[This December we commemorate the 200th anniversary of Clement Clarke Moore’s “A Visit from St. Nicholas” (well, maybe we do—see Monday’s post!). That was one of many Christmas stories I read to my sons when they were young, so this week I’ll AmericanStudy it and four other such holiday classics!]
On two
vital lessons from one of the most enduring Christmas stories.
Four years
ago this week, I started one of my favorite Saturday
Evening Post Considering History columns,
on Dorothy Day and the true spirit of Christmas, by quoting my favorite moment from
Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol
(1843). I’d ask you to check out that column and opening if you would, and then
come on back here for further thoughts on that spot and Dickens’ iconic story.
Welcome
back! As I wrote there, I think Dickens’ central anti-poverty themes have been
under-remembered despite his story’s enduring popularity. It’s not only that an
awareness of the horrifying ubiquity of extreme poverty is one of the main
lessons that Ebenezer Scrooge must learn, nor even (as that particular quote
exemplifies) that he likewise is forced to realize that he is in no way better
than (and indeed in many ways worse than) his most impoverished fellow
countrymen and humans. Along with those key takeaways, Dickens also makes a
compelling and crucial case that if we don’t address those realities and make
things significantly better for those in the worst situations, it spells doom
for all of us—that, to quote
another of my favorite artists, “in the end, nobody wins unless everybody
wins.” As I always note when I use that Bruce quote, it’s an ideal, and too
often perhaps an unattainable one—but I don’t know that any ideal is more worth
fighting for, and that’s certainly a central lesson of A Christmas Carol as well.
But what
makes Dickens’ story so powerful isn’t just that Scrooge learns such things,
but that he changes, becoming (in another top-tier
quote) “as good a friend, as good a
master, and as good a man, as the good old city knew.” And to me, one of the
wisest elements of A Christmas Carol
is its recognition that such change requires both empathetic epiphanies about
other people (like Scrooge’s care for Tiny Tim and his future) and concern for
one’s own welfare (Scrooge’s fears of dying alone and unredeemed in every
sense). The latter might seem far more selfish than the former, and in a
literal sense it is; but the truth is that asking people to entirely abandon
their self interests, to think only and entirely of others, is unrealistic, if not
indeed impossible. The true spirit of Christmas is to receive as well as to
give, to feel loved and cared-for ourselves as well as to share those feelings
with others, and it is when Scrooge realizes that his life, past, present, and
especially future, is devoid of all those layers of goodness that he becomes
determined to “keep Christmas well,” all year round. I don’t know any more
important story and message to share than that.
December
Recap this weekend,
Ben
PS. What
do you think? Christmas or holiday readings you’d share?
No comments:
Post a Comment