A CHRISTMAS CAROL, by Charles Dickens

A CHRISTMAS CAROL, by Charles Dickens Dickens is probably the best known and loved author of the Victorian era. He wrote many memorable tales.

A Christmas Carol may be the most popular one. At the age of 12, some sources say that Charles Dickens worked for 12 hours a day, six days a week in a boot factory finishing the bottles of boot polish. On the seventh day he visited his family at the Marshalsea debtors’ prison. This lasted for two years (a traumatic time for young Dickens). He never forgot it, yet, he used his pain to create memorable characters like Scrooge and Tiny Tim, Bob Cratchit’s disabled little boy.

The reader can almost see young Dickens chained by poverty to his polish pots as little Tiny Tim is invisibly linked to his crutch. The descriptions and dialogues are rich. The characters are striking and memorable. The imagery is colourful, despite the bleakness of the winter months.

The story told in this book is to apply to most of us. Even in our old age it is not too late to change. In Dickens’ tale Ebenezer Scrooge, an old miser, bitter and resentful man is shown his past, his present, and his future by three ghosts. The first ghost reminds him of how he once enjoyed life’s pleasures. The second ghost shows Scrooge his current deplorable state. The final ghost foretells the likely outcome of his way.

This book it is not so much a Christmas story as a New Year’s story. For those of us who want to change the course of our life, for those of us who want this year’s resolutions to actually mean something, we need to go through an Ebenezer-like process. Whether your life is a bad life or an abused life or a flat life, you can use the ideas from this simple story.

Alberto R. Ayala

ORIGIN OF SANTA CLAUS

 

 

Tradition:

In North American poetry and illustrations, Santa Claus, in his white beard, red jacket and pompom-topped cap, would fly on the night before Christmas in his sleigh, pulled by eight reindeer, and climb down chimneys to leave his gifts in stockings children set out on the fireplace’s mantelpiece.

Children naturally wanted to know where Santa Claus actually came from. Where did he live when he wasn’t delivering presents? Those questions gave rise to the legend that Santa Claus lived at the North Pole, where his Christmas-gift workshop was also located.

In 1925, since grazing reindeer would not be possible at the North Pole, newspapers revealed that Santa Claus in fact lived in Finnish Lapland.

Old Origin:

In looking for the historical roots of Santa Claus, one must go very deep in the past. One discovers that Santa Claus as we know him is a combination of many different legends and mythical creatures.

The basis for the Christian-era Santa Claus is Bishop Nicholas of Smyrna (Izmir), in what is now Turkey. Nicholas lived in the 4th century A.D. He was very rich, generous, and loving toward children. Often he gave joy to poor children by throwing gifts in through their windows.

The Orthodox Church, in honored St. Nicholas by building the Russia’s oldest church. Nicholas was considered as one who helped children and the poor. St. Nicholas became the patron saint of children and seafarers.

In the Protestant areas of central and northern Germany, St. Nicholas later became known as der Weinachtsmann. In England he came to be called Father Christmas. St. Nicholas made his way to the United States with Dutch immigrants, and began to be referred to as Santa Claus.

20^th Century:

The American version of Saint Nicholas (Santa Claus) received its inspiration and its name from the Dutch legend of Sinter Klaas, brought by settlers to New York in the 17th century.

This Dutch-American Saint Nick achieved his fully Americanized form in 1823 in the poem “A Visit From Saint Nicholas”, more commonly known as “The Night Before Christmas” by writer Clement Clarke Moore. Moore included such details as the names of the reindeer; Santa Claus’s laughs, winks, and nods; and the method by which Saint Nicholas, referred to as an elf, returns up the chimney.

The American image of Santa Claus was further elaborated by illustrator Thomas Nast, who added such details as Santa’s workshop at the North Pole and Santa’s list of the good and bad children of the world. A human-sized version of Santa Claus, rather than the elf of Moore’s poem, was depicted in a series of illustrations for Coca-Cola advertisements introduced in 1931. In modern versions of the Santa Claus legend, only his toy-shop workers are elves. Rudolph, the ninth reindeer, with a red and shiny nose, was invented in 1939 by an advertising writer for the Montgomery Ward Company.

by Alberto