Have you read "A Christmas Carol" by Charles Dickens? Sure, the novella is not Dickens' best. Undoubtedly, it is senti. Yet it captures brilliantly and celebrates feelingly the Santa Spirit (in all senses of the term as the story is literally driven by a ghost), much needed today as ever.
What is this Santa spirit? As children, we have all loved the Santa Claus who gives us special gifts. As we leave behind that naive joy in a toy or two, we realise that it is our elders who keep the gifts under our pillows. Even then, the charm of the Santa spirit continues to be equally sweet and charming.
Why is it so? How is it relevant now? The Santa Spirit is that of benevolent joy. It consists of sharing happiness. It means making our own selves better and nicer. Hence it is highly relevant in the world today which is driven by the 'i-me-my' obsessions. Take any field, be it the private space or the public sphere. It is vitiated by mean self-obsession, hyper competitiveness and jealous viciousness.
In such a nasty, brutish world (to quote Hobbes' iconic description thereof) which is becoming narrower and narrower, and more hellish as the technology develops at a breakneck speed, people obsess over power, control, abrogating to oneself all the credits and benefits. In such a crooked, crackpot wold, the Santa spirit asserts the joy of sharing, and thereby being a decent, good, genuine human-being. Hence its ever-lasting relevance!
Pratima@ The genuine Santa spirit does not boast of or advertise loudly its gifts as actually that would be self-promotion! I would say that the real Santa gift is becoming by the day a better version of oneself. Oh, yes, that is one of the messages of Dickens' novella, too.
Wow! Such a wonderful point of view!! :)
ReplyDeleteThank you!🙏
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