At our annual Chesterton Advent/Christmas party at Eighth Day Books in Wichita, Kansas we read excerpts from G.K. and Frances' poems, stories, plays, and essays. One of our resources is an out of print collection, The Spirit of Christmas. As Dale Ahlquist of the American Chesterton Society explains:
Each year for over thirty years, G.K. Chesterton would write at least five or six articles on Christmas, along with one or two poems and some other odd piece, that would be spread among the journals for which he was a regular contributor and Yuletide issues of other journals for which he was not. His biographer Maisie Ward once expressed the desire to collect all of Chesterton’s writings on Christmas into one volume, not only because there was such a wonderful variety of material available, but especially because this was a subject in which Chesterton’s charity seemed to shine most brightly.
It was Marie Smith who finally carried out Maisie’s idea and created a book by Chesterton on Christmas. She would go on to put together five posthumous Chesterton collections, only one fewer than Dorothy Collins. The Spirit of Christmas is probably the most successful and possibly the most satisfying.
This book could easily have been five times larger, but even though it represents only a fraction of Chesterton’s Christmas writings, it is an excellent selection, containing both familiar delights and unusual gems. Presented in mostly chronological order, Marie provides a pleasing layout of poems, essays, stories and even the very rare play, “The Turkey and the Turk.” When the book was published in 1984, most of its material was appearing between the covers of a book for the first time. The other rarity, in addition to the mummer’s play, was the previously uncollected poem Gloria in Profundis – the paradoxical “Glory to God in the Lowest.”
There is a paperback edition available on Amazon.com for $542.00!!
G.K.'s Christmas essays explore how we celebrate Christmas with feasting, caroling, giving gifts, debating about Santa Claus ("The child who doubts about Santa Claus has insomnia. The child who believes has a good night's rest"), etc. He often included Charles Dickens in his Christmas essays--but more about that in the second episode of our miniseries on December 16! His poems, like his wife Frances's, are most often focused on the Baby in the Manger:
The Christ-child lay on Mary's lap,
His hair was like a light.
(O weary, weary were the world,
But here is all aright.)
The Christ-child lay on Mary's breast
His hair was like a star.
(O stern and cunning are the kings,
But here the true hearts are.)
The Christ-child lay on Mary's heart,
His hair was like a fire.
(O weary, weary is the world,
But here the world's desire.)
The Christ-child stood on Mary's knee,
His hair was like a crown,
And all the flowers looked up at Him,
And all the stars looked down.
There is another book we bring to our table at Eighth Day Books: A Chesterton Christmas: Essays, Excerpts, and Eggnog, edited by Brian G. Daigle. He includes a long excerpt from The Everlasting Man from Part II, Chapter One, "The God in the Cave", which someone has to read at least part of:
Bethlehem is emphatically a place where extremes meet. Here begins, it is needless to say, another mighty influence for the humanization of Christendom. If the world wanted what is called a non-controversial aspect of Christianity, it would probably select Christmas. Yet it is obviously bound up with what is supposed to be a controversial aspect (I could never at any stage of my opinions imagine why); the respect paid to the Blessed Virgin. When I was a boy a more Puritan generation objected to a statue upon my parish church representing the Virgin and Child. After much controversy, they compromised by taking away the Child. One would think that this was even more corrupted with Mariolatry, unless the mother was counted less dangerous when deprived of a sort of weapon. But the practical difficulty is also a parable. You cannot chip away the statue of a mother from all round that of a newborn child. You cannot suspend the new-born child in mid-air; indeed you cannot really have a statue of a newborn child at all. Similarly, you cannot suspend the idea of a newborn child in the void or think of him without thinking of his mother. You cannot visit the child without visiting the mother, you cannot in common human life approach the child except through the mother. If we are to think of Christ in this aspect at all, the other idea follows I as it is followed in history. We must either leave Christ out of Christmas, or Christmas out of Christ, or we must admit, if only as we admit it in an old picture, that those holy heads are too near together for the haloes not to mingle and cross.
