Interview with William Todd, Author of A Christmas Coda (2016)

It’s not often that a Christmas book crosses our desk as smart, as moving and as ornate as A Christmas Coda, by William Todd.  We were lucky enough to read and review his new book last week, and even luckier when Mr. Todd graciously consented to an interview.

A Christmas Coda is a sequel to Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol, and is a worthy addition to the Scrooge mythos.  It has excited a great deal of interest among Dickens scholars and Carol enthusiasts alike, and is well on its way to becoming a holiday classic in its own right.

Here Todd responds to our questions….

Can you tell us a little about yourself and your career?

I was born in 1960 in Detroit, Michigan, and spent the first couple decades of my life doing non-writing stuff.  So let's start at age 23, when I moved to Los Angeles to begin my first job (of any type, ever) as an aerospace engineer.

Like a lot of new hires, my first couple weeks on the job were basically "free roam," where not much is really expected of you except learning how to use the copy machine.  That's how I found myself one day sitting in my office with a bunch of other new hires, shooting the breeze, until someone raised one of those "Book of 1000 Questions" type of questions, which was:

"If wages were no object, and you could do ANYTHING you wanted to do with the rest of your work life, what would it be?"

To my surprise, I started hearing such answers as "I'd play the saxophone" or "I'd race boats" (which I didn't even know was a career option!).  But an even bigger surprise was that not one of the new hires in my office, aerospace engineering majors all, said, "I'd build the best spaceship ever" or even "I'd become the head of NASA...”

...including me - which was by far the BIGGEST surprise of all.

You see, I'd grown up loving the world of entertainment - books, plays, and especially movies and TV.  But I'd also grown up in Michigan, about as far away from the centers for these activities as you could get, geographically and psychologically.  Entertainment as a career path was never even remotely on my realistic radar.  I was good at school.  I was good at math and science.  An engineering career was a guaranteed job back then.  Why aerospace?

I loved Star Trek.  That should have been a clue.

Instead, I did what I was expected to do.  I got my degree (or two), got my guaranteed job, moved out to the Promised Land...

...and for the first time, stared down the barrel of 50 years doing this.  And, as embarrassed as I am to admit it, waiting my turn to answer the "Book of 1000 Questions" question, not having ever REALLY considered what I'd REALLY like to do with those 50 coming years.

And as it turned out, somewhat to my surprise (and somewhat not), the answer wasn't "to become the best damn engineer I could."

So what DID I want?

And that's how, within a month of graduating from college with two aerospace engineering degrees, and within a week of moving my life out to Los Angeles...

...I started writing scripts.  After work.  Every night.

And didn't stop until I finally sold one, four years later.

Yep, my self-administered "university education" on How To Become A Writer was four straight years of just doing it.

Which, of course, turned out to be only the beginning...

What was it about A Christmas Carol that told you that it needed a sequel?

A Christmas Carol has always been my favorite Christmas story.  Especially Act Three, where the reborn Scrooge awakens on Christmas morning.  I love this part so much that I often watch just this sequence from several of its many movie adaptations, all in a row, for the simple shared joy of it.

But there have always been lingering questions.  And for years, like the spirits that haunted Scrooge, these would occasionally visit me:

- How did Scrooge help Tiny Tim to walk again?

- Could there be any chance for Scrooge to redeem lost love?

- How could Scrooge ever repay a debt of the magnitude he owed Jacob Marley?

Inevitably, these led to speculative musings (most often in the shower, a writer's greatest think tank!) and the eventual forming of answers, image by image and scene by scene.

It took years.  Literally.  But there finally came a time when the enterprise as a whole elbowed its way to the fore and said, "It's time."

And so I began what would be, for me, the most difficult thing I ever wrote in my entire life.

Are there any real-world events that make a sequel to A Christmas Carol particularly pressing at this time?

Yes.  And no.

And forgive me, because my intention is not to waffle, but to hope that A Christmas Coda, like A Christmas Carol before it, is more universal in nature, rather than tied to any specific place, time, or event.  Certainly, there are things in the real world today that beg a re-acquaintance with "goodwill toward men," just as there were very real issues in Victorian times that coincided with the motions of Dickens pen.  But these are universal, ongoing, human issues, not fixed in time, as the longevity of Dickens tale instructs.

The economic realities of Scrooge’s world are pretty bleak; have we come far enough?  Have we lived up to the ideals of The Carol?

We can never - and will never - "come far enough"...

...but that doesn't mean we should stop trying.  I'll broaden the point philosophically to say, there will always be evil in the world, just as our goal should always be to completely eliminate it - even though we know that to be impossible.

We'll never completely "live up to the ideals of The Carol" because that would involve an end point, a state of flawlessness in an inherently flawed universe.  But this is not a matter of despair, because fighting the good fight is what our lives are all about:  It gives us meaning.

[And before anybody beats me to it, yes, I'm the guy who wrote the original Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles movie!]

So much of A Christmas Carol and A Christmas Coda are about redemption, and then making good on that redemption.  Why does redemption resonate with you?

I think it relates to the above:  Trying your best to be as good as you can be, inevitably failing to achieve any ideal standard, but finding that it's never too late to do better.

I’m delighted that Jacob Marley is such a large presence in A Christmas Coda, even though he doesn’t appear onstage.  What is the heart of the Marley Paradox, for you?

I'm not sure what the "Marley Paradox" even is!  But I'll give it a shot:

The thing that always bugged me the most about A Christmas Carol was the idea that Jacob Marley, the guy who moved (presumably) heaven itself to save a friend, was himself never saved, but instead, forever condemned to chains, and in his own wailing words, "doomed to wander through the world—oh, woe is me!—and witness what [I] cannot share, but might have shared on earth, and turned to happiness!"

That's not fair!  That's not right!  Scrooge got a second chance...

...why not Marley???

And thus the seed of a sequel was sown...

What is it about A Christmas Carol that has made it such a classic?  Is it the story?  The character of Scrooge?  Or something else?

If only the S.A.T. had been this easy--

e.)  All of the above!

And, yes, more.

But mostly, I believe, is its message of Redemption:

It's never too late - for anyone - to change for the better.

Take THAT, Relentless Focus On The Negative In Modern Culture!

