K.A.C. 2017 - T - 18 ...

     Well, they DO say breakfast is the most important meal of the day, right? Sadly, though, this probably qualifies as a Breakfast Fail ... which leads us to this year's pack of Christmas Food Fails - like what, you ask? Like ...

      the absolutely CLUELESS photo at right from the Gregg's bakery chain in the UK, who decided to 'touch up' the Nativity Scene by replacing the Baby Jesus with one of their food items - and not just ANY item, but a SAUSAGE ROLL! Take a moment and let that sink in. The full story can be found in the link below:

     https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/4916819/greggs-sausage-roll-jesus-advent-calendar-nativity-christmas-advert/

      Next up is the gingerbread Santa's Sleigh and Reindeer set ... should be easy, right? Comes with directions and everything - umm, well, at least the 'baker' had a sense of humor about the Epic Fail! Take a look at this and 19 other culinary disasters over at this link from The Delish:

     http://www.delish.com/holiday-recipes/christmas/g3150/holiday-food-fails/?slide=1

    




     
     **************************************************************************

     Coming Tomorrow: The first of two Christmas stories from my past, this one involving a moment of nationwide fame for your humble Conjure Cinema Curator ... it's a rather, shall we say, 'demented' tale - and you can read about it AND hear it as it happened! Curious? Tune in tomorrow!
     

K.A.C. 2017 - T - 19 ...

     Want to be a hero this Christmas? Let the world know! Why have a REGULAR tree when you can put up 'Spruce Wayne' - your family will be SO proud!

     Today we take our annual look at the Spirit of Christmas as seen through the competing Christmas ads of the UK. On this side of the pond, commercials are seen as a necessary evil, but in Britain, people eagerly await the annual 'make or break' Christmas ads from stores such as Marks & Spencers,  John Lewis and Sainsbury. This year's ads are already out and the people have voted: some good, some not so good ... and one that was voted as - umm - rather horrifying, actually, with an earworm song that you can't get rid of once you've heard it!

     Our first entry comes from the John Lewis stores, featuring Moz the Monster (seen at right). While not a heart-tugging home run as some of their past year's ads have been, it's still a cute ad. Take a look at it here:

     https://www.msn.com/en-gb/entertainment/entertainmenttv/john-lewis-unveils-its-christmas-advert-for-2017-as-moz-the-monster-comes-out-from-under-the-bed/ar-BBEMNVn      



     Not to be outdone, Marks and  Spencers (John Lewis' biggest competitors) bring out the big guns with none other than Paddington Bear, who makes it his mission to help 'Santa' deliver gifts to the folks in his neighborhood on Christmas Eve. Not surprisingly, this gets my vote for Best Ad for the 2017 season - but I readily admit up front that Paddington and I have a long history together, so I should probably disqualify myself here.
Give it a gander:

      https://www.thesun.co.uk/money/4853877/marks-and-spencer-christmas-advert-2017-paddington-bear-video/

     Up next, Peacocks decided to go all musical with their ad - I'm going to say right now that unless you follow UK music (and especially Britain's Got Talent), you're not going to know half the people in this ad. The only ones I know are the brothers who form Jedward, and that's only because I've seen them on The Graham Norton Show. This ad is probably more of a hit over in the UK ... or not, once you take a look at the comments section below the link. Sounds like a bit of a misfire there this year, Peacocks!

     https://www.thesun.co.uk/money/4901625/peacocks-christmas-advert-2017-features-honey-g-jedward-wagner-and-more-x-factor-stars/

     You would think THAT would have been the musical number folks were up in arms about, right? Guess again! The true Christmas earworm taking over the British Isles comes from Sainsbury's ad and features none other than our very own Kermit The Frog, Rollo, the Singing Dog and a number of cameos from both regular folks and UK celebs. It's called 'Every Bit of Christmas' and will get on Every One Of Your Nerves! Forewarned is Forearmed ... here you go! And I know I've asked this before, but seriously, what is it over there with the link between Christmas and Brussels Sprouts ??? 


     https://www.thesun.co.uk/money/4888429/sainsburys-christmas-advert-2017-kermit-the-frog/

          Finally, here's the link to the other UK ads, from Lidl to Tesco's and from Aldi to Asda. The Tesco ad is another favorite, concentrating on the Christmas Turkey as seen in a number of different families' homes (I'm particularly fond of the harried Mum who has had enough of the banter from the rest of the family and tells them all to "get out of my kitchen, all of ya!"  :) ) 

     https://uk.style.yahoo.com/christmas-adverts-2017-asda-beats-120000070.html

     *******************************************************************

     Before we retire for the day, there was breaking news yesterday of a nefarious Grinch-like creature who almost 'stole Christmas' in Sea Girt, New Jersey. A picture of the culprit follows is at right and the full story can be found at this link:

http://myfox8.com/2017/12/04/squirrel-blamed-for-damaging-towns-christmas-display-charged-with-criminal-mischief/

     Yes, you're reading that right .. the squirrel was 'charged with criminal mischief' ... NOW we're talking K.A.C. material!  :)

     ****************************************************************************

     Coming Tomorrow: Our annual look at Christmas Food Fails - save room for these!

K.A.C. 2017 - T - 20 ...

     Good day to you all! We wrap up our look at Charles Dicken's lesser-known Christmas Books with the fifth and final entry (from 1848), entitled 'The Haunted Man and The Ghost's Bargain'. 

     After a one year hiatus, Dickens returned with the last of  what is now known as the Christmas Books. After this, he would turn his attention to editing and managing two magazines, Household Words, which ran from 1850 - 1858 and All The Year Round, which ran from 1859 - 1867. Both of these periodicals included annual Christmas stories, so he didn't retire from them entirely. Besides, by this point in his career, what with his annual novels and his public readings of his Christmas tales, his name was inextricably associated with the holiday.