Frances Chesterton, wife of British journalist G.K. Chesterton, was a gentle poet and playwright. Her sweet works long lay in obscurity, except for a few Christmas lyrics, which have never gone out of print. Her plays for children were in demand when she wrote them; there is a demand for them again today. Her poems and plays reveal a woman of deep thought, a spiritual woman, a woman longing for Christ, and especially drawn to Him at the Nativity, when He was a small baby. To read these works is to understand better G.K. Chesterton’s wife and spiritual companion. And so, these works are offered back to a world that has almost forgotten them.
Included in How Far Is It to Bethlehem are six plays for children and adults, an essay, numerous poems, and the collection of Christmas Card poems Frances wrote for the family Christmas Card each year.
Among the Christmas plays Frances wrote is The Christmas Gift, intended for very young children. On Christmas Eve, a family gathers for a meager supper; the father is off at war, and the mother reminds her children:
We won't forget to keep the holy night.
Though all is dark, here is a little light.
Their parish church has been destroyed, but some carolers come to sing around the family's manger:
Welcome, welcome, little Lord,
Out of the cold dark night.
We want to give Thee all we have
Of love and warmth and light.
We have no gold, incense or myrrh
To lay at Thy dear feet,
Only our little lips and hands
That offer service meet.
The simple rhymes, the slightly archaic language ("service meet"), and the surprise at the end create an atmosphere of love and simplicity. There's wonder in how strangers meet on Christmas Eve and share with each other the wonder of that Holy Night.
Frances' other plays and poems contain common themes of dark and light, night and eternity, the Baby in the manger, the gifts of the Magi, Mary and Joseph: all focused on the mystery of the Christ Child, God Made Man, as an infant, so tiny and helpless. Her last Christmas card poem was set to music by Herbert Howells:
Here is the little door, lift up the latch, oh lift!
We need not wander more but enter with our gift;
Our gift of finest gold,
Gold that was never bought nor sold;
Myrrh to be strewn about his bed;
Incense in clouds about his head;
All for the child that stirs not in his sleep,
But holy slumber holds with ass and sheep.
Bend low about his bed, for each he has a gift;
See how his eyes awake, lift up your hand, O lift!
For gold, he gives a keen-edged sword
(Defend with it thy little Lord!)
For incense, smoke of battle red,
Myrrh for the honoured happy dead;
Gifts for his children, terrible and sweet,
Touched by such tiny hands, and Oh such tiny feet.
We won't forget to keep the holy night.
Though all is dark, here is a little light.
Their parish church has been destroyed, but some carolers come to sing around the family's manger:
Welcome, welcome, little Lord,
Out of the cold dark night.
We want to give Thee all we have
Of love and warmth and light.
We have no gold, incense or myrrh
To lay at Thy dear feet,
Only our little lips and hands
That offer service meet.
The simple rhymes, the slightly archaic language ("service meet"), and the surprise at the end create an atmosphere of love and simplicity. There's wonder in how strangers meet on Christmas Eve and share with each other the wonder of that Holy Night.
Frances' other plays and poems contain common themes of dark and light, night and eternity, the Baby in the manger, the gifts of the Magi, Mary and Joseph: all focused on the mystery of the Christ Child, God Made Man, as an infant, so tiny and helpless. Her last Christmas card poem was set to music by Herbert Howells:
Here is the little door, lift up the latch, oh lift!
We need not wander more but enter with our gift;
Our gift of finest gold,
Gold that was never bought nor sold;
Myrrh to be strewn about his bed;
Incense in clouds about his head;
All for the child that stirs not in his sleep,
But holy slumber holds with ass and sheep.
Bend low about his bed, for each he has a gift;
See how his eyes awake, lift up your hand, O lift!
For gold, he gives a keen-edged sword
(Defend with it thy little Lord!)
For incense, smoke of battle red,
Myrrh for the honoured happy dead;
Gifts for his children, terrible and sweet,
Touched by such tiny hands, and Oh such tiny feet.
No comments:
Post a Comment