Reading this, I can’t help but share in their unfrivolous and uncomplicated joy – no expectations or pressure. It is their unadulterated imagination that turns their paper-and-foil decorated tree into a magnificent sight, ‘blazing like a Baptist’s window’ that makes homemade gifts their greatest treasure: the smallest things become the most joyful. There is nothing grand about their Christmas, the extravagance and excitement is powered only through their shared childlike gaze. Each time they wander through woods, wade over creeks or spend the afternoon shelling pecans by a fire, Capote evokes a warmth that you can feel in the pit of your stomach, a happiness that has you grinning from ear-to-ear. And it’s not a true Christmas story without a hint of melancholy, Capote ending the story by reflecting on it being their last Christmas together.Ī childish innocence and wonderment run through the story, winds around it like a string of Christmas lights. The second half, they make presents for each other and decorate a tree, spending hours at a kitchen table with “scissors and crayons and stacks of coloured paper”. Haha Jones “who never laughs”, and emptying their secret change purse to buy the cake ingredients.

The first half of the story, “a morning in late November”, follows the two friends as they forage for unharvested pecans, clandestinely purchase whiskey from Mr. Somewhat autobiographical, ‘A Christmas Memory’ has a young Capote as the narrator, preparing Christmas cakes with an elderly cousin – a grandmother in all but name. Truman Capote’s short story, ‘A Christmas Memory’, captures a simplistic Christmastime, adults experiencing child-like wonder, and children delighting in the giving of gifts. Yet there is another story just as festive. It is my deep literary shame that I’ve never got on with Dickens, that I’m missing out on this book-related tradition. For some of us, however, Dickens is not our idea of making the Yuletide gay. Finally, like Michael Bublé, it can come off the shelf and into the spotlight. If they haven’t already, many a bibliophile will be lighting their fires, settling in an armchair and dusting off their copies of A Christmas Carol, the literary quintessence of the holiday season.

A christmas story truman capote