     His final tale is almost the exact opposite of his first, 'A Christmas Carol', and, of all the five, is the most downbeat and depressing tale of the lot, saved at the end by a miraculous turn of events. Reminiscent of both The Tale of King Midas and Poe's Imp of the Perverse, it tells of Mr. Redlaw, a chemistry professor at a university who, while a kind man and decent teacher, is also consumed and bitter by what he feels is an unjust past. He is a self-made man, having had no support from his parents - a father died young, a mother re-wed and with no time for him - and only the love of a sister, who doted on him. Like Scrooge before him, he worked hard for his vocation, eschewing love and friendship in the process. He did find both in a young woman and a best friend, but turned bitter again when they fell in love with each other (due to his inattention) and the too early death of his sister.

     A Phantom assails the professor night after night, taking Redlaw's shape and voice, taunting him about his part privations and hurts. The Christmas Waits (musicians who go door to door for money - think Christmas Carolers, but with instruments) are heard playing  somewhere in the neighborhood, but even their sound bring him little joy. The Phantom offers him a bargain: he has the power to take away all the bad memories of the past, or as he says:


“Receive it as a proof that I am powerful,” returned the Ghost.  “Hear what I offer!  Forget the sorrow, wrong, and trouble you have known!”

“Forget them!” he repeated.

“I have the power to cancel their remembrance—to leave but very faint, confused traces of them, that will die out soon,” returned the Spectre.  “Say!  Is it done?”

“Stay!” cried the haunted man, arresting by a terrified gesture the uplifted hand.  “I tremble with distrust and doubt of you; and the dim fear you cast upon me deepens into a nameless horror I can hardly bear.—I would not deprive myself of any kindly recollection, or any sympathy that is good for me, or others.  What shall I lose, if I assent to this?  What else will pass from my remembrance?”

“No knowledge; no result of study; nothing but the intertwisted chain of feelings and associations, each in its turn dependent on, and nourished by, the banished recollections.  Those will go.”
“Are they so many?” said the haunted man, reflecting in alarm.

“They have been wont to show themselves in the fire, in music, in the wind, in the dead stillness of the night, in the revolving years,” returned the Phantom scornfully.

“In nothing else?”

The Phantom held its peace.

But having stood before him, silent, for a little while, it moved towards the fire; then stopped.
“Decide!” it said, “before the opportunity is lost!”

“A moment!  I call Heaven to witness,” said the agitated man, “that I have never been a hater of any kind,—never morose, indifferent, or hard, to anything around me.  If, living here alone, I have made too much of all that was and might have been, and too little of what is, the evil, I believe, has fallen on me, and not on others.  But, if there were poison in my body, should I not, possessed of antidotes and knowledge how to use them, use them?  If there be poison in my mind, and through this fearful shadow I can cast it out, shall I not cast it out?”

“Say,” said the Spectre, “is it done?”

“A moment longer!” he answered hurriedly.  “I would forget it if I could!  Have I thought that, alone, or has it been the thought of thousands upon thousands, generation after generation?  All human memory is fraught with sorrow and trouble.  My memory is as the memory of other men, but other men have not this choice.  Yes, I close the bargain.  Yes!  I WILL forget my sorrow, wrong, and trouble!”

“Say,” said the Spectre, “is it done?”

“It is!”

“It is.  And take this with you, man whom I here renounce!  The gift that I have given, you shall give again, go where you will.  Without recovering yourself the power that you have yielded up, you shall henceforth destroy its like in all whom you approach.  Your wisdom has discovered that the memory of sorrow, wrong, and trouble is the lot of all mankind, and that mankind would be the happier, in its other memories, without it.  Go!  Be its benefactor!  Freed from such remembrance, from this hour, carry involuntarily the blessing of such freedom with you.  Its diffusion is inseparable and inalienable from you.  Go!  Be happy in the good you have won, and in the good you do!”

     Too late, Redlaw realizes what the 'bargain' entails. Where he had sorrow and remorse for the past, now he has emptiness ... and a slowly growing anger that he cannot account for. Everyone he now encounters, his servants, the custodians of the university and a poor loving family, the Tetterbys (pictured at right - the stand-ins for the Cratchits here), are all poisoned by his touch, their past hurts and bad memories erased and an increasing bitterness and disgust with their lot in life and each other spreading like a disease.

     Let me pause here for a moment and dwell on the Tetterbys. If Dickens was hoping to strike gold again with this family as he did with the Cratchits, he was woefully off base. Even before they are laid low by Redlaw, they are a loud, fractious lot, with far too many children and far too little means of providing for them. Also unlike the Cratchits, Father thinks nothing of smacking the kids around to get them to bed and to make them stay in there - and the youngest boy, Johnny, is bullied into the slave labor of carting around baby Sally (nicknamed 'Moloch' for her prodigious size) around the clock, with constant threats of punishment from his mother if he falters. THIS is what passes for 'comedy relief' in this tale! I must be missing something, for far from finding any of it funny, instead I find it distinctly off-putting. Dickens makes the case that even with all their sniping interactions, the family does love each other, but to these modern eyes, there seems to be little difference in their before and after actions after Redlaw passes his contagion along to them.

     

      Two people alone are unaffected by Redlaw: the first is Milly Swidger, daughter of the old custodian of the school and the story's resident 'angelic' figure. Her inherent goodness is completely immune to the professor's cursed touch (the reason given at the end of the book). In addition to her other duties, she is taking care of a sick student of the teacher, who she dotes on. At one point, Redlaw is informed of the student and goes to see him, infecting him as well, making him turn against the Angel of Mercy who has cared for him for so long.


     The other person is a near-feral child who is brought into the professors' home by the custodians. Found outside on a bitterly cold night, they take mercy on him, bring him inside, feed him and let him sleep by the kitchen fire. He won't let anyone get near him and will attack anyone who comes too close. When Redlaw questions the ghost why the boy is not changed by his touch, the spirit tells him that life has so cruelly treated the child from birth on a daily basis that there is nothing more Redlaw CAN do to him: his spirit is so turned against humanity that his touch would be superfluous at this point. 