I can imagine that someone who wrote A Christmas Coda is a fan of the holiday.  What are your thoughts and feelings on Christmas?

I've always loved Christmas.  It's been my favorite holiday ever since childhood, when I actually experienced the magic of a Midwestern winter morning transformed by the kindness of parents into a warmly glowing treasure hunt initiated by siblings in knit pajamas well before the rise of the sun, tearing open package after package of colorfully wrapped gifts, piled 'neath a twinkling tree... made of aluminum.

I thought it the most beautiful thing in the world.  I used to lie under it at night reading Archie Christmas comic books, staring up at the ornaments, slowly changing hue from the rotating color wheel with its ratcheting metal plate and blindingly hot floodlight bulb that could only exist in a fairy-tale era before OSHA.

The gifts are the very least of it for me now.

I love it for the music, and the food, and, yes, the fact that people at least try to experience it as "a kind, forgiving, charitable, pleasant time".

In other words, I love it for a lot of the same reasons Charles Dickens did.

How do you envision Scrooge?  Is there an actor or interpretation you had in mind while writing your novel?

I sometimes envision a specific person (such as an actor, but not always) as a physical model when writing a script, and it was (perhaps too) easy to let Alastair Sim slip into the role of Scrooge, given that the 1951 film version of A Christmas Carol has become all but canon amongst movie adaptations.

Certainly, in the opening sequence of A Christmas Coda, Mr. Sim was much in mind, right down to the whooping of his post-salvation laugh, since his interaction with Mrs. Dilber was purposely reminiscent of the scene in the 1951 movie (which does not exist in Dickens' novella) where she threatens to "scream for the beadle".

Soon thereafter, however, I abandoned all physical reference to Scrooge, even the original John Leech illustrations, in favor of the original character Dickens described, and thus available to be cast to the particular taste of any reader, in their own mind's eye.

Do you have a favorite adaptation of A Christmas Carol?

Actually, no.  Not even what seems to be the consensus pick for "Best Adaptation," which, as mentioned above, is the 1951 Renown Pictures version starring Alastair Sim.

As alluded to farther above, I tend to judge A Christmas Carol adaptations by their third acts, and each has its strengths and weaknesses.

A particular strength of the 1951 version is the scene in which Scrooge goes to his nephew Fred's house on Christmas Day to finally accept his annual dinner invitation.

[An aside:  In an example of just how much people love that 1951 movie version of A Christmas Carol, and for anyone who might particularly appreciate a story of heroic research, there is the tale of "Fred's Maid".  She appears in a scant 42-second scene in which she answers the door to Scrooge, and silently encourages him to enter the party.  This actress didn't have a single word of dialogue, and is nowhere credited in the film, but she became such a beloved character to many over the years that she eventually sparked an internet hunt for her identity.  Only recently has the mystery been solved!  If anyone cares to, you may read about it here:  http://dickensblog.typepad.com/dickensblog/2013/05/meet-the-maid-an-interview-with-theresa-derrington-cozens-hardy.html]

There, he encounters Fred and his wife, a woman he had heretofore refused to acknowledge (previously thinking it a bad match - financially) and, in one of the most emotional scenes in the entire movie, asks forgiveness.  And all to the strains of "Barbara Allen" - quite the concentration of weepy emotion in and of itself!

Similarly, the 1984 movie adaptation starring George C. Scott finds its deepest emotional resonance in that very same scene, Scrooge literally capping it with, "God forgive me the time I've wasted."

I love these scenes.  Perhaps best of all.  And the most fascinating thing about them is this:

These moments DO NOT EXIST in Dickens' original "A Christmas Carol".

Instead, he wraps up the entire Fred visit in barely half a page:

In the afternoon he turned his steps towards his nephew’s house.  He passed the door a dozen times, before he had the courage to go up and knock. But he made a dash, and did it:

“Is your master at home, my dear?” said Scrooge to the girl. Nice girl! Very.

“Yes, sir.”

“Where is he, my love?” said Scrooge.

“He’s in the dining-room, sir, along with mistress. I’ll show you up-stairs, if you please.”

“Thank’ee. He knows me,” said Scrooge, with his hand already on the dining-room lock. “I’ll go in here, my dear.”

He turned it gently, and sidled his face in, round the door. They were looking at the table (which was spread out in great array); for these young housekeepers are always nervous on such points, and like to see that everything is right.

“Fred!” said Scrooge.

Dear heart alive, how his niece by marriage started! Scrooge had forgotten, for the moment, about her sitting in the corner with the footstool, or he wouldn’t have done it, on any account.

“Why bless my soul!” cried Fred, “who’s that?”

“It’s I. Your uncle Scrooge. I have come to dinner. Will you let

me in, Fred?”

Let him in! It is a mercy he didn’t shake his arm off. He was at home in five minutes. Nothing could be heartier. His niece looked just the same. So did Topper when he came. So did the plump sister when she came. So did every one when they came. Wonderful party, wonderful games, wonderful unanimity, won-der-ful happiness!

And now, a Sacrilege:

I actually like the movie versions of the Fred scene better than Dickens' original.  To me, they resonate with far more emotion.

But before you gather pitchfork and torch and set GPS coordinates for my home address, pause a moment, as I once did, to consider that perhaps some good can come out of this realization...

...because for me, it was a sign that I, too, might dare extrapolate the work of The Inimitable.

Or that you, perhaps, could actually enjoy it.

My fond hope, of course, is that you will.

For my dearest hope is that A Christmas Coda, like The Carol before it, will become a small part of YOUR love of the Christmas season - blessed to Dickensian fullness--

With Tidings of Comfort and Joy,

William Todd

A Christmas Coda, by William Todd (2016)

Regular readers of The Jade Sphinx know of the central place Christmas holds in my life, and the paramount importance of Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol in my personal philosophy and worldview.  To Your Correspondent, Ebenezer Scrooge is not just a fictional character, but a friend, an example, and a terrible lesson all-in-one.  The book is my secular liturgy, my heart-laid-bare, the best reflection of my best self.  People who wish to reimagine or write a sequel do so at their peril.

