The gift of the wise

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The Gift of the Magi (in the original The Gift of the Magi , as dt. Output also the gift of the Magi is) a short story by O. Henry , the first time on 10 December 1905 in the Sunday supplement of the New York Sunday World magazine , who was then largest newspaper in the United States, under the title Gifts of the Magi . The story, which was included unchanged in O. Henry's first short story collection The Four Million in April 1906 under the title that is popular today, is one of the author's most successful short stories and has been anthologized many times and translated into numerous languages.

The story is about a young couple with little money who surprise each other with a Christmas present. The sentimental story with its morality about giving presents is often adapted , especially for performances during the Christmas season . The plot and its surprising twist are well known and are occasionally parodied . In various anecdotes about the genesis of the story, it is said that O. Henry wrote the story in great haste immediately before it was first published under time pressure.

Audio version of the original English text on Wikimedia Commons

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James [Jim] Dillingham Young and his wife Della are a young couple who are deeply in love but can barely afford the small apartment they live in. For Christmas, however, Della decides to give her husband a $ 21 necklace for his precious pocket watch, an heirloom. To raise this amount, she has her knee-length, beautiful hair cut off and sells it as material for wigs . In the meantime, Jim decides his valuable watch to sell to Della a jewel studded comb -Set from tortoiseshell to pay for her wonderful hair. Regardless of the disappointment that they can no longer use each other's gift, both are taken with their gift as an expression of their love for one another.

The story ends with the narrator comparing the couple's mutual offerings with those of the wise men from the Orient :

“The wise, as you know, were wise men - wonderfully wise men - who brought presents to the child in the manger. You invented the art of making Christmas presents. Since they were wise, their gifts were of course wise too, and perhaps had the privilege of being exchangeable if there were duplicates. And here I have now told you the uneventful story of two foolish children in a furnished apartment who, most unwise, sacrificed the greatest treasures of their house for one another. But with one last word, let me say to the sages of today that these two were the wisest of all givers. Of all who give and receive gifts, they are the wisest. They are the wisest everywhere. They are the true sages. "

Narrative structure and linguistic means

In the narrative structure of the story, two separate levels can be distinguished. The level of the fable and the narrated itself is located in the vicinity of a poor apartment; Against this background, the actual story of Della and Jim takes place in two longer scenes and a short interlude. A second level of narration is built up from this. The narrator presenting and commenting on the fable tries to establish communication with the reader who is addressed by him several times. Right from the start, the narrator shows himself to be an eloquent, urban figure who stands far above the world he reveals to the reader with his story. Nevertheless, he shows compassion for his narrative characters; in the end he referred, for example, as "foolish children" ( "foolish children") . By addressing it several times, the reader is assigned to the level of the narrator; this enables him to maintain the same benevolent distance from the story. The ethos of the short story is the authorial expressly stated final comment of the narrator; in this way, the reader has no doubts from the outset about the final meaning of the fable.

O. Henry divides the linguistic material of the narrative into the image fields of the “poor” , the “cute and dainty” , the “deceptive appearance” and the “biblical-oriental” . The description of the background of the action is made using plain language, unadorned words that are only literarily exaggerated by varying repetition. When Della looks sadly out the window, she looks out at “a gray cat walking on a gray fence in a gray backyard” (“a gray cat walking a gray fence in a gray backyard”) . The image field of the poor built up at this point pervades the entire story in ever new details such as the worn carpet, the old brown jacket or the old brown hat ( “worn red carpet” , “old brown jacket” , “old brown hat” ). Della moves in a funny way in this dreary world; for example, at one point she is compared to a kitten (“leaped up like a little cat”) . Through the pictorial connection of the poor with the cute and petite, Stella's world is upgraded to an idyll, despite all privations.

In contrast, the socio-economic environment in which Della and Jim move is depicted satirically . In this world where Jim got his name on the door sign as "Mr. James Dillingham Young “states that begging is elaborately described as mendicancy . O. Henry falls back on the means of the comic epic , the effect of which arises primarily from the discrepancy between the trivial object and stylistically exaggerated designation. By withdrawing from this world of deceptive appearances into that of the simple, homely home, the end of the short story also becomes a moral victory.

In addition, the various echoes of the biblical and oriental, not only in the title of the story, are striking . The wig maker to whom Della sells her hair is called Sofronie; the Queen of Sheba and King Solomon are mentioned by name by the narrator in hypothetical comparative sentences. O. Henry not only highlights the Christmas aspect of the story, but also uses these allusions as a contrast medium to prepare the narrator's assessment at the end. The story of the Queen of Sheba is both about the motive of giving and the question of wisdom. The Queen has heard of Solomon's proverbial wisdom and goes to see him at his court in Jerusalem to check his wisdom. Overwhelmed by what she sees, she showered him with precious gifts to show him appreciation.

Della can also be related to the Old Testament figure of Delilah from the Book of Judges . While, to put it bluntly, Delilah uses her seductive skills as a prostitute to steal Simson's hair and manhood, Della, in contrast, sacrifices her hair and thus part of her attraction as a woman in order to express her love for Jim with a precious gift . In return, she finds compensation in O. Henry's story in domestic happiness, which of course means more than all material values ​​in the external reality that has been exposed as an illusory world.

