Quotes about Christmas
page 3
Interview with Bill Kristol (March 2017)
pg. 369
The Sports and Pastimes of the People of England (1801), Country wakes
Violating the Boundaries: An Interview with Richard Rodriguez (1999)
"Did I Make You Cry On Christmas Day? (Well, You Deserved It!)" (2005)
Lyrics, Others
Page 38
So the Wind Won't Blow It All Away
"My Christmas" http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2008/dec/08/christmas-saving-money-celebrities, The Guardian, (2008-12-08).
On how she spends Christmas Day.
Christmas in India, Stanza 5.
Departmental Ditties and other Verses (1886)
#425, "Rites of Fall" (2003), collected in Invasion of the DTWOF (2005).
Dykes to Watch Out For
Discussing staying romantic in a marriage with children. Quoted by Jennifer Weiner in InStyle, February 2010.
“To appreciate Christmas to the full, one must know how it feels to be deprived of its blessings”
as quoted in the " Carlos P Romulo Speech 1949 President UN Assembly, Filipino http://mannaandquail.com/2012/07/09/carlos-p-romulo-speech-1949-president-un-assembly-filipino/" on mannaandquail.com
“The Apology”.
Great Days (1979)
Column, May 31, 2012, "Barack Obama: Drone Warrior" http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/barack-obama-drone-warrior/2012/05/31/gJQAr6zQ5U_story.html at washingtonpost.com.
2010s, 2012
How do we fight the loudmouth politics of authoritarian populism? (21 November 2016)
"Adrian Henri's Talking After Christmas Blues", from The Mersey Sound (1967).
Review http://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/a-clockwork-orange-1972 of A Clockwork Orange (11 February 1972)
Reviews, Two star reviews
About the Ardennes Offensive, quoted in "SS: Hell on the Western Front" - Page 166 - by Chris Bishop, Michael Williams - History - 2003
Waiting on the World to Change
Song lyrics, Continuum (2006)
“That's what I'm saying about Christmas, I might not be in the mood for it; December 25th”
The Podfather Trilogy, Episode 3 Christmas
On Christmas
Source: Books, When Will Jesus Bring the Pork Chops? (2004)
Song lyrics, Singles and rarities
pg. 159
The Sports and Pastimes of the People of England (1801), Christmas
Source: Parable of the Talents (1998), Chapter 13 (p. 253)
On World/Inferno's contribution to the second Rock Against Bush compilation. http://www.pastepunk.com/features.php?v=195
Interviews
Quote from Turner's letter to Mr. Hawkesworth, 24 December, 1849; as quoted in The life of J.M.W. Turner, Volume II, George Walter Thornbury; Hurst and Blackett Publishers, London, 1862, pp. 90-91
1821 - 1851
Telegraph to Abraham Lincoln (December 1864), as quoted in Southern Storm: Sherman's March to the Sea https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:BookSources/0940450658 (2008), by Noah Andre Trudeau, New York: HarperCollins, p. 508.
1860s, 1864, Telegram to Abraham Lincoln (December 1864)
Source: This Is the Way the World Ends (1986), Chapter 16, “In Which the Essential Question Is Answered and Something Very Much Like Justice Is Served” (p. 211)
Yes I would like a flat, thank you.'
A Brief History of Timewasting, Room 101, The News Quiz
“Since it's Christmas, let's be glad
Even if your life's been bad,
There are presents to be had.”
"It's Christmas! Let's Be Glad" (2006)
Lyrics, Others
2000s, 2002, State of the Union address (January 2002)
Source: Fares, Please! (1915), Everything Upside Down, p. 187
Context: Christmas turns things last end foremost. The people whom the world arranges last in its procession — the weary, the poor, the foolish, the lame, the halt, the blind — these are the ones who come at the very head of the column in the consideration of the Little Child who leads. The last, the least, the lost — how often those words were on Jesus's lips — the three great objects of his passion! It is not the world's idea of correct form. … most of us unconsciously arrange our acquaintances or possible acquaintances in the order of what advantage they may be to us. Jesus reverses the whole scheme as a perversion and sets up a new basis of classification. His question is not, What can this man do for me? but What can I do for him? The most important person for us to know, he tells us both by word and example, is the one who needs us most. "The first shall be last and the last shall be first."