There have been many continuations of A Christmas Carol since 1843, many of them created in Dickens’s own lifetime.  Most of them have been dire.  We have seen Scrooge and Sherlock Holmes, Scrooge and Cratchit taking on corrupt businessmen, a grown Tiny Tim involved in international conspiracies, Scrooge and zombies...  Sigh.  There have also been several serious literary visitations to Scrooge: for example, Robertson Davies (1913-1995), one of the great voices of 20^th Century letters (if not the great voice), wrote a continuation of A Christmas Carol which is utterly indigestible.  It is almost as if the Christmas Cosmos created by Dickens is too big, too intimidating, too … honest for other writers to approach on an equal level.

So, it was with some little trepidation that I approached A Christmas Coda, just e-published by author William Todd.  Trepidation entirely unjustified, as Todd has written a wise, moving and wonderful book, fully in keeping with both Dickens and the Carol, and a worthy literary achievement in its own right.

In Todd’s novel, it is exactly one year since the events of A Christmas Carol.  Scrooge is as good as his word, and has become as good a friend, as good a master, and as good a man as he possibly can.  But … the thing that most occupies him is repaying his debt to Jacob Marley.

Readers versed in the Carol will remember that the visitation of the mighty Christmas Ghosts and Scrooge’s redemption were all at Marley’s intervention.  While Scrooge has his reclamation, poor Marley is doomed to walk forever fettered in chains, witnessing what he cannot share, but might have shared on earth, and turned to happiness.  Scrooge is determined to alleviate the otherworldly suffering of his late friend.

To do this, he creates The Jacob Marley Foundation to help those who need it most.  He also practices personal philanthropies, such as sponsoring the surgeon who cures Tiny Tim, creating an annual Fezziwig Ball, and helping dozens of the needy on London streets.

The linchpin of the novel is Scrooge’s association with a young businessman, Midas Stump.  Stump – rapacious, consumed with gain, unthinking of the human toll his ambitions would take – is much like the younger Scrooge.  Scrooge hopes to reform him while helping the Jacob Marley Foundation; this task becomes more urgent when he learns that Stump is engaged to the daughter of the woman he loved in his youth, Belle.  To achieve his ends, Scrooge must assume the tasks of the Ghosts of Christmas Past, Present and Yet-to-Come to save a young soul, and relieve another in torment, but without supernatural aid.

It is nearly impossible to say enough good things about this book.  Todd assumes a sustained Dickensian diction and prose line that is surprisingly successful.  The new characters – Stump and his assistant, Pockle, for instance – come wonderfully to life.  (Todd also has a knack for Dickensian names.)  But best of all, Todd understands Scrooge and the others from the original novel with a humane, novelist’s empathy.  Here is Scrooge talking to Tim, “You see, Tim, sometimes we get used to things that aren’t good for us.  It becomes hard to imagine living any other way.  But we can be shown, by those who care, how to walk a better path. To change.”

One of the most interesting things in Dickens’ original novel is the sense of … ritual.  Scrooge, before his reclamation, does many things by route and habit.  In Todd’s novel, that remains; he has, to some extent, fetishized his experience with the Ghosts into his own secular ritual.  He wants Tim to walk specifically on Christmas Eve, as explained here:  Scrooge made straightaway to Tim, still in his father’s arms.  “You see Tim,” he began, in earnest chord, “that’s why I arranged the doctor’s visit today.  Christmas Eve is very special to me.  I wanted it to be just as special for you.  For us all.  Every one.”

This is great stuff; true characterization without shtick or caricature and, mercifully and blessedly free of irony.  Better still is the climactic scene with Scrooge and Stump at the gravesite of Jacob Marley on Christmas Eve – Scrooge, avenging angel, merciful father and very human man all at the same time. 

Todd gets Scrooge – which is wonderful, as so many do not.  The popular reading of A Christmas Carol is that it’s a parable against greed – but that is a complete misreading of the text.  Scrooge is not damned because he’s a miser, or even because he is a business shark – he’s damned because he has cut himself off from his own humanity and the humanity of others.  His soul was barren – he filled it up with business and gain, but it could’ve been alcohol or sex or anything else, and the effect would have been just the same.  He lost the fact that all of our actions affect those around us, and to be uncaring of other people and their fates has profound consequences. 

That is the Scrooge that Todd gives us, not the bah, humbug cartoon so often served up. 

Readers who love Christmas tales – and you know who you are – will also find little Easter eggs strewn throughout the book.  Scrooge’s nephew Fred, who has no last name in Dickens, is christened Gailey by Todd – the name of the lawyer in Miracle on 34^th Street.  There are also a few lines that reference that other great holiday icon, the Grinch.  But these references never become jokey or dumb; they are merely there for the eagle-eyed to spot.

I cannot recommend this book enough.  It is only available – inexplicably – in e-copies.  (Why was this book not published by a mainstream house?)  You can find it on Amazon here:  https://www.amazon.com/Christmas-Coda-Will-Todd-ebook/dp/B01LDWH7BS.

Buy this book.  Buy this book now.  Buy this book now and read it today – and God bless us, every one.

A Special Christmas Message From The Jade Sphinx

The Christmas spirit, like most truly important things, is difficult to define.  It means more than just being ‘aware’ of Christmas, just as it means more than waiting for gifts or looking at glittering decorations.  (Delightful as these things are!)  No, the Christmas spirit is a shared moment when we open our shut-up hearts and pause for a moment to realize the subtle, quiet miracle of our lives. 

It is also that moment, when, during the long calendar of the year, we make the conscious decision to be happy.  Yes, our jobs are irritating, our bank accounts low, our presidential prospects dire, the climate is changing.  But … none of that really matters for just a few scant, magical weeks in December.  We are still here, the potential for fun and joy (two different things) remains, and we are free to delight in the time we have left and that the pleasures of having one-another has not yet been closed off.  It’s the time when we’re reminded that it’s possible that our souls may indeed be as eternal as Christmas itself, and that our lives are, ultimately, what we make of them.

Space, scientists tell us, is vast, and life seems to be quite rare.  The conditions for life are exacting – a few subtle alterations in conditions millions of years ago, and the Earth would be as dead as Mars.  The sheer improbability of our very existence illustrates a staggering triumph against near incalculable odds.  Honestly and objectively recognizing this fact can lead only to endless wonder … In the face of such mystery, how can I – how can anyone – fail to be happy?

