What's The Theme Of The Gift Of The Magi
What's The Theme Of The Gift Of The Magi - Our editors will review your submission and determine if the article needs to be revised. Our editors will review your submission and determine if the article needs to be revised. The Gift of the Witches, a story by O. Henry, was published in the New York Sunday World in 1905 and later collected in The Four Million (1906).
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What's The Theme Of The Gift Of The Magi
The story concerns James and Della Dillingham Young, a young couple who, despite their poverty, decide to give each other a wonderful Christmas present. Della sells her beautiful long hair to buy a platinum chain for Jim's antique gold watch. At the same time, Jim took Della's precious watch to buy decorative tortoiseshell combs for her jewelry.
Along with The Last Leaf, The Witch's Gift is O. Henry's most famous and most studied story. This 1906 story is, as the title suggests, a Christmas classic. The story explores a number of "big" themes, and these are worth exploring in more detail and depth.
The story can be described as follows: On the eve of Christmas, a couple Jim and Della live in poverty in a rented apartment in New York. Della doesn't have the money to give Jim the gift he wants most: a platinum watch chain. She manages to sell her hair and use the money to buy a necklace for Jim as a Christmas present.
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The History Of O. Henry’s ‘The Gift Of The Magi’
But eventually we find out that Jim bought a hair comb as a Christmas present and sold his gold watch to raise money for the gift. So they receive gifts that are worthless to them, but remind them that no matter how poor they are, they have a more valuable gift: the gift of love.
Incidentally, O. Henry begins The Witch's Gift by noting how poor Jim and Della are. Della counts her money: one dollar eighty-seven cents. That's all. Sixty cents of them in a pencil. Penny saved one or two by bulldozing the grocer, the vegetable, and the butcher, until the avarice of such closeness gently burned her cheeks.
It also shows the suffering and shame that people living in poverty often feel. Della emphasizes how much she loves Jim and is willing to go to any lengths to get money for his gift. Later, we found out that Jim needed a new coat and a pair of gloves when he came out in the cold to show how poor the Youngs were.
Most importantly, O. Henry's story can be read as a love story. Christmas is often a season of love and kindness, and the two main characters in The Witches' Gifts decide to show their love for each other by buying special gifts. What she doesn't understand, of course, is that the material gifts she buys as declarations of love won't benefit anyone else: Della can't use a hairbrush because she sold her hair to buy a hair chain.
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Jim, but Jim sold his watch, so he doesn't need a chain. But while these physical gifts may begin as signs of their love or devotion to each other, the ultimate "moral" of O. Henry's story is that love itself is the ultimate gift. Of course, they can prove their love by buying thoughtful gifts, knowing that their significant other wants it the most.
In other words, it doesn't matter if the material things turn out to be useless because they are only a means to an end, their purpose is to show how much their husband's happiness means to them. Love is more important than wealth. O. Henry invites us not to laugh at Jim and Della's folly, but to celebrate their mutual sacrifice.
Indeed, though the narrator describes them as "children," they acted with wisdom, not with folly or naivety, as the story's closing remarks suggest: but let the sages of these days, in their last words, say that these two are the wisest of gift-givers. He seems to be the smartest of gift givers and receivers.
Where is more intelligent. They are smart people. "Witches" or "Wise Men" were Zoroastrian astrologers who, according to the Gospel of Matthew, saw the baby Jesus and brought him gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh. But it should be noted that O. Henry's third person does not explain that Jim and Della and others like them are "the smartest."
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Something Went Wrong
And it's smart, because even though it's hard to buy a well-intentioned gift, they're still happy and happy with each other. They saw someone else make a sacrifice to get the special gift they wanted. Love, O. Henry seems to forego physical possessions in his quest to show his love for someone.
With that thought in mind, we can close by looking at one last topic related to the story of O. Henry. Note Jim and Della's sacrifices, which clearly reflect the gender roles of the era in which the story was published (the first decade of the 20th century).
When describing Della's long hair, O. Henry uses the word "gifts" to play on the title of the story: "If the Queen of Sheba lived in an apartment opposite the air shaft, Della would one day allow her hair to hang on the window to dry, lowering Her Majesty's jewels and gifts. So
Della's hair is so beautiful that even the biblical Queen of Sheba would feel that her jewels and gifts pale in comparison to Della's natural “gift.” This is ironic, of course, because Della sells her hair to buy another gift: her hair. It has a price tag of twenty dollars. But the fact that women are willing to part with a part that symbolizes their beauty shows how far Jim is willing to go to make him happy. Jim also leaves with a gift that embodies his masculinity: a wristwatch is a gentleman's essential accessory, and Jim's gold watch.
The Interconnectedness Of Poverty And Shame
it is passed down from generation to generation in the male line of the family. Della wants to break up with him so she can buy him the present he wants. Of course, the two gifts one buys reinforce the gender roles: the watch chain will literally make Jim's gold watch look taller, and Della's hair will be more beautiful and stunning.
combs her hair with a pair of combs that Jim buys.
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