Saturday, December 23, 2006

Who is Fiction's Best Known Executor?

Come now! 'Tis the season when the answer should be at the tip of your tongue:

"[Jacob Marley's] sole executor, his sole administrator, his sole assign, his sole residuary legatee, his sole friend and sole mourner" was . . . Ebeneezer Scrooge.

Flinty old coot, Ebeneezer Scrooge. Happily, the Christmas spirit(s) set him right.

"It was always said of him," Dickens tells us, "that he knew how to keep Christmas well, if any man alive possessed the knowledge.

"May that be truly said of us, and all of us!"

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