Anthony Walters as Tim Crachit

 I just happened upon this picture of Anthony Walters as "Tiny Tim" Crachit from George Scott's Carol today. As the picture shows he was suitably pathetic for the role. 

Kim Downer in George Scott's Carol

                                               

Here is a post I found about an actor named Kim Downer who was in George Scott's Christmas Carol, I hadn't heard of him, but it looks like he could of played Fred or even Bob Crachit. Those roles were played by Roger Rees and David Warner respectively. This guy was an extra, who fondly recalled having met George C. Scott.

https://www.shropshirestar.com/entertainment/shrewsbury-entertainment/2021/12/15/fake-snow-and-film-stars-when-a-christmas-carol-came-to-shrewsbury/

The Stephen King Connection?

 

    Nell Trent                                     Theodore Trenton

Stephen King has often claimed that he intended for Theodore "Tad" Trenton to survive in the novel Cujo, but when he came to the end, he "discovered" that the child did die after all. 

Now back as a teen not long, after I read the book, I just supposed that to be rot. I mean, perhaps he met that metaphorically, or he thought it was the ending that "worked." But in fiction the author is tottally in control. he is what ultimately determines the fate the characters. SK wasn't always consistent when he  said "I had to kill him off" or "I did it. I'm not totally glad I did it but..", versus "He died on his own."

The author is in control in fiction.

Or is he?

But if King didn't ultimately determine the Tadder's fate, then who or what did?

If you take it literally that it wasn't King who did, then we're talking in the realm of God or Fate. Something like that.

And God of Fate, in other words mysterious forces that control what happens, and are at least sometimes beyond human control is something I've grown to believe in. How much control do we really have? The same certainly would apply to authors, what books get written, or finished, and what fictional characters survive and which do not. 

Another perhaps equally infamous child death was that of "Little Nell" Trent of Dickens' The Old Curiousity Shop. Readers on both sides of the Atlantic were on the edge of the seats waiting to see if thirteen-year-old Nell would survive. Dickens disappointed the majority of them, of course. Was it for the best, artistically speaking? Dickens, had his reasons, of course just as King did. In this case, its said that he didn't want his child characters to grow up and be corrupted. But of course, many of them did survive, while others did not. He very nearly kills off Oliver's aunt seventeen-year-old Rose as well. I'm not sure what made him decide to spare her life in the end, but he seemed to be disturbed by the deaths of fragile young girls and women, yet was impelled to include it in fiction, something like his friend and contemporary, Edgar Allen Poe, influenced by the death of his young mother, and one of his girlfriends. 

The fact Nell is a girl-child undoubtedly had something to do with it. Purity and innocence was and is even today, valued more highly in the "fairer sex." Then again today that might be considered a bit sexist, which wouldn't make Dickens motivations for killing her very reputable. But just how much control did Dickens(or King) have anyway, even though they personal motives? 

The fact that both Little Nell and Theodore have almost the same last name is strikingly odd. King is today's nearest analogue to Dickens, in terms of popularity, output, depth of character and intricacy of plot. Dickens confined his weird elements almost entirely to his ghost tales (there's more of those than just Scrooge, in case you didn't know), and King does not, but in sheer scope, the two authors clearly rival each other. the descions such influential authors make concerning the lives and deaths of their characters is enough to influence popular culture, and culture as a whole. 

The authors had their own personal demons. But why did they have those personal demons in the first place?

The deaths of Nell and Tad seem to parallel on another. Does this in fact mean they were also predetermined? 

Perhaps King little less control in killing off the Tadder than he even guessed.