     Seeing what disaster he brings to all and sundry about him, Redlaw bitterly regrets making his bargain and seeks to put things right, begging the Phantom to release the people he has turned against each other. He understands he is cursed until the end of his days and accepts his fate, but cannot bear to continue to destroy other lives. 

     In the end, it is Milly who saves the day. She is not affected by Redlaw as she has already gone through Hell with the loss of her own child and came out the other side still intact and loving, wiser, sadder and more determined to help others. As Literature Wikia puts it:

      "Towards the end of the story, Milly states that painful memories serve an important purpose. People need to remember those who have wronged them in the past so that they can forgive them and, as a result, grow and develop as human beings. At that point, all of the characters cease to be angry and Professor Redlaw becomes a more humble and also a kinder person."

     Once Redlaw has gotten the message, the Phantom releases him from his foolish bargain and, like Scrooge before him, the professor emerges a changed man. No longer bitter and brooding, he is instead humble, looking forward to the future and to helping all he comes in contact with. The story ends with a massive Christmas dinner for all the participants and a hearty wish that we ALL remember our memories, good and bad, for they make us who we are. Or, as the 87-year-old patriarch of the Swidger clan repeats throughout the book, "Lord keep my memory green!"

     Should you like to read the tale yourself, the following link will take you to it:

     https://archive.org/stream/hauntedmanthegho00dickuoft#page/n11/mode/2up

     ******************************************************************

    

     And with that, we come to the end of The Christmas Books. The entries from here on take a PRECIPITOUS drop in class, as we unveil 19 full days of weirdness from around the world! Like what, you ask? Well, before we go, it would be remiss of us not to mark today's date, December 5th - it's famous around these parts for being Krampus Night (or Krampusnacht), when Our Mascot is on the loose with his switches and sack for ALL the bad little boys and girls! Over the years, the K-man has gone through a LOT of changes, now becoming a pop culture icon - don't believe me? Who is the LAST (goat)person you'd expect to see in a Nativity scene? You know the answer ...

    https://dangerousminds.net/comments/behold_this_one-of-a-kind_krampus_nativity_set

     THAT should give you a pretty fair idea of what's coming for the duration of the season here at the K.A.C. - consider yourselves warned!






*********************************************************************

     Coming Tomorrow: We close the book on Dickens and turn our attention to some STRANGER Christmas spirits - join us, won't you?

K.A.C. 2017 - T - 21 ...

     To arms, to arms, K.A.C. devotees, as we engage today in 'The Battle of Life (A Love Story)', the fourth (of five) of Charles Dickens' annual Christmas tales, originally published in 1846. It is both the shortest and the least 'Christmas'-y of the lot. In fact, it only has one scene in the entire novella set at Christmas!

     It is a tale of a love not recognized as such by one of the two people in love (or more properly, who SHOULD be in love) and the extraordinary lengths one sister goes through to ensure the proper love happens for the other. Reading more like a Shakespearean romantic farce than any of his previous works, Dickens' plot does some incredible literary gymnastics to get his characters where they need to be by the end.

     Wikipedia gives a much better accounting of the plot than I'm able to, so let's turn it over to them:
  
     "Two sisters, Grace and Marion, live happily in an English village with their two servants, Clemency Newcome and Ben Britain, and their good-natured widower father Dr Jeddler. Dr Jeddler is a man whose philosophy is to treat life as a farce. Marion, the younger sister, is betrothed to Alfred Heathfield, Jeddler's ward who is leaving the village to complete his studies. He entrusts Marion to Grace's care and makes a promise to return to win Marion's hand.

Michael Warden, a libertine who is about to leave the country, is thought by the barristers Snitchey and Craggs to be about to seduce the younger sister into an elopement. Clemency spies Marion one night in her clandestine rendezvous with Warden. On the day that Alfred is to return, however, it is discovered that Marion has run off. Her supposed elopement causes much grief to both her father and her sister.

     Six years pass. Clemency is now married to Britain and the two have set up a tavern in the village. After nursing heartbreak, Alfred marries Grace instead of Marion and she bears him a daughter, also called Marion. On the birthday of Marion, Grace confides to Alfred that Marion has made a promise to explain her so-called "elopement" in person. Marion indeed appears that evening by sunset and explains her disappearance to the parties involved. It turns out that Marion has not "eloped" but has instead been living at her aunt Martha's place so as to allow Alfred to fall in love with Grace. Tears are shed and happiness and forgiveness reign as the missing sister is reunited with the rest. Warden also returns, and, forgiven by Dr Jeddler, marries Marion."

     The Battle of Life is also notable among the Christmas Books as being the only one of the five with no supernatural involvement whatsoever. I don't know if it is because of this or just that it was not what audiences were expecting from Dickens during the holiday season, but it is considered the least (and least liked) of the five books.

     My favorite characters in this novella are, surprisingly, none of the main characters (who I actually find all rather hard to relate to). Instead, they are the comedy relief servants, Clemency and Ben, who have a good-natured teasing banter back and forth through the book. It's strange to say, as the main plot is about the nature of mistaken love and what has to happen for it to blossom as it is meant to, but the dialogue between the two servants over time has a much more natural progression to it than that of the main characters and you're glad to see they finally come together as husband and wife in the final part of the story.  

     I'll give the final word here to the author himself, who ends the tale thus: 

     
      "TIME - from whom I had the latter portion of this story, and with whom I have the pleasure of a personal acquaintance of some five-and-thirty years' duration - informed me, leaning easily upon his scythe, that Michael Warden never went away again, and never sold his house, but opened it afresh, maintained a golden means of hospitality, and had a wife, the pride and honour of that countryside, whose name was Marion. But, as I have observed that Time confuses facts occasionally, I hardly know what weight to give to his authority."

