The characters Ebenezer Scrooge and Jacob Marley are from Charles Dickens' 1843 novel, "A Christmas Carol." Scrooge was a miserly old man who detested Christmas and things that brought joy. He is the main character of the book. When he arrives at his house, ready to spend Christmas Eve alone, he is visited by the ghost of his dead business partner, Jacob Marley. Marley, who died seven years earlier on Christmas Eve, spent his life taking advantage of the poor and as a result is damned to walk the Earth for eternity bound in chains of his own greed. Marley warns Scrooge that he could end up the same way, and that as a final chance of escape he will be visited by three spirits: Past, Present, and Yet to Come.