Nan You're A Window Shopper
Song lyrics, Alright, Still (2006)
A Visit from St. Nicholas, published anonymously in the Troy, New York Sentinel on December 23, 1823 and was reprinted frequently thereafter with no name attached; later attributed to Clement Clarke Moore and included in an 1844 anthology of his works.
No. 269 (8 January 1712).
The Spectator (1711–1714)
Rabbit at Rest (1990)
Last Laugh ‘06 (2006)
"Economic Responsibility", The Second Fred Hirsch Memorial Lecture, Warwick University, 6 March 1980, republished in Comparative Political Economy: A Retrospective (2003)
“I'm dreaming of a white Christmas,
Just like the ones I used to know.”
Song White Christmas.
Source: 1963 - 1967, What Is Pop Art? Interviews with Eight Painters, Part 1 (1963), pp. 116-19
Speech http://hansard.millbanksystems.com/commons/1979/mar/28/her-majestys-government-opposition-motion in the House of Commons (28 March 1979). In the No confidence debate which brought his government down on 28 March 1979, Callaghan poked fun at the opposition parties and drew attention to their low showing in opinion polls. In the event the Scottish National Party lost 9 of its 11 seats
Prime Minister
"The intolerance of diversity" (22 December 2011) http://youtube.com/watch?v=IolHgMf_nbw
2011
Bisy Backson.
The Tao of Pooh (1982)
Review http://www.reelviews.net/movies/p/paycheck.html of Paycheck (2003).
One-and-a-half star reviews
Canto VI, introduction, st. 3.
Marmion (1808)
" A Child's Christmas in Wales http://www.undermilkwood.net/prose_christmas.html", from Quite Early One Morning (1954)
Last lines of the Apollo 8 Genesis reading, and adding his own closing to the message from Apollo 8 crew, as they celebrated becoming the first humans to enter lunar orbit, Christmas Eve (24 December 1968) http://nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/planetary/lunar/apollo8_xmas.html
Being on Ascension Island in 1944
Article in Movie Maker http://www.moviemaker.com/directing/article/luise_rainer_3324/
New Year's Address 2011/2 http://kongehuset.dk/english/Menu/news/her-majesty-the-queens-new-year-speech-2011 (01 January 2012).
Society
US 101st Airborne Division at Bastogne in the Battle of the Bulge (22 December 1944), as quoted in Gen. McAuliffe’s Christmas message, Battle of the Bulge http://www.mtdemocrat.com/opinion/gen-mcauliffes-christmas-message-battle-of-the-bulge-1944-dec-24/
Characters, Ch. 2 : A Christmas Dinner
Sketches by Boz (1836-1837)
Context: Christmas time! That man must be a misanthrope indeed, in whose breast something like a jovial feeling is not roused — in whose mind some pleasant associations are not awakened — by the recurrence of Christmas. There are people who will tell you that Christmas is not to them what it used to be; that each succeeding Christmas has found some cherished hope, or happy prospect, of the year before, dimmed or passed away; that the present only serves to remind them of reduced circumstances and straitened incomes — of the feasts they once bestowed on hollow friends, and of the cold looks that meet them now, in adversity and misfortune. Never heed such dismal reminiscences. There are few men who have lived long enough in the world, who cannot call up such thoughts any day in the year. Then do not select the merriest of the three hundred and sixty-five for your doleful recollections, but draw your chair nearer the blazing fire — fill the glass and send round the song — and if your room be smaller than it was a dozen years ago, or if your glass be filled with reeking punch, instead of sparkling wine, put a good face on the matter, and empty it off-hand, and fill another, and troll off the old ditty you used to sing, and thank God it’s no worse. Look on the merry faces of your children (if you have any) as they sit round the fire. One little seat may be empty; one slight form that gladdened the father’s heart, and roused the mother’s pride to look upon, may not be there. Dwell not upon the past; think not that one short year ago, the fair child now resolving into dust, sat before you, with the bloom of health upon its cheek, and the gaiety of infancy in its joyous eye. Reflect upon your present blessings — of which every man has many — not on your past misfortunes, of which all men have some. Fill your glass again, with a merry face and contented heart. Our life on it, but your Christmas shall be merry, and your new year a happy one!
