My friend Tilda Lamb (who looks remarkably like the actress Alex Kingston) once said something to me about the nature of “coincidence”, and perhaps, it was that observation that got me started. We were talking about how ‘A Christmas Carol’ has always been such an important story to me, and she, being just about the number one expert on all things Dickensian, was regaling me with the story of why Ebenezer Scrooge is called Ebenezer Scrooge  - or, at least, the “Scrooge” part. I had remarked that most people who felt they were in the know enough to say something about the matter, didn’t seem to be in the know at all, but in the dark, suggesting vaguely it was partly inspired by the word "scrouge", meaning "crowd" or "squeeze", but Tilda just made a noise that I can best spell like this: ‘Ppffffffsssstt!’ I remember it really well because she emphasized her disdain for the idea by waving her melted brie baguette in my face just like Nudeweets waves her melted brie baguette in Maltibald’s face near the end of “Love & Light & Marzipan”, and then she told me that her research had suggested that Dickens actually knew a chap called Ernst Scrooge, a German Jewish immigrant, who had famously undergone a bizarre transformation in personality, following a blow to the head in a ludicrous accident, just like my character of Henry Salmon did in that same book. Having once been a hard-nosed, tight fisted businessman, on regaining consciousness, the real Ernst Scrooge had immediately set about distributing his fortune amongst the poor and needy - earning him the epithet “The Angel of East End”. I must admit I was sceptical. Tilda said she had gleaned this information, completely by accident, when reading a comment by Ian Fleming (who wrote the James Bond novels) that he had actually met Ernst’s grandson, Stavro, in France in 1940, and he had told Fleming all about it. This in turn gave Fleming the Christian names for his most notorious villain, “Ernst Stavro Blofeld”.  Anyway; Dickens changed “Ernst” to “Ebenezer” and the rest is history – or possibly not. What else was I going to say? Oh yes! Tilda then casually mentioned she had seen just two productions of “A Christmas Carol” in the last few years - both in the United States - and claimed that the character of Scrooge had been played by one Michael Ernst in the first production, and by a certain Lee Ernst in second. I studied her expression: Nothing doing. There was no indication I was having either (or both) of my legs pulled, but no suggestion that I wasn’t either. The steam from her hot chocolate was condensing on the lenses of her larger than necessary, round, steel rimmed spectacles.

‘You see, kiddo’ she said ‘either nothing is a coincidence, or everything is.’

 

Robert Elland