     ***************************************************************************

     Coming Tomorrow: The final 'Christmas Books' tale, and a chilling one at that, The Haunted Man and The Ghost's Bargain - don't miss it!

K.A.C. 2017 - T - 22 ...

     Welcome back! Our third tale of Christmas Spirits by Charles Dickens concerns a husband, a wife and a chirpy little cricket who is more than it seems. Entitled 'The Cricket On the Hearth (A Fairy Tale of Home)', it was originally published in 1845 as his (now-expected by the public) annual Christmas tale. 

     Following in the tradition of 'A Christmas Carol' and 'The Chimes', 'Cricket' is a cautionary tale of the season, a tale of not running to judgement without all the facts and a tale that involves the interjection of supernatural assistance. In 'Carol', it was the Ghosts of Christmas Past, Present and Future; in 'Chimes', it was the Goblins of the Bells and here it comes in the form of fairies who put things right.

John and Dot

     The main story concerns John Peerybingle, a middle-aged, successful carrier of goods, and husband to his pretty, much younger wife Dot. They have an infant boy (never named) and a good life. They are devoted to each other (modern sensibilities reading this might say too much so) and to their friends, including a poor toymaker, Caleb Plummer and his blind daughter, Bertha, who live in a run-down hovel in the meanest conditions. Caleb spins fantasies about their life for his daughter so she doesn't find out the truth. They are employed to make the toys (and paid a pittance for them) by the miserly Mr. Tackleton (nicknamed in the novella "Gruff and Tackleton" by all and sundry), the Scrooge-like figure of this tale, to Caleb's Bob Cratchit.

     The fact that the Plummer's get by at all rests on the the assistance of the Peerybingles, as Dot and Bertha are good friends, and whenever they come to visit, she and John make sure to bring food and goods for them. They also do not spoil Caleb's fantasy to his daughter and play along with it for her sake.

Caleb and Bertha

     In addition to the hardship of their life, Caleb also had a son Edward, whom, when grown, had traveled to South America to seek his fortune, but whom they've never heard from and is feared dead.

     The final members of the story are May Fielding, Dot's best friend, and her opinionated, shrewish aunt Mrs. Fielding, a cantankerous type who has to have a say about everything and everybody (oddly enough the most disagreeable character in the whole story, far outweighing miser Tackleton). Did I say say final members? My mistake: there is ONE more character, and though she is the comic relief of the tale, she is my favorite member of the human cast: Dot and John's nursemaid for their baby, the outrageously-named Tilly Slowboy. 

     She has a heart of gold, a disjointed body that goes every which way and a way with children that today would have her before a Child Services board in a heartbeat. She may be more than a little mentally deficient, with the running joke of the story being Tilly's almost preternatural ability to mishandle the baby (who, thankfully for the tyke, takes after his father and is made of strong stuff). Here is Dickens' introduction of her:

Tilly Slowboy and Boxer

     "Don't let the dear child fall under the grate, Tilly, whatever you do!"
 
     It may be noted of Miss Slowboy, in spite of her rejecting the caution with some vivacity, that she had a rare and surprising talent for getting this baby into difficulties: and had several times imperilled its short life in a quiet way peculiarly her own. She was of a spare and straight shape, this young lady, insomuch that her garments appeared to be in constant danger of sliding off those sharp pegs, her shoulders, on which they were loosely hung. Her costume was remarkable for the partial development, on all possible occasions, of some flannel vestment of a singular structure; also for affording glimpses, in the region of the back, of a corset, or a pair of stays, in colour a dead green. Being always in a state of gaping admiration at everything, and absorbed, besides, in the perpetual contemplation of her mistress's perfections and the baby's, Miss Slowboy, in her little errors of judgment, may be said to have done equal honour to her head and to her heart; and though these did less honour to the baby's head, which they were the occasional means of bringing into contact with deal doors, dressers, stair-rails, bed-posts, and other foreign substances, still they were the honest results of Tilly Slowboy's constant astonishment at finding herself so kindly treated, and installed in such a comfortable home. For the maternal and paternal Slowboy were alike unknown to Fame, and Tilly had been bred by public charity, a foundling; which word, though only differing from fondling by one vowel's length, is very different in meaning, and expresses quite another thing."

     I seriously wonder if JRR Tolkien hadn't read this story and had Tilly in mind when it came time to write the dialog for Gollum, as she sounds EXACTLY like him (and, having said that, once you read this tale, your mind is GUARANTEED to read her words in that voice) - case in point:
  
     "Did its mothers make it up a Beds, then!" cried Miss Slowboy to the Baby; "and did its hair grow brown and curly when its caps was lifted off, and frighten it, a precious Pets, a sitting by the fires!"

     But aren't we forgetting someone, you ask? Not at all: we've saved the best for last, the titular character of the tale, the Cricket. The Cricket is introduced at the very beginning of the story, living in the Peerybingle's hearth and always joining in whenever the kettle is put on - as soon as it begins to whistle, the cricket starts to sing and play along with it until it's taken off the fire. As John arrives home after a long day of deliveries, we get this exchange:

     "Heyday!" said John in his slow way. "It's merrier than ever to-night, I think."

     "And it's sure to bring us good fortune, John! It always has done so. To have a Cricket on the Hearth is the luckiest thing in all the world!"

     And so it would seem, as the Cricket seems to be the touchstone of the Peerybingle's good fortune, as well as a happy companion to Dot during John's long hours away. She goes on to her husband interpreting its different chirps and songs and he good-naturedly agrees with her.

     As they are unloading his cart for the next day's deliveries, two items out of the ordinary are brought in: one is an old man, a stranger who John met on the road and, given the severity of the weather, brought home with him. The other is a wedding cake: it turns out miser Tackleton has asked May Fielding to be his wife. She was originally affianced to Edward Plummer before his unfortunate disappearance and now must face her future - either alone or with Tackleton. She is honest about her lack of feeling towards the man (who sees it himself as more of a business arrangement), but lacking any other option (and in the repeated badgering by her maiden aunt) has agreed to the appointment.

