Super Pop!: Pop Culture Recommendations for Every Occasion

Ten Wildly Different Interpretations of the Meaning of Christmas

Christmas is a riddle wrapped inside an enigma (which is then gathered up by elves, swaddled in rags, roasted next to chestnuts, and placed underneath an enormous fir tree—as per tradition). Its mascots include a red-nosed elk, a drummer boy, a snowman, and a flaming log called “Yule.” It’s a Christian holiday, but pagans were the ones who gave it to us, and today it’s presided over by a jolly old fat cat who breaks into people’s homes and steals cookies on a global scale. So what does it all add up to? What’s the “meaning of Christmas?” Here are some of the most popular answers from pop culture, in chronological order. 

10. A CHRISTMAS CAROL
, WRITTEN BY CHARLES DICKENS (1843)

Dickens gave us almost every hallmark of the Christmas we now celebrate. He gave us Christmas charity and holiday feasts and, of course, “bah, humbug!” But more than that, he gave the holiday an irresistible storyline. When we celebrate Christmas today, we celebrate the sentimentality of Charles Dickens as much as anything else. At every other time of year we live our lives as Scrooges, but in December, we get to think like Tiny Tim. We get to emote. And for once, we’re happy to be suckers. (It’s also worth noting that almost all of the best Christmas movies—from It’s a Wonderful Life to Scrooged—borrow heavily from this iconic tale.) This is the meaning of Christmas that we’re always happy to return to. It’s the one that makes us treasure our shortcomings for the opportunity they give us to do just a little bit better next time.

Verdict: During Christmas we can sob over coffee commercials without having to explain ourselves.

9. THE NUTCRACKER
, COMPOSED BY PYOTR ILYICH TCHAIKOVSKY (1892)

Christmas and music have a very strong alliance. Christmas carols tend to use simple melodies—often borrowed from old religious hymns—to tell a simple story, and, if nothing else, they do an excellent job of getting inside your head and never leaving again. In other words: do-you-hear-what-I-hear-jingle-bells-jingle-bells-jingle-all-the-way-in-a-manger- no-crib-for-a-rum-pa-pum-p-LEASE MAKE IT STOP!

So as
a result, when you hear something that sounds like Christmas but at the same time doesn’t make you want to kill yourself, that’s a great feeling. And that’s a feeling that The Nutcracker provides in spades. Watching the ballet or even just listening to the score is like seeing snowflakes for the first time. It captures the wonder of that moment, and it really is magical. (Especially during “Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairies.”) Also, new rule: every ballet has to have a rat king in it.

Verdict: Christmas is all about restoring a sense of childlike wonder.

8. IT’S A WONDERFUL LIFE, DIRECTED BY FRANK CAPRA (1946)

Since we were kids, everyone’s been telling us that this movie is the great Christmas movie. It’s on all the time, it’s old, and it has Jimmy Stewart wobbling with his wobbly mouth all over the place. This is all true, but It’s a Wonderful Life shouldn’t be dismissed as simple or naïve. The climax comes after the main character—George Bailey, by name—has given up on his dreams and decided to commit suicide. And although the movie ends with tears of joy, George Bailey is still a man who has sacrificed his own dreams to support the people that he loves. Most movies would sink under the weight of that kind of sadness, but It’s a Wonderful Life works because it has so much life in it—it has the hard glare of reality, the disappointments of adulthood, and dozens of little moments that make George Bailey’s small little life seem wonderfully real. In other words, it’s Charles Dickens’s book all over again, but with an even better climax. If you’re not sobbing at the end, or beaming at the end, or both, you must be a piece of coal.