Part Troll (2004)
Whoops! It's Christmas (1959)
Context: A lady, who looked like an animated Christmas tree with packages dangling from every limb, and I bumped and spilled. As I was trying to pick up the packages she gasped out, “Oh, I hate Christmas, anyhow! It turns everything upside down.”
I said, “That is just what it was made for.” But this lofty sentiment did not stop her dirty looks at all. But it is the big thing about Christmas!
Christmas is a story about a baby, and that is a baby's chief business, turning things upside down. It is gross slander on babies that their chief passion is food. It is rearrangement! Every orthodox baby rearranges everything he sees, or can get his little hooks into, from the order of who's important in the family, to the dishes on the table. A baby in a family divides time into two eras, just as Christmas does. There is B. C., which means "before child," and A. D., which means "after deluge."
Source: Billy Budd, the Sailor (1891), Ch. 24
Context: Marvel not that having been made acquainted with the young sailor's essential innocence (an irruption of heretic thought hard to suppress) the worthy man lifted not a finger to avert the doom of such a martyr to martial discipline. So to do would not only have been as idle as invoking the desert, but would also have been an audacious transgression of the bounds of his function, one as exactly prescribed to him by military law as that of the boatswain or any other naval officer. Bluntly put, a chaplain is the minister of the Prince of Peace serving in the host of the God of War — Mars. As such, he is as incongruous as a musket would be on the altar at Christmas. Why then is he there? Because he indirectly subserves the purpose attested by the cannon; because too he lends the sanction of the religion of the meek to that which practically is the abrogation of everything but brute Force.
“Christmas won't be Christmas without any presents”
Source: Little Women (1868), Ch. 1 : Playing Pilgrims, First lines
Context: "Christmas won't be Christmas without any presents," grumbled Jo, lying on the rug.
"It's so dreadful to be poor!" sighed Meg, looking down at her old dress.
"I don't think it's fair for some girls to have plenty of pretty things, and other girls nothing at all," added little Amy, with an injured sniff.
"We've got Father and Mother, and each other," said Beth contentedly from her corner.
The four young faces on which the firelight shone brightened at the cheerful words, but darkened again as Jo said sadly, "We haven't got Father, and shall not have him for a long time." She didn't say "perhaps never," but each silently added it, thinking of Father far away, where the fighting was.
“The only real blind person at Christmas-time is he who has not Christmas in his heart.”
"Christmas in the Dark" in Ladies Home Journal (December 1906)
Context: The only real blind person at Christmas-time is he who has not Christmas in his heart. We sightless children had the best of eyes that day in our hearts and in our finger-tips. We were glad from the child's necessity of being happy. The blind who have outgrown the child's perpetual joy can be children again on Christmas Day and celebrate in the midst of them who pipe and dance and sing a new song!
Whoops! It's Christmas (1959)
Context: The central core of truth is that Christmas turns everything upside down, the upside of heaven come down to earth. The Christmas story puts a new value on every man. He is not a thing to be used, not a chemical accident, not an educated ape. Every man is a V. I. P., because he has divine worth. That was revealed when "Love came down at Christmas." A scientist said, making a plea for exchange scholarships between nations, "The best way to send an idea is to wrap it up in a person." That was what happened at Christmas. The idea of divine love was wrapped up in a person.
