Hollydaze Quotemail #1: The Yuletide Gift-Bringer

Hello everyone –

Now that the holiday season has more-or-less “officially” begun, I have two pieces to share with you about the Yuletide gift-giver who is most familiar in North America – Santa Claus. Despite the misappropriation of this beloved figure by commercial interests each December, Santa’s core message remains the same from one generation to the next, and it’s a message that isn’t limited to a single holiday or religion or culture or nation. Here’s how Fred Astaire summarized the message of Santa Claus in the closing narration of the classic Rankin-Bass holiday special, Santa Claus Is Coming to Town (1970):

“But what would happen if we all tried to be like Santa and learned to give, as only he can give: of ourselves, our talents, our love and our hearts? Maybe we could all learn Santa’s beautiful lesson, and maybe there would finally be peace on Earth and good will toward men.” 

First of all, I’d like to share with you the most famous newspaper editorial in American history – to remind us all that we have a wonderful opportunity to share our stories, insights, and encouragement with a world that stands in desperate need of HOPE. And now (drumroll, please) – without further delay (cue the spotlight) – here’s the most famous newspaper editorial in American history!

 

“Yes, Virginia, There Is a Santa Claus”

Source: http://www.newseum.org/yesvirginia/

[Eight-year-old Virginia O'Hanlon wrote a letter to the editor of New York's Sun, and the quick response was printed as an unsigned editorial Sept. 21, 1897. The work of veteran newsman Francis Pharcellus Church has since become history's most reprinted newspaper editorial, appearing in part or whole in dozens of languages in books, movies, and other editorials, and on posters and stamps.]

“DEAR EDITOR: I am 8 years old. Some of my little friends say there is no Santa Claus. Papa says, ‘If you see it in THE SUN it’s so.’ Please tell me the truth; is there a Santa Claus?
VIRGINIA O'HANLON.
115 WEST NINETY-FIFTH STREET”

VIRGINIA, your little friends are wrong. They have been affected by the skepticism of a skeptical age. They do not believe except [what] they see. They think that nothing can be which is not comprehensible by their little minds. All minds, Virginia, whether they be men's or children's, are little. In this great Universe of ours man is a mere insect, an ant, in his intellect, as compared with the boundless world about him, as measured by the intelligence capable of grasping the whole of truth and knowledge.

Yes, VIRGINIA, there is a Santa Claus. He exists as certainly as love and generosity and devotion exist, and you know that they abound and give to your life its highest beauty and joy. Alas! how dreary would be the world if there were no Santa Claus. It would be as dreary as if there were no VIRGINIAS. There would be no childlike faith then, no poetry, no romance to make tolerable this existence. We should have no enjoyment, except in sense and sight. The eternal light with which childhood fills the world would be extinguished.

Not believe in Santa Claus! You might as well not believe in fairies! You might get your papa to hire men to watch in all the chimneys on Christmas Eve to catch Santa Claus, but even if they did not see Santa Claus coming down, what would that prove? Nobody sees Santa Claus, but that is no sign that there is no Santa Claus. The most real things in the world are those that neither children nor men can see. Did you ever see fairies dancing on the lawn? Of course not, but that's no proof that they are not there. Nobody can conceive or imagine all the wonders there are unseen and unseeable in the world.

You may tear apart the baby's rattle and see what makes the noise inside, but there is a veil covering the unseen world which not the strongest man, nor even the united strength of all the strongest men that ever lived, could tear apart. Only faith, fancy, poetry, love, romance, can push aside that curtain and view and picture the supernal beauty and glory beyond. Is it all real? Ah, VIRGINIA, in all this world there is nothing else real and abiding.

No Santa Claus! Thank God! he lives, and he lives forever. A thousand years from now, Virginia, nay, ten times ten thousand years from now, he will continue to make glad the heart of childhood.

 

Selections from My Remarks at the ACES Honors Symposium

Friday, April 13^th, 2007

[Editor’s Note: Here are some of my own reflections on the message of Santa Claus – a message for all people, all over the world, especially for children, their families, and their caregivers.]

        In L. Frank Baum’s classic holiday tale, The Life and Adventures of Santa Claus (1902), we meet a young man named Claus, a human foundling raised by the immortal denizens of an enchanted forest. In his young manhood, he chose to dwell among mortal humans because he wanted to share the joys of his own happy childhood with the children of humankind. At first he simply played, sang, and shared stories with the children who lived near his home in the Laughing Valley of Hohaho, but afterward, he “invented” the first toys and spread the joy of giving Yuletide gifts around the world. Claus obtained endless life within the circles of the world, when the immortals who had raised him endowed him with the Mantle of Immortality. They gave Claus such a momentous gift because Claus had seen that the lives of mortal children in that long-ago time were filled with drudgery and misery, and he had determined to correct this injustice by sharing with them the fruits of his experience – namely, that a happy childhood, filled with kindness and giving, could lay the foundation for a better world when the children grew up.