     Time goes by and the elderly stranger lives with the Peerybingles for awhile as the nuptials draw near. Dot seems ill at ease around him, which Tackleton notices and files away. Trying to make May see him in a better light, he suggests they all have a dinner party together: the Peerybingles, the Plummers and themselves. Not surprisingly, it doesn't go well, as May deliberately 'pokes the bear', making jibes about her husband-to-be; her aunt holding court about all and sundry, and more. Tackleton is understandably upset by May's behavior and more than a little jealous over the domestic bliss John and Dot have. 

     He starts insinuating that Dot may NOT be the wholesome, devoted wife John takes her for: after getting a warning about what would happen to people who talk like that about his beloved, Tackleton backs off (it's established early on that John is a huge, strong man - he'd have to be, in his line of business). As Dot is making up a bed for the stranger, John is sitting beside the hearth, thinking of what he's heard and seen, when the true nature of the Cricket makes its first appearance:

     "And as he soberly and thoughtfully puffed at his old pipe, and as the Dutch clock ticked, and as the red fire gleamed, and as the Cricket chirped, that Genius of his Hearth and Home (for such the Cricket was) came out, in fairy shape, into the room, and summoned many forms of Home about him. Dots of all ages and all sizes filled the chamber. Dots who were merry children, running on before him, gathering flowers in the fields; coy Dots, half shrinking from, half yielding to, the pleading of his own rough image; newly-married Dots, alighting at the door, and taking wondering possession of the household keys; motherly little Dots, attended by fictitious Slowboys, bearing babies to be christened; matronly Dots, still young and blooming, watching Dots of daughters, as they danced at rustic balls; fat Dots, encircled and beset by troops of rosy grandchildren; withered Dots, who leaned on sticks, and tottered as they crept along. Old Carriers, too, appeared with blind old Boxers lying at their feet; and newer carts with younger drivers ("Peerybingle Brothers" on the tilt); and sick old Carriers, tended by the gentlest hands; and graves of dead and gone old Carriers, green in the churchyard. And as the Cricket showed him all these things—he saw them plainly, though his eyes were fixed upon the fire—the Carrier's heart grew light and happy, and he thanked his Household Gods with all his might, and cared no more for Gruff and Tackleton than you do."

     By the way, the Boxer mentioned above is John's dog, who goes with him on his deliveries and is the terror of the neighborhood ... well, neighborhood cats, at any rate.

     After viewing Dot becoming more flustered by their boarder, Tackleton keeps a close eye on the pair and announces to John that his 'loving wife' is cheating on him. John doesn't believe it for a second until Tackleton takes him to his own counting-house to show Dot and the 'elderly stranger' together, he with his wig and other accoutrements off and exposed as a young man, instead. John is left reeling and hurt.

     We move to the final part of the story here, with John and Dot at home. She can feel he is out of sorts with her and gets more and more nervous for the cause - finally, crying, she goes to bed, leaving him alone and brooding with his dark thoughts.

     Speaking of dark, for a Christmas story, this one goes WAY dark here - the more John plays over what he saw, the more morose he gets, to the point of getting down his gun and starting to the room to murder the stranger for destroying the happiness of his home. He literally has the gun in full upswing to batter the door down when the deus ex machina (well, in THIS case, Gryllidae ex machina) kicks in: the Cricket starts to chirp and breaks his concentration. 

     As Dickens writes: 

     "No sound he could have heard, no human voice, not even hers, could so have moved and softened him. The artless words in which she had told him of her love for this same Cricket were once more freshly spoken; her trembling, earnest manner at the moment was again before him; her pleasant voice—oh, what a voice it was for making household music at the fireside of an honest man!—thrilled through and through his better nature, and awoke it into life and action.
He recoiled from the door, like a man walking in his sleep, awakened from a frightful dream; and put the gun aside. Clasping his hands before his face, he then sat down again beside the fire, and found relief in tears.

The Cricket on the Hearth came out into the room, and stood in Fairy shape before him.

"'I love it,'" said the Fairy Voice, repeating what he well remembered, "'for the many times I have heard it, and the many thoughts its harmless music has given me.'"

"She said so!" cried the Carrier. "True!"

"'This has been a happy home, John! and I love the Cricket for its sake!'"

"It has been, Heaven knows," returned the Carrier. "She made it happy, always,—until now."

"So gracefully sweet-tempered; so domestic, joyful, busy, and light-hearted!" said the Voice.

"Otherwise I never could have loved her as I did," returned the Carrier.

The Voice, correcting him, said "do."

The Carrier repeated "as I did." But not firmly. His faltering tongue resisted his control, and would speak in its own way for itself and him.

The Figure, in an attitude of invocation, raised its hand and said:
"Upon your own hearth——"

"The hearth she has blighted," interposed the Carrier.

"The hearth she has—how often!—blessed and brightened," said the Cricket; "the hearth which, but for her, were only a few stones and bricks and rusty bars, but which has been, through her, the Altar of your Home; on which you have nightly sacrificed some petty passion, selfishness, or care, and offered up the homage of a tranquil mind, a trusting nature, and an overflowing heart; so that the smoke from this poor chimney has gone upward with a better fragrance than the richest incense that is burnt before the richest shrines in all the gaudy temples of this world!—Upon your own hearth; in its quiet sanctuary; surrounded by its gentle influences and associations; hear her! Hear me! Hear everything that speaks the language of your hearth and home!"

"And pleads for her?" inquired the Carrier.

"All things that speak the language of your hearth and home must plead for her!" returned the Cricket. "For they speak the truth."

     Saying this, the fairies of the ENTIRE HOUSE come forth to plead Dot's innocence: they stream from the walls and the floor, from the clocks and the kitchen implements, from the cart outside and from every single article in the house and they proceed to show him a series of visions of Dot's love and devotion to him, in every way. The vision proceeds throughout the night, leaving a broken, changed man to face the dawn. 

