Starting with this extract, how does Dickens present the character of Scrooge?

In the extract, Scrooge is presented as a miserly, isolated character. Dickens employs a number of methods to demonstrate this to the reader.
Firstly, Dickens' choice of adjectives which describe Scrooge's life are decidedly depressing. The repetition of the word "Melancholy" in the first sentence immediately emphasises how everything about his life appears drab and desolate. Further, Scrooge's property is described as "gloomy" and "dark". The description of the setting in this way makes it clear that Scrooge's surroundings are lacking in colour or interest. This causes the reader to project these negative attributes onto scrooge himself, and will encourage them to consider him a gloomy, melancholy character. While we are often encouraged to feel derision for scrooge due to his seemingly selfish and callous actions, here the reader may also feel an element of sympathy towards Scrooge as they observe how pitiful his life is, regardless of the circumstances that led him to become this way.
As the reader learns more about Scrooge's past, this element of sympathy may grow. When learning about his time as a schoolboy who was "neglected by his friends", the reader will further consider how Scrooge's life has been beset with loneliness, leading to his older self being "solitary as an oyster". However, through the lessons of the Ghosts of Christmas Present and Yet to Come, we also learn that Scrooge has orchestrated his own loneliness to a certain extent, and needs to change if he is to be freed from the chains he has forged through neglecting others. At the end of the play, after Scrooge has transformed and endeavours to "keep christmas in (his) heart", we see Scrooge gaining the gift of love and companionship. A critical reader may observe his transformation as too complete and swift to have any true meaning.