Whoops! It's Christmas (1959)
Context: The central core of truth is that Christmas turns everything upside down, the upside of heaven come down to earth. The Christmas story puts a new value on every man. He is not a thing to be used, not a chemical accident, not an educated ape. Every man is a V. I. P., because he has divine worth. That was revealed when "Love came down at Christmas." A scientist said, making a plea for exchange scholarships between nations, "The best way to send an idea is to wrap it up in a person." That was what happened at Christmas. The idea of divine love was wrapped up in a person.
The Wild Flag (1943)
Context: This is the dream we had, asleep in our chair, thinking of Christmas in the lands of fir tree and pine, Christmas in lands of palm tree and vine, and of how the one great sky does for all places and all people.
After the third great war was over (this was a curious dream), there was no more than a handful of people left alive, and the earth was in ruins and the ruins were horrible to behold. The people, the survivors, decided to meet to talk over their problem and to make a lasting peace, which is the customary thing to make after a long and exhausting war. There were eighty-three countries, and each country sent a delegate to the convention. One English-man came, one Peruvian, one Ethiopian, one Frenchman, one Japanese, and so on, until every country was represented.
Source: Fares, Please! (1915), Everything Upside Down, p. 186
Context: Charles Lamb, in one of his most delightful essays, sets high worth on the observance of All Fools' Day, because it says to a man: "You look wise. Pray correct that error!" Christmas brings the universal message to men: "You look important and great; pray correct that error." It overturns the false standards that have blinded the vision and sets up again in their rightful magnitude those childlike qualities by which we enter the Kingdom.
Christmas turns things inside out. Under the spell of the Christmas story the locked up treasures of kindliness and sympathy come from the inside of the heart, where they are often kept imprisoned, to the outside of actual expression in deed and word. … It is the vision of the Christ-child which enables all men to get at the best treasures of their lives and offer them for use.
"No Offense Intended, But Fuck Xmas!" (1972) The Harlan Ellison Hornbook
Context: Christmas is an awfulness that compares favorably with the great London plague and fire of 1665-66. No one escapes the feelings of mortal dejection, inadequacy, frustration, loneliness, guilt and pity. No one escapes feeling used by society, by religion, by friends and relatives, by the utterly artificial responsibilities of extending false greetings, sending banal cards, reciprocating unsolicited gifts, going to dull parties, putting up with acquaintances and family one avoids all the rest of the year... in short, of being brutalized by a 'holiday' that has lost virtually all of its original meanings and has become a merchandising ploy for color TV set manufacturers and ravagers of the woodlands.
Source: Fares, Please! (1915), Everything Upside Down, p. 185
Context: Christmas turns everything upside down. This is the central truth of the incarnation — "Immanuel, God with us." The upside of heaven come down to earth. "The Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, and we beheld his glory,... full of grace and truth." Men miss the entire meaning of Jesus when they see in him the highest upreach of man; he is God reaching down and making common cause with man's struggle. The meaning of Christmas puts down the mighty things in men's minds from their seats — place, riches, talents — and exalts the things of low degree — humility, simplicity, and trust.
Stig Bjorkman interview <!-- pages 6-7 -->
Bergman on Bergman (1970)
Context: In our family we had a well-to-do aunt who always gave us magnificent Christmas presents. She was so much part of the family that we even included her in our prayers at bedtime... I suppose I must have been nine or ten years old at the time. Suddenly Aunt Anna's Christmas presents were lying there too, and among them a parcel with 'Forsner's on it. So of course I instantly knew it contained a projector. For a couple of years I'd been consumed with a passionate longing to own one, but had been considered too small for such a present... I was incredibly excited. Because my father was a clergyman we never got our presents on Christmas Eve, like other Swedish children do. We got them on Christmas Day... Well, you can imagine my disappointment when it turned out to be my older brother — he's four years older than myself — who got the projector — and I was given a teddy bear. It was one of my life's bitterest disappointments. After all, my brother wasn't a scrap interested in cinematography. But both of us had masses of lead soldiers. So on Boxing Day I bought the projector off him for half my army and he beat me hollow in every war ever afterwars. But I'd got the projector, anyway.