     With the approach of morning, Tackleton arrives. Being that it is his wedding day, he is cheerful, yet worried that John might have done something rash during the night. Upon checking, however, the stranger is gone and John avers that he laid no finger on the man. He also tells Tackleton his decision to annul the marriage and let Dot leave, after seeing her with the younger man and coming to the (wrong) conclusion that he had taken her away from her home at too young an age and how she had been loyal to him, a middle-aged carrier, but how she really wanted to be with a lover her age, instead. The fairies have shown her to be blameless and to have brought no shame on his household, but he loves he so much he will give her her freedom - and he warns Tackleton that NO ONE is to talk against her regarding his decision. Tackleton, deciding not to push his luck any further, agrees and leaves to get ready for his wedding.

     A thoroughly miserable Dot has heard all this and is bawling her eyes out, causing Tilly to go into histrionic hysterics:
  
     "Ow, if you please, don't!" said Tilly. "It's enough to dead and bury the Baby, so it is if you please."

     "Will you bring him sometimes to see his father, Tilly," inquired her mistress, drying her eyes,—"when I can't live here, and have gone to my old home?"

     "Ow, if you please, don't!" cried Tilly, throwing back her head, and bursting out into a howl—she looked at the moment uncommonly like Boxer. "Ow, if you please, don't! Ow, what has everybody gone and been and done with everybody, making everybody else so wretched? Ow-w-w-w!"

     From this point on, it's hell bent for leather to the end. First Caleb and Bertha show up, having heard some inklings of what Tackleton had suggested, and upon hearing Dot's innocence, are much relieved. Caleb decides this is the time to end his own charade and tells Bertha the truth about their situation - part of which being he had also lied about Tackleton being a kind and generous man. Bertha is heartbroken by this turn of events, but bears up well.

     During all this, a carriage containing a young man arrives, the same young man who portrayed the stranger at the Peerybingle's home: none other than Caleb's long-lost son, Edward, who had returned secretly, bringing Dot into his confidence, upon learning of May's nuptials. With Tackleton waiting at the church, the young reunited lovers run off to get married first, leaving him at the altar.

     A HUGE party breaks out, with overflowing food and drink and local musicians roused to accompany the dancing. Dot makes John dangle for a LONG while as she has all the explanations brought forth; then when she can not bear to see him miserable any longer, she rushes to his arms.

     A thoroughly confused Tackleton arrives, sees and hears the update and goes away more confused than ever. He does, good-naturedly (and rather abruptly) change character and sends along the wedding cake for them to enjoy. Even more surprising, he returns to the party and pleads to be part of the company - he has had a revelation and wants to make things right, for Caleb and Bertha, for Edward and May, for everyone he may have slighted. What works for Scrooge in his Christmas redemption comes off as forced here, but be that as it may, that's where the tale ends.

     Well, almost. With the kettle going, the musicians playing and the company dancing and jolly, the last bit is left to another music maker:

     "Hark! how the Cricket joins the music with its Chirp, Chirp, Chirp; and how the kettle hums!"

     If you're intrigued enough to read the full story, you can find the link to it here:

     http://www.gutenberg.org/files/20795/20795-h/20795-h.htm



     *************************************************************************
 
     Like 'A Christmas Carol' before it, 'Cricket' was an instant hit upon publication, spawning a number of play (and later film) adaptations. The best-known (and at the same time strangest) film version is the Rankin-Bass animated TV Christmas special from 1967. Why strangest? Well ... take everything you've read above and toss it all out. Main characters? Out! Supporting characters? Out! Cricket in the house of the Peerybingles? OUT! 

     Instead the story is re-imagined with Caleb and Bertha (the toymaker and his blind daughter) as the main characters (voiced by the father and daughter team of Danny and Marlo Thomas). In this version, Bertha goes blind from depression (!) after receiving news her lover was lost at sea. The evil boss they work for decides to make Bertha his wife, to the family's dismay. However, they are helped out of their predicament by Crocket the Cricket (voiced by Roddy McDowell) , who brings a mysterious stranger to their house and sets things right. 

     It's an odd mixture of live action, TV-quality animation and murals with narration (in order to save money). All this in 49 minutes, INCLUDING seven (count 'em!) songs! But don't take my word for it ... settle in and watch it yourself!

     https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TSCoeu6HMxE 

     ****************************************************************************

     

      Finally, it would be remiss of me not to mention that many houses have a 'lucky cricket' of their own that the owners keep on their hearth to attract luck and good fortune the year round. They are usually made of brass or cast iron, such as this fellow to the right. You can find him here:

     http://www.plowhearth.com/cast-iron-hearth-cricket-fireplace-accent.htm?aff=6443&CAWELAID=1018186706&catargetid=530007710000089506&cadevice=c&gclid=EAIaIQobChMIu8uEnq-i1QIVm4izCh0nQw2CEAQYBCABEgIlpvD_BwE 

     There are many variations of the 'lucky cricket' available, so search around and find one that appeals (or perhaps 'chirps') to you! And it's not just homes that have them. Stretching the point just a little, but keeping it all in the same family, here in New England one of our main tourist attractions is Old Sturbridge Village. Care to guess what the village logo is? Yes, I hear you say, it's a grasshopper, not a cricket (I DID say the same family - perhaps I should have said the same genus). The Village's description of WHY this merry critter is on their log says:



    

    
Why is the Village's logo a grasshopper?
According to ancient folk belief, the grasshopper was not born but emerged directly from the earth itself. As a rural museum the Village was likewise "sprung from the soil." In 1956 - ten years after its official opening - the Grasshopper was adopted by Old Sturbridge Village as a fitting symbol.

     I prefer to believe it all points back to luck.