And, if life is so rare, how can we fail to recognize that each and every one of us is special?  Are we perfect?  Certainly not!  Troubled?  Quite possibly.  Unique in all the universe?  Most definitely!  Christmas, again, draws the map to follow: we must cherish ourselves and one another.

It is at this time of year particularly that Your Correspondent finds it impossible not to believe in the invisible world.  Just as an ant is innocent of knowledge of the human beings that teem around it, we are unaware of the great mystery that surrounds us.  Christmas plugs us directly into great channels of mystery and wonder, leading to a realization of the simple, abundant joy of creation.

The tradition of Christmas has been a boon to Your Correspondent that is impossible to measure.  Its celebration has made me part of a millennia-long tradition of finding light in the darkness, warming the human heart, and celebrating the wonders of existence.  Just as the food and drink of the season underscore the pleasure of our physical, corporeal selves, the Christmas spirit nourishes and replenishes our emotional, philosophical and spiritual selves.

For the past several years, I have shared with readers that Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol is the central text of my holiday.  In view of the above, I can find no better way of closing this year’s message than with the closing lines of this, perhaps the greatest of all novels:

Scrooge was better than his word. He did it all, and infinitely more; and to Tiny Tim, who did not die, he was a second father. He became as good a friend, as good a master, and as good a man, as the good old city knew, or any other good old city, town, or borough, in the good old world. Some people laughed to see the alteration in him, but he let them laugh, and little heeded them; for he was wise enough to know that nothing ever happened on this globe, for good, at which some people did not have their fill of laughter in the outset; and knowing that such as these would be blind anyway, he thought it quite as well that they should wrinkle up their eyes in grins, as have the malady in less attractive forms. His own heart laughed: and that was quite enough for him.

He had no further intercourse with Spirits, but lived upon the Total Abstinence Principle, ever afterwards; and it was always said of him, that he knew how to keep Christmas well, if any man alive possessed the knowledge. May that be truly said of us, and all of us! And so, as Tiny Tim observed, God bless Us, Every One!

A Christmas Cornucopia Part II: The Four Faces of Scrooge

Last week we reviewed Fred Guida’s masterful A Christmas Carol and Its Adaptations: Dickens’s Story on Screen and Television, and it got us thinking of our favorite dramatizations of the story.

The Carol is perhaps Charles Dickens’ most theatrical work.  Whole sections of dialogue are infinitely quotable (and have, indeed, entered into the language), and the simple, basic dramatic arc of the story cries out for dramatization.  Dickens himself made a performance piece of it, doing public readings of the text over several years, enacting all the parts himself.  (The closest we have to this type of protean reading was the magnificent one-man show starring Patrick Stewart (born 1940); sadly, his own full-cast dramatization made for Hallmark television is something of a disaster.)

It is no exaggeration to say that Your Correspondent has spent his entire life closely watching various versions of the Carol, so naturally I have some opinions in the matter. 

So, in no particular order, my favorite versions of A Christmas Carol are:

Scrooge made in 1951, starring Alistair Sim (1900-1976) as Scrooge.  This has been hailed by many as the yardstick by which versions of the Carol are measured.  However, while we certainly love this film, it is not our favorite.  Screenwriter Noel Langley (1911-1980) takes a great many liberties with the original text, providing an extended backstory for Scrooge and introducing many non-Canonical characters.  In addition, while Sim is magnificent, we find that none of the Christmas spirits are particularly memorable. 

Finally – heresy coming! – while Sim is terrific, he is not the definitive Scrooge to our way of thinking.  Sim is essentially a great comedian, while we believe Scrooge is best performed by a tragedian.  Sim’s quirky eccentricity, his giddiness upon his reclamation and his heavily-circled eyes make him something of a cartoon.

The great actor Basil Rathbone (1892-1967) essayed the role of both Scrooge and Marley several times on early television, but perhaps never better than as the all-singing all-dancing Scrooge in 1956.  This broadcast-live musical, The Stingiest Man in Town, was originally part of The Alcoa Hour.  This production had been counted as lost for decades, and only recently come to light in a terrific DVD transfer that preserves the live broadcast, flubs and all.  The show also starred Martyn Green and Vic Damone and the score, while not stellar, is certainly pleasant.

What is fascinating here is Rathbone’s take on Scrooge.  I think Rathbone a fascinating figure – he was really the first actor to bridge the classical and popular worlds; were he alive today, he would have Ian McKellan’s career.  Too bad he ended up in some of the films he did.    I appreciate Stingiest Man more than I like it, but Rathbone is never less than captivating.

Where Rathbone shines is that his post-reclamation Scrooge is little different from his frosty Scrooge.  His mannerisms and approach are the same … we see here a Scrooge who is still trying to figure out the impact of the Spirits on his life, and post-Scrooge will always be a work-in-progress.

There are many animated versions of the Carol, but by far the very best features Mr. Magoo.  Produced in 1962, Mr. Magoo’s Christmas Carol offers one of the most faithful adaptations of Dickens’ story, and includes some truly champion songs, performed by the likes of Jack Cassidy, Jane Kean and Paul Frees. 

The centerpiece, though, is Magoo, as voiced by character actor Jim Backus.  This is in every instance a real performance, filled with anger, fear, pathos and joy.  Whole swathes of dialog were lifted verbatim from Dickens, and now it is nearly impossible for Your Correspondent to read many of these lines without hearing Backus’ voice.

Nearly every version of interest takes some central part of the story and turns it into a showpiece (demonstrating that Dickens’ tale is nearly inexhaustible).  The highlight of the Magoo Carol is definitely the musical number involving the Undertaker, Laundress and the Charwoman, all of whom have robbed the dead, unloved body of Scrooge.  Catchy, funny and infinitely memorable (perhaps the only tune to ever rhyme “reprehensible” with “pencil-ble”).

Finally, our very favorite version was made for television in 1984 starring George C. Scott (1927-1999).  Directed by Clive Donner (1926-2010), this Carol is the most faithful, artful and moving version of all.

