Research Catalog

Title

Christmas past : an anthology of seasonal stories from nineteenth-century America / edited by Thomas Ruys Smith.

Publication

Baton Rouge : Louisiana State University Press, [2021]

Items in the Library & Off-site

Details

Additional Authors

Smith, Thomas Ruys, 1979-

Description

lxvi, 237 pages : illustrations; 24 cm

Summary

"As the modern celebration of Christmas took shape across the nineteenth century, American writers gave it new meaning in the pages of countless books and magazines. Now, for the first time, this rich anthology brings together some of the most significant of those seasonal stories to retell a forgotten tale of Christmases past. From the authors who helped define a national literary culture, to the popular sentimentalists who negotiated Christmas's position at the center of family life, to the realists who looked to reshape American letters in the wake of the Civil War, and beyond: all varieties of American writers turned to Christmas as an inevitable and potent subject during this deeply formative period in the history of American literature. Editor Thomas Ruys Smith brings together a diverse range of their voices to showcase the many ways in which Christmas was imagined across the nineteenth century, offering images that echo down to the present day. Readers looking for antiquarian pleasures beyond Dickens will find much to enjoy. But these carefully curated stories also provide a shock of recognition, or perhaps reassurance, that many of the concerns and tensions that animate the festive season today were equally felt by those living in the nineteenth century. As these stories make clear, then as now, people lamented the commercialization of the season, agonized about selecting presents for loved ones, argued about its spiritual significance, politicized the holidays, and used this time to highlight inequities that seemed even more stark when displayed against a festive backdrop. The introduction that frames the anthology provides a new literary history of Christmas, contextualizing the selections and making clear the links both between them and to the wider trajectory of American literature"--

Subjects

• Literary collections
• History
• 1800-1899
• United States
• Christmas stories, American
• Christmas in literature
• Christmas > United States > History > 19th century
• American prose literature > 19th century
• Christmas > Literary collections

Genre/Form

• History.
• Literary collections.

Bibliography (note)

• Includes bibliographical references.

Contents

Old Christmas, new Christmas -- Christmas (1819) / Washington Irving -- Christmas from The pearl, or, Affection's gift (1829) -- Excerpt from Retrospect of Western travel (1938) / Harriet Martineau -- Sentiment, slavery, and war at Christmas -- Christmas, or, The good fairy (1850) / Harriet Beecher Stowe -- Merry Christmas! -- Happy Christmas! (1853) / Fanny Fern -- Christmas in Slavery -- Excerpt from Narrative of the life of Frederick Douglass (1845) / Frederick Douglass -- Excerpt from Twelve years a slave (1853) / Solomon Northup -- Christmas festivities (1863) / Harriet Jacobs -- A hospital Christmas (1864) / Louisa May Alcott -- Excerpt from Five Little Peppers and How They Grew (1881) / Margaret Sidney -- Christmas realities -- The promise of the dawn: a Christmas story (1863) / Rebecca Harding Davis -- How Santa Claus came to Simpson's Bar (1873) / Bret Harte -- An English New Year (January 1879) / Henry James -- Christmas every day (1892) / William Dean Howells -- Christmas Jenny (1891) / Mary Wilkins Freeman -- Little Miss Sophie (1899) / Alice Dunbar-Nelson -- Wrestling with the reason for the season -- Excerpt from Ben Hur: a tale of the Christ (1880) / Lew Wallace -- Miracle joyeux (1898) / Frank Norris -- A Christmas sermon (1891) and What I want for Christmas (1897) / Robert G. Ingersoll -- Happy Christmas to all? -- Excerpt from The ghost dance war (1890) / Charles Alexander Eastman -- Rabbi Eliezer's Christmas (1899) / Abraham Cahan -- General Washington: a Christmas story (1900) / Pauline Hopkins -- Merry Christmas in the tenements (1897) / Jacob A. Riis.

Call Number

JFE 21-8396

ISBN

• 9780807176085
• 0807176087

LCCN

2021008034

OCLC

1245961079

Title

Christmas past : an anthology of seasonal stories from nineteenth-century America / edited by Thomas Ruys Smith.

Publisher

Baton Rouge : Louisiana State University Press, [2021]

Type of Content

text

Type of Medium

unmediated

Type of Carrier

volume

Bibliography

Includes bibliographical references.

Chronological Term

1800-1899

Added Author

Smith, Thomas Ruys, 1979- editor.

Other Form:

Online version: Christmas past Baton Rouge : Louisiana State University Press, 2021 9780807176528 (DLC) 2021008035

Research Call Number

JFE 21-8396