From Dickens to Nabokov to Ali Smith, Kate Webb traces the history of authors pondering Christmas, and the 21st century revival of the Christmas story:
Even in our prickly individualism, hemmed in by consumer goods, there are moments when we can escape from safe, homogenized lives to experience the tingling pleasures of heat and cold, of icy days and starry nights. The Christmas story reveals these freely available good things in front of us as it binds us to custom and continuity, drawing us back.