One pitfall that it is all-to-easy for adaptations to fall into is portraying Bob Cratchit as a spineless milksop.  Donner neatly avoids this by casting screen villain David Warner (born 1941) in the role, who plays Cratchit as a simple working man of unusual decency.  He is ably supported by Susannah York (1939-2011) as Mrs. Cratchit.  Here, when Bob talks about Tiny Tim’s inherent goodness or his hope’s for the boy’s recovery, York looks aside, as if she is more than used to Bob trying to convince himself of good outcomes that will never come to pass.

The philanthropists seeking money from Scrooge are wonderfully played by Michael Gough (1916-20111 -- who appeared in countless horror shockers in the 1960s) and John Quarmby (born 1929) – and they turn these usually sanctimonious nudges into simple humanitarians.

The late Roger Rees (1944-2015) is excellent at Scrooge’s nephew, Fred.  As with Cratchit, many actors make Fred nearly simple-minded in his goodness; here, Rees, is simply a warm, kind man who feels responsibility towards his uncle.

Perhaps the finest thing about this version of the Carol are the Spirits.  In Dickens, the Spirits are mighty creations, other-worldly visitations that are both great and terrible.  Things start with a magnificent, sonorous, stentorian Marley, played with histrionic biro by Frank Finlay (born 1926).   Angela Pleasance (born 1941) is truly … unnerving as the Ghost of Christmas Past.  There is something positively inhuman about her, and her line readings sound as if they come from another world.  Perhaps even better is Edward Woodward (1920-2009) as the Ghost of Christmas Present.  Playing on stilts beneath a rich mantle of green, this is a Ghost of great joviality, but he is also tormented and angry at witnessing man’s inhumanity to man.  His revelation of the horrid children, Ignorance and Want, residing beneath his robe is one of the most affecting, chilling moments in television movies.  The Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come (Michael Carter) is little more than a shrouded skeleton, a truly terrifying, gothic figure.

Which leaves us with Scott.  This is a Scrooge to be reckoned with.  This Scrooge ableydefends himself against the accusations of the ghosts, and has a marked sense of humor while relishing his own wickedness.  But, at heart, Scott is a tragedian.  This is a Scrooge who feels, more than any other, what might have been.  Perhaps Scott himself, who had many career ups-and-downs, understand the variable nature of life and how certain roads led to ruin or success. 

After his reclamation, Scott is transformed.  Unlike Sim, who merely tapped into the whimsy patently within him, Scott is saved by finding a new lightness of heart, a sense of salvation, and the certainty that he now has the ability to change his life.  This is the Scrooge who I would like to know personally.

More Christmas dispatches tomorrow!

A Christmas Cornucopia Part I: R. O. Blechman and Victorian Voices

As we close out our holiday week, I thought I would add some holiday cheer with smaller stories before posting a special Christmas message.  (Be sure to read it on the 25^th!)  And so, with no further ado:

Vintage Holiday Greetings From R. O. Blechman

Jade Sphinx readers of a certain age surely remember a period before cable television when national networks created simple, heart-felt holiday messages at this time of year.  Though such a gesture would be unthinkable in these rather hard and uncharitable times, these spots brought home simple messages of charity, mercy, forbearance and benevolence. 

The CBS network excelled at these messages, and the most famous were created in 1966 by celebrated cartoonist and animator R. O. Blechman (born 1930).  Blechman is perhaps best remembered for his amusing, simply-drawn cartoons for The New Yorker, but is also a champion author of children’s books, including The Juggler of Our Lady (1953).

Robert Oscar Blechman was born in Brooklyn, New York, and attended the High School of Music and Art.  He worked for animation studio Terrytoons (home of Mighty Mouse), winning a BAFTA for his animated version of The Juggler of Our Lady, narrated by Boris Karloff (1887-1969).

In 1977, Blechman produced a holiday special animating his drawings, along with segments by Maurice Sendak (1928-2012) and Seymour Chwast (born 1931), and it was narrated by Colleen Dewhurst (1924-1991). 

These moving stories are simply too good to be missed, and here are links.

Simple Gifts can be seen here (the first of seven parts): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x2tbVaDqHXA.

One of his CBS holiday greetings can be found here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CFixiBGmskI

Your Correspondent’s favorite holiday message can be found here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MUWMjUjit_U

That last piece has haunted me for years, so thank heavens for Youtube!

Victorian Voices at Christmas and All The Year Round

For many (myself included), Christmas means A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens.  But for writer, archivist and cat-lover Moira Allen, the Victorian world is an endless feast of articles, stories and dispatches, all lovingly culled from the hundreds of periodicals printed during the era. 

Allen has created an indispensable resource for neo-Victorians, an entire Website devoted to reproductions of Victorian-era magazine articles.  Each and every month the indefatigable Allen sends out a collection, and the December number is filled with treats.  You can find the current issue (and hundreds of archived pieces) here: http://www.victorianvoices.net/index.shtml.

Better, still, Allen also has a deluxe paperback collection called A Victorian Christmas Treasury, also available on her site.  We got this book last year and have been paging through it this season with great satisfaction.

Serious historians, lovers of the Victorian ethos, designers, Christmas buffs – there is something here for everyone who is keenly aware of the past.  Be sure to check out Moira Allen’s site, and be remember to say that The Jade Sphinx sent you!

More Christmas dispatches tomorrow!

Miracle on 133rd Street, written by Sonia Manzano and illustrated by Marjorie Priceman

In Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol, Scrooge and the Ghost of Christmas Present walk the streets of London on Christmas day.  In the midst of a central London marketplace, revelers shop for their holiday dinners.  As they make their way, Dickens writes:

The sight of these poor revellers appeared to interest the Spirit very much, for he stood with Scrooge beside him in a baker's doorway, and taking off the covers as their bearers passed, sprinkled incense on their dinners from his torch. And it was a very uncommon kind of torch, for once or twice when there were angry words between some dinner-carriers who had jostled each other, he shed a few drops of water on them from it, and their good humour was restored directly. For they said, it was a shame to quarrel upon Christmas Day. And so it was. God love it, so it was.

In time the bells ceased, and the bakers were shut up; and yet there was a genial shadowing forth of all these dinners and the progress of their cooking, in the thawed blotch of wet above each baker's oven; where the pavement smoked as if its stones were cooking too.

“Is there a peculiar flavour in what you sprinkle from your torch.” asked Scrooge.

“There is. My own.”

