 minutes to the movie to show that C maybe could be a good ball player, or artist, or writer who cares about the civil rights. So this idea of "wasted talent" is just somthing that's said and not supported by the story in any way. Lorenzo is a bus driver, Sonny is a mob boss, C and his friends do nothing but hang out all day on the street. The problem is, no one in the movie has any discernable talent that's at any risk of going to waste. In it, DeNiro's character (Lorenzo) drives home the idea to his son Calogero (or "C") that "there's nothing worse in life than wasted talent." It's said multiple times, and it's a great message that's always stuck with me. It's a simple story told extremely well and I think we need more movies like it. I've probably watched it more than a dozen times. It could be said he expanded on the character of Gabriel Grub from The Pickwick Papers (1837).īut while the name Scrooge is now a byword for a selfish, miserly person, the book ends on a note of optimism: “God bless us, every one!” Surely Scroggie and Elwes would applaud that sentiment too.First I love this movie. “His avarice,” says Topham, “consisted not in hard-heartedness, but in self-denial.” He left the equivalent of over £28million to his children after his death in 1789.ĭickens is certainly no stranger to the miser as a type. Unusually for a miser, Elwes could be affable, considerate and generous with his cash, often lending to those in need (without the usury terms that Scrooge would recognise) - and losing it. “All earthly comforts he voluntarily denied himself: he would walk home in the rain, in London, sooner than pay a shilling for a coach: he would sit in wet clothes sooner than have a fire to dry them: he would eat his provisions in the last stage of putrefaction sooner than have afresh joint from the butcher's…”Īnd this was a man who was bequeathed an estate by his uncle which exceeded £18million in today’s money. Unusually for a miser, Elwes could be affable, considerate and generous with his cash.ĭickens would have known of Elwes through a biography written by Edward Topham, Life of the Late John Elwes (1790), which became a bestseller, going through 12 editions and establishing ‘Elwes the miser’ as the archetypal penny-pincher: But there are plans to recognise Scroggie and his life by erecting a memorial and drawing attention to his literary influence. Unfortunately, the grave marker was lost during restoration of the Kirk in 1932. He may have taken advantage of one of his servants too, having a child out of wedlock - not the behaviour you would expect from Dickens’ Scrooge well, maybe after the visitations. ![]() He was a jovial man and a scallywag who once interrupted the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland by goosing the Countess of Mansfield. Scroggie imported wine in bulk and exported whisky in return, building a reputation and gaining royal patronage, leading to two years acting as Edinburgh’s Lord Provost. Research by political economist Peter Clark has shown that he had been a corn trader and vintner whose family had supplied Captain Cook’s ship Endeavour as it charted the Pacific. He couldn’t have been more wrong about the real Scroggie. Somehow Dickens misread this as ‘mean man’ and later wrote in his notebook: "To be remembered through eternity only for being mean seemed the greatest testament to a life wasted." The gravestone gave ‘meal man’ as Scroggie’s profession, referring to his trade as a merchant. It’s been suggested that during a walk in Edinburgh’s Canongate kirkyard in June 1841, Dickens came across the gravestone of one Ebenezer Lennox Scroggie. ![]() Dickens couldn’t have been more wrong about the real Scroggieīut how did the author create Ebenezer Scrooge – "a squeezing, wrenching, grasping, scraping, clutching, covetous, old sinner," as Dickens describes him?
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