     *****************************************************************************

     Coming Tomorrow: The next of the Dickens Christmas Books - The Battle Of Life!

K.A.C. 2017 - T - 23 ...

     Good morning! We continue with a look at the second of Charles Dickens' 'Christmas Books' - 'The Chimes: A Goblin Story Of Some Bells That Rang An Old Year Out And A New Year In', originally published in 1844.

     Question: When is a Christmas story NOT a Christmas story? Answer: When it is THIS story, which is actually set at New Years! With the worldwide success of A Christmas Carol, Dickens devoted himself each year to come up with an annual holiday tale, trying to capture lightning in a bottle again with similar holiday fare. The fact that he was never able to replicate his success does not make his followup stories any less enjoyable.

     Of the four immediate annuals, 'The Chimes' is the most 'Christmas Carol'-like and is considered the literal (and spiritual, no pun intended) successor to the original tale, covering a lot of the same ground and concerned with the same problems of the time.

     The story concerns one Toby 'Trotty' Veck, an old man who has spent his life as a ticket porter or 'trotter', of mail, messages and small packages from one place to another. His home base is on the steps of a London church, always open to the elements, waiting for his next job. Dickens paints Trotty as a long-suffering, though patient, man, eager and still willing to do his job, even though the years haven't been kind to him and there are now younger (and quicker) lads to do it.

     Trotty's main love in life is his daughter Margaret, known as Meg. She always comes in the evening to bring her father supper, after his long, cold day. This evening she brings him one of his favorite dishes, tripe, and some news. She is full of excitement and tells her father she wants to marry her long-time fiance' Richard the following day (New Year's Day). He is happy for his daughter but worries for the young couple's future (the main threesome here are all established as part of London's massive poor population at the time; they serve in the Cratchit's role for this story).

     Not helping matters are Alderman Clute and another pompous businessman, who overhear Meg's news to her father and deride her (and all poor people) that they should be out working and not planning a poor marriage and all that entails; i.e., the inevitable children that would arrive, making more mouths to feed and a further tax burden on the rich. Their conversation makes Trotty feel guilty and he wants Meg to forestall her marriage.

     After delivering one last message, he is heading home when he comes upon a destitute laborer named Will Fern and his fragile, orphaned niece Lillian. Recognizing the name from his last delivery of the day, he finds out Will is on his way to see Sir Joseph Bowley, MP, regarding a debt he owes. Trotty persuades him not to go and to come home with him, for he overheard the MP saying that he would throw Will in prison when he arrived. Trotty and Meg feed the travelers and put them up for the night in their meager lodgings, with the earlier rantings from the rich about the uselessness of the poor playing over and over in the messenger's head.

      With the guests asleep, Trotty goes out for a midnight stroll, hearing the Bells of the church calling to him, more insistently than ever before. Here is where we get to the meat of the story, with the Goblins of the Bells serving the same purpose as the Ghosts in Dickens' earlier Christmas Carol.

      Making his way up to the steeple, we are treated to this exchange:

     

‘What visitor is this!’ it said.  The voice was low and deep, and Trotty fancied that it sounded in the other figures as well. 

‘I thought my name was called by the Chimes!’ said Trotty, raising his hands in an attitude of supplication.  ‘I hardly know why I am here, or how I came.  I have listened to the Chimes these many years.  They have cheered me often.’

‘And you have thanked them?’ said the Bell.

‘A thousand times!’ cried Trotty.

‘How?’

‘I am a poor man,’ faltered Trotty, ‘and could only thank them in words.’

‘And always so?’ inquired the Goblin of the Bell.  ‘Have you never done us wrong in words?’

‘No!’ cried Trotty eagerly.

‘Never done us foul, and false, and wicked wrong, in words?’ pursued the Goblin of the Bell.

Trotty was about to answer, ‘Never!’  But he stopped, and was confused.

‘The voice of Time,’ said the Phantom, ‘cries to man, Advance!  Time is for his advancement and improvement; for his greater worth, his greater happiness, his better life; his progress onward to that goal within its knowledge and its view, and set there, in the period when Time and He began.  Ages of darkness, wickedness, and violence, have come and gone—millions uncountable, have suffered, lived, and died—to point the way before him.  Who seeks to turn him back, or stay him on his course, arrests a mighty engine which will strike the meddler dead; and be the fiercer and the wilder, ever, for its momentary check!’

‘I never did so to my knowledge, sir,’ said Trotty.  ‘It was quite by accident if I did.  I wouldn’t go to do it, I’m sure.’

‘Who puts into the mouth of Time, or of its servants,’ said the Goblin of the Bell, ‘a cry of lamentation for days which have had their trial and their failure, and have left deep traces of it which the blind may see—a cry that only serves the present time, by showing men how much it needs their help when any ears can listen to regrets for such a past—who does this, does a wrong.  And you have done that wrong, to us, the Chimes.’

Trotty’s first excess of fear was gone.  But he had felt tenderly and gratefully towards the Bells, as you have seen; and when he heard himself arraigned as one who had offended them so weightily, his heart was touched with penitence and grief.

‘If you knew,’ said Trotty, clasping his hands earnestly—‘or perhaps you do know—if you know how often you have kept me company; how often you have cheered me up when I’ve been low; how you were quite the plaything of my little daughter Meg (almost the only one she ever had) when first her mother died, and she and me were left alone; you won’t bear malice for a hasty word!’

‘Who hears in us, the Chimes, one note bespeaking disregard, or stern regard, of any hope, or joy, or pain, or sorrow, of the many-sorrowed throng; who hears us make response to any creed that gauges human passions and affections, as it gauges the amount of miserable food on which humanity may pine and wither; does us wrong.  That wrong you have done us!’ said the Bell.

‘I have!’ said Trotty.  ‘Oh forgive me!’

‘Who hears us echo the dull vermin of the earth: the Putters Down of crushed and broken natures, formed to be raised up higher than such maggots of the time can crawl or can conceive,’ pursued the Goblin of the Bell; ‘who does so, does us wrong.  And you have done us wrong!’