“Would it apply to any kind of dinner on this day.” asked Scrooge.

“To any kindly given. To a poor one most.”

“Why to a poor one most?” asked Scrooge.

“Because it needs it most.”

Your Correspondent was reminded of this wonderful moment while reading the new book by Sesame Street star Sonia Manzano, Miracle on 133^rd Street.  Energetically illustrated by Marjorie Priceman, Miracle tells the story of Jose and his family’s holiday dinner.  Jose and his Mami are preparing the Christmas roast, but their oven is too small for the meat.

In an inspired moment, Jose thinks that they can take the roast to the local pizza parlor, and cook it there.  As Jose and his Papi walk through their 133^rd Street apartment building, they pass children fighting, scared shut-ins, arguing neighbors, and other challenges to urban life.  Outside, they tramp through the snow, passing a desperate Christmas-tree salesman and finally comforting a grouching pizza-pusher.

However, hours later after the roast has been cooked, Jose and Papi finally become holiday pied pipers as the pizza man, tree salesman and all manner of troubled apartment dwellers follow them home, beguiled by the delicious aroma of Christmas dinner.

Suddenly, the apartment that Jose’s Mami thought was too small is now just right for a holiday gathering. 

Though simple in its plot and execution, Miracle on 133^rd Street is complex in its themes and approach.  This is not a tale to sugarcoat the many challenges immigrants (in Jose’s case, Puerto Ricans) have in assimilating in inner cities; nor does it paint a picture of blanket good will during the holidays as a given.  Instead, Manzano demonstrates how simple creature comforts, a warm and loving environment and reaching out to people are more than enough to generate Christmas spirit.

The illustrations by Marjorie Priceman have a madcap, energetic quality.  Like much modern art, perspective is flattened and bright (almost neon) colors pile one-atop another, as if Priceman was channeling Chagall for children.  They are a perfect accompaniment to the text, and the resulting paring is something like music.

Better still, Manzano and Priceman have created a picture book that will inspire children to cherish their homes, their friends and their communities.  It is a delightful tale reminding us that we are all going through life together, and there is no better time to share our common humanity than at Christmas.  Highly recommended.

An Invisible Thread: A Christmas Story (2015), Text by Laura Schroff and Alex Tresniowski, Illustrated by Barry Root

Many Christmas picture books encompass a great capacity for wonder.  Stories of Santa Claus and his magical North Pole factory, tales of elves and Christmas sprites, and even vintage stories of Christmas ghosts, for example, use magic as a vehicle for transcendence. 

These stories can be great and good (Your Correspondent was certainly raised on them), but it is rare that a picture-book uses real-world experiences to illustrate the miracle of Christmas.  Parents looking for something rare and wonderful should look no further than the delightful and heart-warming An Invisible Thread: A Christmas Story, written by Laura Schroff and Alex Trensiowski, and illustrated by Barry Root. 

Many readers would be familiar with the story already, as it is based on Schroff’s New York Times bestselling book of the same name.  This picture-book version softens many of the details for children’s consumption, but alert children will pick up on the inherent grittiness of the tale.

In brief:  advertising executive Schroff is hit up for spare change by a street kid, Maurice, who is hungry.  Initially Schroff says no, but turns back and offers to buy the boy lunch.

So starts an unusual friendship, where Schroff takes young Maurice to dinner every week.  As the fabric of their lives become more interwoven, Schroff learns of the poverty of the boy’s existence, of his struggling family, and of his desire to break out of his miserable circumstances.

Soon, Schroff learns that Maurice has never had a proper Christmas.  So, as the holiday rolls around, Schroff helps the boy write his first letter to Santa, asks his help putting up her Christmas tree, and, on the Day of Days itself, takes the boy with her to spend the day with her family.

In return, Maurice leaves a very special present under Schroff’s tree, one that she will treasure forever…

Based on a true story, the book closes with a picture of both Schroff and Maurice when they met, and how they look today.  Maurice freely admits that Schroff’s kindness and interest in him steered him away from a possibly troubled life; Schroff asserts that simple acts of kindness can change the world by impacting positively on individuals.  (It is, in short, a dramatic, real-life illustration of the lesson found in Dickens’ A Christmas Carol.)

The book ends with a brief homily on the value of Small Acts of Kindness.  While many people will spend Christmas buying gifts, this book reminds young readers that the true meaning of the holiday is the importance of giving from our hearts.

The text (one imagines that Tresniowski did the adaptation from Schroff’s source material), is tight and smartly written.  One can see that there was a lot of judicious editing to make the hardscrabble realities of Maurice’s life palatable to youngsters, but nothing is lost by the concision.

The illustrations by Barry Root are energetic, warm and intimate.  Through smiles and body language, Root is able to illustrate their deep emotional connection.  One is touched by the primacy of Christmas trees in these pictures, as if a teeming holiday spirit was taking root and growing.  Root’s pictures are terrific, and make the story come to life.

This book is highly recommended to anyone looking to help youngsters learn the true meaning of Christmas and, perhaps, turn them into budding altruists, too.  If you have children on your Christmas list from about ages four-to-10, it would be hard to do better.

More Christmas picture books tomorrow!

A Christmas Carol and Its Adaptations: Dickens’s Story on Screen and Television, by Fred Guida (2000)

Regular readers of The Jade Sphinx know of my deep and abiding romance with literature, and of how alarmed I have become over contemporary literary criticism.  Since the introduction of Theory and Deconstruction, the deconstructionists have … destroyed.  Tearing down pillars of artistic merit, transcendence, beauty and tradition, contemporary literary critics have succeeded only in leaving little but devastation in their wake.

Readers interested in this catastrophe should read When Nothing is Cool, by Lisa Ruddick in the current issue of The Point.  (The article can be read here: http://thepointmag.com/2015/criticism/when-nothing-is-cool.)  Ruddick succinctly summarizes the state of affairs by writing:  Repeatedly, we will find scholars using theory—or simply attitude—to burn through whatever is small, tender, and worthy of protection and cultivation. Academic cool is a cast of mind that disdains interpersonal kindness, I-thou connection, and the line separating the self from the outer world and the engulfing collective … I have spoken with many young academics who say that their theoretical training has left them benumbed. After a few years in the profession, they can hardly locate the part of themselves that can be moved by a poem or novel. It is as if their souls have gone into hiding, to await tenure or some other deliverance.

