What is the narrative purpose of this excerpt from chapter 1 of a christmas carol by charles dickens?
oht but he was a tight-listed hand at the grindstone, scroogel a squeezing, wrenching, grasping, scraping, clutching, covetous, old sinner hard
and sharp as fint, from which no steel had ever struck out generous fire; secret, and self-contained, and solitary as an oyster. the cold within m
froze his old features, nipped his pointed nose, shrivelled his cheek, stiffened his gait; made his eyes red, his thin lips blue; and spoke out shrewdy
in his grating voice. a frosty rime was on his head, and on his eyebrows, and his wiry chin. he carried his own low temperature always about with
him; he iced his office in the dog-days; and didn't thaw it one degree at christmas.
a. plot development
b. building suspense
c. creating dramatic irony
d. developing characterization