“CHRISTMAS IS WAITING TO BE BORN:
In you, in me, in all mankind.”
"Christmas Is Waiting to be Born" in The Mood of Christmas & Other Celebrations (1985)
Context: Where refugees seek deliverance that never comes
And the heart consumes itself as if it would live,
Where children age before their time
And life wears down the edges of the mind,
Where the old man sits with mind grown cold,
While bones and sinew, blood and cell, go slowly down to death,
Where fear companions each day's life,
And Perfect Love seems long delayed.
CHRISTMAS IS WAITING TO BE BORN:
In you, in me, in all mankind.
Parliament of Whores (1991)
“Christmas is a season not only of rejoicing, but of reflection.”
“At Christmas, all roads lead home.”
“Gifts of time and love are surely the basic ingredients of a truly merry Christmas.”
“Every time we love, every time we give, it's Christmas.”
[Christmas, Wikisource, 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica, 1911, https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/1911_Encyclopædia_Britannica/Christmas]
On what inspired him to write the play Home in “Lyrical, Uplifting HOME by Samm-Art Williams Comes to ICT” https://www.broadwayworld.com/los-angeles/article/Lyrical-Uplifting-HOME-by-Samm-Art-Williams-Comes-to-ICT-20170915 in Broadway World: Los Angeles (2017 Sep 15)
Much Obliged, Jeeves (1971)
As for international understanding, I feel that macaroni has done more for our appreciation of Italy than Mussolini... in food, as in death, we feel the essential brotherhood of mankind.
Source: The Importance of Living (1937), Ch. IV : On Having A Stomach, p. 46
About the poverty increase in Carter County, as quoted in Poverty Grew in One-Third of Counties Despite Strong National Economy https://www.pewtrusts.org/en/research-and-analysis/blogs/stateline/2019/12/19/poverty-grew-in-one-third-of-counties-despite-strong-national-economy (December 19, 2019) by Tim Henderson, The Pew Charitable Trusts.
"Urban Dysentery" for boys and girls!
On consumerism.
What It Is (2009)
"Everything is Cool"
Song lyrics, The Missing Years (1991)
The Scent of Water (1963), Chapter 14.2
Source: The Story of Jesus (1938), Chapter 2
Via tweet https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1313984510749544450 October 7, 2020
2020s, 2020, October
Original: (it) È Natale ogni volta che sorridi a un bimbo, tenendogli la mano. È Natale ogni volta che riconosci i tuoi limiti, i tuoi errori. È Natale ogni volta che rimani in silenzio per ascoltare l'altro. È Natale ogni volta che doni con amore la tua dolcezza. È Natale ogni volta che ascolti la canzone del cuore.
Source: prevale.net
Source: The Kingdom of God is Within You (1894), Chapter XII, Conclusion—Repent Ye, for the Kingdom of Heaven is at Hand
"Under No Circumstances Will Michelle Yeoh Be Serving a Christmas Turkey" in Vogue (19 November 2019) https://www.vogue.com/article/michelle-yeoh-interview-last-christmas
Torvalds, Linus, 2021-12-19, <nowiki>Linux 5.16-rc6</nowiki>, 2022-01-06 https://lore.kernel.org/lkml/CAHk-=wgWuZPhK6dgXsS42iMz4o610Uw4QXeUsTSOQheNo1tf5A@mail.gmail.com/T/#u,
2010s, 2021
Source: Bisher Al-Khasawneh (2021) cited in: " PM greets Christians on Christmas https://www.jordantimes.com/news/local/pm-greets-christians-christmas" in The Jordan Times, 26 December 2021.