The state of contemporary criticism was often back-of-mind while reading A Christmas Carol and Its Adaptations: Dickens’s Story on Screen and Television by Fred Guida.  Thankfully, Guida is utterly free of irony, agenda and the canons of Political Correctness.  He comes to Dickens’s ‘ghostly little tale’ as a Carol Connoisseur, a man who loves Dickens, the Carol and the great, ghostly tradition of all it stands for.  He is an expansive humanist, at heart, nostalgic for the best of the past and hopeful for the best of what is to come.  If The Christmas Carol is as important to you as it is to myself, then Guida’s book is indispensable.

Guida provides not only cogent and reasoned critiques of the various film and television adaptations of the Carol, but also looks at the literary, political and economic roots of the work.  He bravely addresses both Dickens’s Christian philosophy and his distaste for organized religion. Guida also strives to be more than a simple reference work, opting instead to be wonderfully comprehensive, transcending the mere facts and figures of actors, directors and broadcast dates, and instead talking about the intent, approach and emotional truth behind each adaptation.

Best of all … Guida gets it.  The Carol is a very special work, transcending literature and becoming secular liturgy.  Most who have only a fleeting experience of Dickens mistake the book for a light Christmas confection, ignoring the harsh realities and social terrors that Dickens bravely tackles.  This is a book that includes both joyous Christmas parties, and a scene where the Ghost of Christmas Present shows Scrooge the horrible children, Ignorance and Want, the legacy of man’s indifference and venality.  The key component of Guida’s argument is that the best Carol adaptations are those that: (a) maintain the core integrity of the book (b) focus on some component of it overlooked by other dramatizations and (c) comment on the times in which they are made.

Here’s an example of Guida rifting on the meaning of it all:  There is often an implication (or an inference) of frivolousness connected with the use of the world nostalgia; but we see that the nostalgia at work within Dickens was a rather complex thing.  Small wonder then that the heart and mind that would articulate so beautifully the need to touch all of the past, the sweet and the bittersweet, could also be so sensitive to, and inspired by, a very different kind of stimulus; and that this stimulus would culminate in the shattering images of two children named Ignorance and Want.

Criticisms of Guida and his book would mostly boil down to matters of preference.  Though all of his critical choices are well-reasoned, they will not always be the reader’s own, so mileage varies.  But whether you are a partisan of Basil Rathbone or Alistair Sim or Mr. Magoo or Albert Finney or George C. Scott – you will still feel united with Guida in a larger brotherhood of Carol aficionados.

Guida provides exhaustive coverage of not only the major productions of the Carol, but homages and takeoffs found in sitcoms; he looks at the history of magic lantern shows and examines operatic works inspired by the Carol.  Your Correspondent would have liked an overview of radio adaptations (for example, there is a wonderful version starring Ronald Colman that can easily be found on the Web); but that would swell an already fecund work to the breaking point.

Often throughout the text of The Christmas Carol, Dickens alludes to the fact that he is sitting beside us in spirit as we read; for many people, Christmas is a time to reconnect with both Dickens and the Carol.  Guida understands that our annual visit with Scrooge and the Christmas Ghosts is an ongoing conversation that changes every 15-to-20 years, with no end in sight.  A reflection of where we’ve been with Carol adaptations and intimation of where they might go, Fred Guida’s book is simply terrific.

The President’s Hat, by Antoine Laurain (2012)

Those wanting a perfect Christmas book without wanting a book about Christmas could do no better than this superb fable for adults, The President’s Hat, by Antoine Laurain (born 1970).

An unbeatable feat of Gallic whimsy, The President’s Hat is the story of Daniel Mercier, a nice middle-class man who decides to eat alone at a bistro when his wife is out of town.  Who should happen to be at a neighboring table, but the President of the Republic himself, Francois Mitterrand.  At first delighted to be so close to the presidential presence, Mercier is even more thrilled to see that the Great Man has left behind his hat.

With a little subterfuge, Mercier is able to get Metterrand’s hat and the next thing you know … his life has changed completely.  He wears clothes with more dash, is more dynamic at the office, is finally offered that promotion he wanted so much, and, he and is family are finally able to move to a better home.

Things look great … until Mercier loses the hat himself!  We then follow the enchanted chapeau from head-to-head in Paris, from a woman struggling to emerge from beneath the thumb of her older and more domineering lover, to a disaffected creator of perfumes, and, perhaps, back to Mercier once again.  Add to that the French Secret Service hot on the trail, and you have a delicious confection indeed.

Let me be upfront about this right now:  if you read Laurain’s book, you will feel good.  This is a fairy tale for adults; a book of almost infinite good humor and high spirits, and one that will definitely make you smile indiscriminately.

Those looking for a moral (and there are always those) will have much to sift through: are our heroes suddenly rejuvenated in their careers and personal lives because of new-found self-confidence, or, perhaps, is there a subtle alchemy as yet undiscovered in inanimate things.  (One immediately thinks of Charles Dickens, an animist of the first water, who clearly thought that tables, doorknockers, fireplaces and clocks had souls.)  It also tussles with such thorny issues as fate, romantic love, and the fundamental necessity of personal fulfillment.

This brief book (barely 200 pages) is incredibly rich, and not to be missed.  I felt a queer sense of contentment, both while reading and immediately after.  If you are the sort of reader who loves literature, comfort, simple and droll humanity, and books that are life-affirming without being silly, then The President’s Hat is for you.  It won rave reviews in its native France, and has been equally well-received in the US.  Ask your bookseller for a copy – it makes a perfect gift (even to one’s self).

As with many books these days, it ends with some fairly useless Reading Group Questions and an Interview with the Author.  Though these are usually the only disposable parts of any new book, the President’s Hat does provide an author’s quote that is worth sharing here for anyone considering this book.  When asked if he (Laurain) believed in destiny or magic, the author replied:  Certainly the former and quite possibly the latter.  I’m going to take the liberty of quoting Vladimir Nabokov, whose words on the subject far exceed anything I might have to say.  It comes from one of his lectures on literature given in the USA: “The truth is that great novels are great fairy tales … literature was born on the day when a boy came crying ‘wolf, wolf’ and there was no wolf behind him."