        Baum summarizes so eloquently the lessons to be drawn from his mythical biography of Santa Claus that they require no further comment on my part. He writes:

Everything perishes except the world itself and its keepers. But while life lasts, everything on Earth has its use. The wise seek ways to be helpful to the world, for the helpful ones are sure to live again. … Yet every man has his mission, which is to leave the world better, in some way, than he found it. (Book I, Chapters 6 & 7)

[Santa Claus] brought toys to the children because they were little and helpless, and because he loved them. He knew that the best of children were sometimes naughty, and that the naughty ones were often good. It is the way with children, the world over, and he would not have changed their natures had he possessed the power to do so.  And that is how our Claus became Santa Claus. It is possible for any man, by good deeds, to enshrine himself as a Saint in the hearts of the people.  (Book II, Chapter 9)

It is true that great warriors and mighty kings and clever scholars of that day were often spoken of by the people; but no one of them was so greatly beloved as Santa Claus, because none other was so unselfish as to devote himself to making others happy. For a generous deed lives longer than a great battle or a king's decree or a scholar's essay, because it spreads and leaves its mark on all nature and endures through many generations. (Book II, Chapter 11)

“In all this world there is nothing so beautiful as a happy child,” says good old Santa Claus; and if he had his way, the children would all be beautiful, for all would be happy. (Book III, Chapter 3)

Finally, a Swedish poem about the Jultomten – originally, a guardian spirit who watched over each farmstead, who was later transformed into a Scandinavian Yuletide gift-bringer; the English translator refers to the Jultomten as “Robin Goodfellow,” an elf who had similar functions in traditional English folklore.

 

“Robin Goodfellow” (1881)

By Viktor Rydberg (1828-1895)

 

Midwinter’s nightly frost is hard —

  Brightly the stars are beaming;

Fast asleep is the lonely Yard,

  All, at midnight, are dreaming.

Clear is the moon, and the snow-drifts shine,

  Glistening white, on fir and pine,

Covers on rooflets making.

  None but Robin is waking.

 

Grey, he stands by the byre-door,

  Grey, in the snow appearing;

Looks, as ever he did before,

  Up, at the moonlight peering;

Looks at the wood, where the pine and fir

  Stand round the farm, and never stir;

Broods on an unavailing

  Riddle, forever failing;

 

Runs his hand through his hair and beard —

  Gravely, his head a-shaking —

»Harder riddle I never heard,

  Vainly, my head I’m breaking.» —

Chasing, then, as his wont for aye,

  Such unsolvable things away,

Robin trips, without hustling,

  Now, about duty bustling.

 

Goes to the larder and tool-house fine,

  Every padlock trying —

See! by moonlight, in stalls, the kine,

  Dreaming of summer, are lying;

Heedless of harness and whip and team,

  Pollë, stabled, has, too, a dream:

Manger and crib, all over,

  Fill with sweet-smelling clover.

 

Robin goes to the lambs and sheep —

  See! they are all a-dreaming!

Goes to the hens, where the cock will sleep,

  Perched, with vanity teeming;

Karo, in kennel, so brave and hale,

  Wakes up and gladly wags his tail;

Karo, he knows his brother-

  Watchman, they love each other.

 

Lastly, Robin will steal to see

  The masterfolks, loved so dearly;

Long have they liked his industry,

  Now, they honor him, clearly;

Stealing on tiptoe, soon he nears

  Nursery cots, the little dears;

None must grudge him the pleasure;

  This is his greatest treasure.

 

Thus he has seen them, sire and son,

  Endless numbers of races;

Whence are they coming, one by one,

  All the slumbering faces?

Mortals succeeding mortals, there,

  Flourished, and aged, and went — but where?

Oh, this riddle, revolving,

  He will never cease solving!

 

Robin goes to the hay-shed loft,

  There, is his haunt and hollow,

Deep in the sweet-smelling hay, aloft,

  Near the nest of the swallow;

Empty, now, is the swallow’s nest,

  But when spring is in blossom drest,

She for home will be yearning,

  Will, with her mate, be returning.

 

Then she’ll twitter, and sing, and chat

  Much of her airy travel,

Nothing, though, of the riddle that

  Robin can never unravel.

Through a chink in the hay-shed wall,

  Lustrous moonbeams on Robin fall,

There, on his beard, they’re blinking,

  Robin’s brooding and thinking.

 

Mute is the wold, is nature all,

  Life is so frozen and dreary;

From afar, but the rapids’ call,

  Murmuring, sounds so weary.

Robin listens, half in a dream,

  Fancies he hears the vital stream,

Wonders whither it’s going,

  Whence its waters are flowing.

 

Midwinter’s nightly frost is hard —

  Brightly the stars are beaming.

Fast asleep is the lonely Yard,

  All till morn will be dreaming.

Faint is the moon; and the snow-drifts shine,

  Glistening white on fir and pine,

Covers on rooflets making.

  None but Robin is waking.

 

A late 19^th-century Swedish Yuletide card by Jenny Nyström, depicting the Jultomten.

 

Until next time –

Rob