Books about Christmas, and as a gift

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Books about Christmas, and as a gift

The Christmas season, dreaded by some, beloved by others, especially children. Already you’ll find houses festooned with lights and yards dotted with inflatable Santas, “Jingle Bells” and “Silent Night” on the radio and grocery store shelves stuffed with cards, chocolates and holiday cookies.

Time then to look at some Christmas books.

In 2022, Pamela McColl published “Twas the Night: The Art and History of the Classic Christmas Poem” (Grafton and Scratch Publishers, 264 pages), which celebrated the poem, took readers on a tour of its history and featured more than 200 illustrations by artists like Jessie Willcox Smith, N.C. Wyeth and Norman Rockwell. It’s a gorgeous book for all who love Clement More’s poem and the visual arts.

This season McColl strikes gold again with “Wondrous Mrs. Claus: A Literary & Pictorial Review of the Christmas Character” (Grafton and Scratch Publishers, 2025, 98 pages). She conducts a brief tour of predecessors for Santa’s helpmate, figures found in mythology and then in folklore and Christian art.

McColl devotes much of her book to Mrs. Claus in literature. She made her first appearance in 1849 in J.W. Moore’s poem “A Christmas Legend,” and soon became a regular personage in Santa’s life. In Charles Dickinson’s 1871 “Mrs. Santa’s Adventure,” for instance, we find that stock-in-trade tale of husband and wife switching roles. Santa tells his wife of chimneys filled with “naughty deeds” that prevent him from leaving presents for the children, and she assumes his account of struggle and woe is made up. When she discovers his stories are true, she’s carried home by Christmas sprites “excited, torn, and humbled.”

Music, plays and films featuring Mrs. Claus follow, lists which bring new and old gifts to readers. Chapters on appearances by Mrs. Claus at Christmas festivities, Mrs. Claus collectibles and Mrs. Claus as heroine conclude the narrative.

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Best of all are the illustrations, particularly those from the 19th century. Most striking to my own eye was a painter and a canvas unfamiliar to me, Gerardus Terlaak’s 1853 “A Rich Lady Visits a Poor Family.” On a bed of straw lies a clearly ill male figure, presumably the woman’s husband. She is seated beside him a baby in one arm, an older daughter asleep at her knee. Behind them is a visitor, the wealthy woman bearing a basket. The light from a tiny window shines in on the poor woman, while her troubles and poverty lie in shadows around her.

For those wanting more about the Santa’s spouse, McColl and Lindsay Stewart, a Clemson graduate living in Charlotte, have jointly written “What Would Mrs. Claus Do? Where There Is a Wish, There Is a Way,” also published this year. This smaller book offers advice on general topics like kindness while zooming in on “how to avoid becoming stressed with the flurry of activities that come with the holidays.”

Here we find an interview with Mrs. Santa, encouraging words urging readers to remember that life is a gift, and her “Fa-La-La” philosophy, which begins with a smile and operates under the principle that “Wishes are dreams with a plan of action.” It’s a mix of some homemaking and decorating tips, a general guide to dress, recipes — the “Cinnamon Orange Honey Butter” caught my eye as the foundation for a goodly dab of peanut butter — and some suggestions on teaching thoughtfulness and kindness to the young. As a longtime advocate of using fiction and biography as tools for teaching virtue, I particularly liked one of Mrs. Claus’s questions: “When was the last time you were a hero or a heroine? When was the last time you asked someone for their help in a difficult situation? Do you read children stories of brave heroes and heroines that model these qualities well?”

In the end, “What Would Mrs. Claus Do?” left me puzzled. Who were its intended readers? It’s not a children’s book. Most teens, I suspect, would find its advice insipid and its approach and voice a bit goofy, and while adults may linger here and there over a recipe or a reminder to slow down the frenzied pace of the season and share some love and laughter, it’s unlikely to find a permanent place on the bookshelf.

Here the classics of Christmas — the Dickens tale Scrooge’s conversion, More’s “Night Before Christmas,” O. Henry’s “The Gift of the Magi” and other longtime favorites — might better instill the holiday spirit.

One final note: In David McCullough’s “History Matters,” a posthumous collection of some of his shorter essays and addresses, is the chapter “A Book on Every Bed.” Here McCullough recounts how as a child his parents always began Christmas morning by slipping into their children’s bedrooms and leaving a package at the foot of the bed, which “was always beautifully wrapped with ribbon and bow, and it was always a book.” Later, he did the same for his five children.

He concludes this brief visit into the past with this advice: “But try it yourself is my recommendation — to all parents, grandparents, aunts, uncles, to anyone who loves a child, a book at the foot of the bed for Christmas morning.”

Absolutely. Whether at the foot of the bed or under the tree, a book for Christmas is a fine gift.

(Jeff Minick reviews books and has written four of his own: two novels, “Amanda Bell” and “Dust On Their Wings,” and two works of nonfiction, “Learning As I Go” and “Movies Make the Man.” This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..)

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