A children’s book for adults, The President’s Hat comes highly recommended.

A Literary Education and Other Essays, by Joseph Epstein (2014)

Here is a book of deep learning, smart (in both senses of the word) writing, and significant importance: A Literary Education and Other Essays, by Joseph Epstein (born 1937).

Epstein is the former editor of the American Scholar, and has taught English and writing at Northwestern University for many years.  Many of his 24 books are collections of essays.  Epstein is one of our most significant living essayists – few contemporary writers have managed to make take this form as their primary means of expression, and even fewer have managed to be as successful at it as Epstein.  Unlike academics who write mostly “for the trade,” Epstein writes to be read by all, providing insight and context about the world in which we live, and all-too-often pointing out where we have gone wrong as a culture and as a people.

A Literary Education collects those essays that have not yet found a home between hardcovers.  Do not think, though, that this is merely Epstein clearing out the back files – each and every essay in this collection is a delight.

The oldest essay in the collection (about growing up in Chicago) dates back to 1969, the most recent (on the late Hilton Kramer) to 2013.  He writes about his boyhood, his period as an advisor to the National Endowment for the Arts, on Jewish humor and standup comics, academic freedom, the death of poetry, as well as people like Walter Cronkite (not a fan), Paul Goodman (ditto) and Hilton Kramer (whom Epstein seemed to idolize).  What astonishes upon reading them is the range of topics Epstein writes about, and the depth of humor and humanity that he brings to them.

Certainly humor and humanity are the two qualities that can be found in abundance in A Literary Education.  In a culture where much writing about the arts has become arid or politicized or mired in theory, Epstein talks abut aesthetic quality, the importance of distinguishing between high and pop culture, and what art (and experience) means to us as human beings.

Epstein is also a man of serious purpose.  He freely admits that he was not much of a student, and that built a life of the mind for himself through reading, through a love of high art and challenging literature, and through what he calls a higher seriousness.  Higher seriousness, he implies, is meeting challenging works on their own level, thinking about them, and maintaining an adult perspective.  (The latter very difficult in these days of perpetual adolescence, he opines.)  We need more like him.

He is also never less than quotable.  Writing about the various flavors of deconstructionism that have plagued literary studies for the past several years, Epstein muses so many looney tunes, so few merrie melodies.  (This was repeated around Your Correspondent’s household for several weeks.)  Or, better yet, this wonderful sentiment from the essay The Academic Zoo:  Theory – In Practice, which chronicles how arts studies in our universities have really become an intellectual garage sales:

All this might be entirely comical – it’s still pretty damn ridiculous – if it didn’t have real intellectual consequences.  Life without a sense of humor, which is life as it tends to be lived in the contemporary university, is life without any sense of proportion or perspective.  Where laughter has been abrogated, so has common sense, which is why much in current English department studies seems, not to put too fine a point on it, quite nuts.  Thus I read not long ago a batch of student papers in which I learned that “English is the language of imposition for African-Americans, a language of slavery and domination”; that “Shakespeare and [Robert] Coover [what a jolly pairing!] are both products of propagators of a male-dominated capitalistic society and both use their mastery of rhetoric to reinforce the status quo”; and that Joseph Conrad, benighted fellow, shows “ethnocentric androgenism,” which goes a long way toward explaining that Mr. Kurtz’s problem, in Heart of Darkness, is apparently that he failed to acculturate sufficiently with the tribesmen he met up with in the Congo.  “You don’t like my brother,” an old joke about cannibalism has it, “at least eat the noodles.”

Personal story here:  last Christmas I was at a party thrown by an old friend.  I was talking about my boundless admiration and affection for Charles Dickens when a drunken English lit professor (with the worst breath I have ever encountered) descended upon me. 

Drunken Professor sneers and asks how I could admire Dickens.  I respond with his love of humanity, the warmth of his heart, his expansive good cheer.  She turns to someone and says, “Is he serious?”

I go on about how his characters become friends, and that there is the glow of hearth and warmth and love.  Metaphorically patting me on the head, she says that he’s great in a Classic Comics sort of way, and that she used to love Classic Comics, too.

So … I couldn’t help it.  I told her my favorite Classic Comic was Remembrances of Things Past.  “Did they do that?” Drunken Professor asks.

“Yes, it was great.  Visually it was a little boring, because every panel was just this guy in bed.”

“How did they fit it all in one comic?” 

“Oh, it was 45 issues, just this ongoing series.  But my favorite,” I said, “Was the Kafka Classic Comics.”

“They did that, too?” 

“Yes, but they made the mistake of getting Jack Kirby to draw it, so the roach looked like the Mighty Thor.”

Well … I had lots of fun that night.

Back to Epstein: one of the other amazing things about the man is that here is an intellectual who, frankly, loves America.  He also believes, however, that with the advent of the various lunacies of the 1960s, that the nation has been in an intellectual and cultural decline.  Here he is in the essay, What To Do About the Arts?:

Nobody with a serious or even a mild interest in the arts likes to think he has lived his mature life through a bad or even mediocre period of artistic creation. Yet a strong argument can be made that ours has been an especially bleak time for the arts.

One of the quickest ways of determining this is to attempt to name either discrete masterpieces or impressive bodies of work that have been written, painted, or composed over the past, say, 30 years. Inexhaustible lists do not leap to mind. Not only is one hard-pressed to name recent masterpieces, but one’s sense of anticipation for the future is less than keen. In looking back over the past two or three decades, what chiefly comes to mind are fizzled literary careers, outrageous exhibitions and inflated (in all senses of the word) reputations in the visual arts, and a sad if largely tolerant boredom with most contemporary musical composition.

Perhaps my favorite piece in A Literary Education is A Case of Academic Freedom, in which Epstein accounts the denial of tenure to a radical activist professor, Barbara Foley (born 1948) for her role in forcibly preventing a talk by Adolfo Calero, then commander-in-chief of the Nicaraguan Democratic Forces, all in the name of “free speech.”  Epstein does much to remind us that the adjective Orwellian can be liberally applied to both the left and the right.

A Literary Education comes highly recommended, and will be savored by anyone serious about art, culture and education.