‘Not meaning it,’ said Trotty.  ‘In my ignorance.  Not meaning it!’

‘Lastly, and most of all,’ pursued the Bell.  ‘Who turns his back upon the fallen and disfigured of his kind; abandons them as vile; and does not trace and track with pitying eyes the unfenced precipice by which they fell from good—grasping in their fall some tufts and shreds of that lost soil, and clinging to them still when bruised and dying in the gulf below; does wrong to Heaven and man, to time and to eternity.  And you have done that wrong!’

‘Spare me!’ cried Trotty, falling on his knees; ‘for Mercy’s sake!’

     Because Trotty took the rich alderman's words to heart and took their stance regarding the poor, believing their hurtful words and giving up hope of he and his fellow man's chance of improving their lot in life and succumbing to despair (and in that way ignoring the hopeful message of the peals of the Bells), he is not spared. Instead, the Goblins take him on a wild journey. First they show him his dead body at the bottom of the steps, telling him he misgauged his trip up to them and all is now over. Not being content with that shock, however, they relate that he has been dead for nine years and proceed to show him the future of all those he loved and cared for and the horrible end they all came to.

     Richard and Meg marry, but their situation worsens and worsens as Richard becomes a hopeless alcoholic, dying and leaving Meg a single mother with no way to care for her baby. Will Fern is finally caught and sent to debtor's prison; his daughter Lillian slowly turns to prostitution just to stay alive, much to Meg's horror. They don't speak for many years, but finally do reconcile, only to have Lillian succumb to illness and die. Meg is so distraught by this final ray of hope and happiness dying out that she takes her baby to the riverbank to drown it and herself. Trotty sees all this and begs the Goblins to save his daughter and her child. As Wikipedia relates:
     
     "The chimes' intention is to teach Trotty that, far from being naturally wicked, mankind is formed to strive for nobler things, and will fall only when crushed and repressed beyond bearing. Trotty breaks down when he sees Meg poised to jump into the river, cries that he has learned his lesson and begs the Chimes to save her, whereupon he finds himself able to touch her and prevent her from jumping."

     Trotty awakens to the chimes of the Bells on New Year's Day (shades of Scrooge's awakening and redemption on Christmas Day) - in A Christmas Carol, Scrooge at one time tells Marley's ghost he does not believe he is really in the room with him and is just a bit of bad roast beef ... in this tale, the reader is given an out when it is suggested that Trotty's horrible night may be due to the tripe being off that Meg had brought for his supper the night before. Be that as it may, the old man is delighted to find all of Meg and Richard's friends have worked together to provide them a jolly wedding feast and an equally jolly party. Trotty has learned his lesson and life, with all its struggles, goes on. Dickens ends the tale with an admonition that we ALL learn the lesson that Trotty has learned on this fateful night, by saying: “So may the New Year be a happy one to you, happy to many more whose happiness depends on you!”

     ***************************************************************************

    

Like A Christmas Carol before it, The Chimes was a holiday hit with audiences, even given it's grim tone. Dickens once again did many readings of the tale and it was adapted numerous times for the stage and later film (including a claymation short in 2000). If not for the enduring (and endearing) popularity of A Christmas Carol, The Chimes would most likely be his best remembered tale. But it is by and large forgotten now and that's a pity. If you'd like to read the tale yourself, here is the link:

     http://www.ibiblio.org/ebooks/Dickens/Chimes/Dickens_Chimes.pdf 


      Coming Tomorrow: Our third Christmas tale, and my personal favorite of the five, The Cricket On the Hearth! See you then.

Welcome to the Kitschmas Advent Calendar 2017 !!! T - 24 Days ... and Counting !!!

    

     Good morning and welcome to the 2017 edition of the K.A.C. !!! This is the Ninth Year of our annual online tradition of showcasing the odd, the bizarre, the downright strange aspects of the holiday season ... everyday from now until Christmas Eve I will have a new post with an item of interest to amuse, amaze and entertain you. 

     Our theme this year is Christmas Spirits (of all shapes, sizes and forms). What better way to start than with one of our K.A.C. stalwarts, Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol. Over the years I have devoted a number of past articles on this perennial favorite, so I'm not going to go into much more detail on this story (aside from some new trivia that I've come across). Instead, I'm going to focus on the author and a rather surprising fact that I only recently became aware of (and something I'm surprised I didn't know earlier considering all the research I've done on Dickens): A Christmas Carol is actually the first of FIVE Christmas stories he wrote over the years, each a year apart, which were eventually bound together in a hardback edition entitled The Christmas Books. We'll be devoting our first five entries this year to these tales, many of which you may not be familiar with.

     A fascinating article I came across recently talks about the different medical conditions the author may have had and how they influenced and showed up in his novels. Give it a read here:

     http://hekint.org/the-medical-journey-of-charles-dickens/ 

     Next is an article placing A Christmas Carol in its proper historical era and showing what was happening in the real world at the time. I found the most interesting part giving Scrooge's age and extrapolating world events from there. Take a look!

     https://nbytblog.wordpress.com/2015/09/28/some-christmas-carol-history/ 

     

       Finally, how's this for synchronicity? Just in time for the holiday season comes this new film, The Man Who Invented Christmas, starring Dan Stevens as Charles Dickens and Christopher Plummer as Scrooge, recounting the true story of HOW Dickens came up with the characters and the story of A CHRISTMAS CAROL. It's a delightful film out now that I think readers of this blog will enjoy. Take a look at the trailer here:

     https://bleeckerstreetmedia.com/themanwhoinventedchristmas

     **************************************************

     Coming Tomorrow: The second of The Christmas Books and one decidedly more gruesome than A Christmas Carol. Join us for the tale of The Chimes: A Goblin Story of Some Bells that Rang an Old Year Out and a New Year In!