History of origin

O. Henry had had a contractual agreement with the New York Sunday World Magazine since 1903 , which required him to deliver one short story a week for a fee of one hundred dollars. This contract, which was a dream in the eyes of the public, was often nightmarish for O. Henry himself due to the time pressure, as his biographers report.

Allegedly O. Henry wrote The Gift of the Magi in a hurry. One of the anecdotes about the genesis of this short story says that the editors of the World have commissioned a friend of the writer to pick up the manuscript, since the printing date for the Christmas edition was imminent. When this friend appeared in O. Henry's apartment, the author is said not to have put a single word on paper. He invited his friend to take a nap on the sofa. In less than two hours he wrote the story in such a well-rounded form that it did not have to be revised six months later, even for republication in book form.

According to other reports, however, O. Henry wrote the story in Pete's Tavern on Irving Place in New York City . Representations like this are in line with O. Henry's reputation for standing in the tradition of the traveling storyteller and always finding the right word or a fitting punchline with a sure grip.

The short story Dulvina by the little-known French author Emile Chevalet is sometimes cited as a possible source for the figures and the motifs of the hair and watch sales in The Gift of the Magi . Whether O. Henry actually knew this story and whether his story can be traced back to Chevalet has not yet been established with absolute certainty.

Reception history

In literary criticism, O. Henry's short story is expressly excluded from the negative rating even by his harshest critics, who otherwise hardly find a word of praise for his short stories, which are geared towards mass taste .

Above all, the narrative brilliance of the story and the “special charm of the ending” with the “double link between sacrifice and gift” are praised. The design of the final scene with its “double sequence of tension generation, increase in tension and surprising resolution” is also seen as a “masterpiece of reader guidance”, which confirms O. Henry's reputation as a “magician of the double punch”.

Manfred Durzak particularly emphasizes the “narrative economy” of this short story , which contributes significantly to the success of the punch line, since the reader remains limited to Della's perspective at crucial moments. According to him, The Gift of the Magi also provides an important literary template for the short story The Three Dark Kings by Wolfgang Borchert , written in 1946, the title of which refers to O. Henry and creates a similar situation in contemporary history. Borchert's story, which, unlike O. Henry, is not written for a broad, diversion-seeking mass audience, is told more tightly and is much more restrained in the emphasis on ethos. In addition, Borchert's story in its symbolic - metaphorical allusions is much more concentrated on a variation of the Christian situation pattern on Christmas Eve .

German editions in book form (selection)

Adaptations

O. Henry's short story provided the literary basis for a large number of film adaptations, for example in 1952 as part of the episode film Five Pearls (in the original O. Henry's Full House ) after five short stories by O. Henry. Other film adaptations of The Gift of the Magi appeared under the same title, for example in 1958 as an 85-minute musical adaptation by George Schaefer or in 2001 as a 20-minute short film by Bert van Bork and in 2014 as a 16-minute film adaptation by Ismene Daskarolis, to name just a few to call. Motifs based on the short story with its double point can also be found in countless cinema and television films, including as episodes of certain series, sometimes also in animated versions such as Mickey's Merry Christmas .

A setting as a Christmas opera by David Conte was premiered in 1997 at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music ; the German premiere of this chamber opera took place in December 2010 at the English Theater in Berlin.

Secondary literature

  • Claus Gadau: O. Henry: “The Gift of the Magi”. In: Klaus Lubbers (ed.): The English and American short story . Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft Darmstadt 1990, ISBN 3-534-05386-9 , pp. 100-109.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ See the detailed information from Claus Gadau: O. Henry: “The Gift of the Magi”. In: Klaus Lubbers (ed.): The English and American short story . Scientific Book Society Darmstadt 1990, ISBN 3-534-05386-9 , p. 100.
  2. ↑ Adjusted for inflation, this amount corresponded to a purchasing power of 400 to 500 dollars in 2009 , cf. MeasuringWorth .
  3. ↑ Cf. Claus Gadau: O. Henry: “The Gift of the Magi”. In: Klaus Lubbers (ed.): The English and American short story . Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft Darmstadt 1990, ISBN 3-534-05386-9 , p. 104.
  4. ↑ In the German translation, the means of subtle choice of words used in other places by O. Henry are unfortunately lost, as there are hardly any suitable equivalents to be found.
  5. ↑ Cf. Claus Gadau: O. Henry: “The Gift of the Magi”. In: Klaus Lubbers (ed.): The English and American short story . Scientific Book Society Darmstadt 1990, ISBN 3-534-05386-9 , p. 105.
  6. ↑ See also Claus Gadau: O. Henry: “The Gift of the Magi”. In: Klaus Lubbers (ed.): The English and American short story . Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft Darmstadt 1990, ISBN 3-534-05386-9 , pp. 105-107.
  7. ↑ See the remarks by Claus Gadau: O. Henry: “The Gift of the Magi”. In: Klaus Lubbers (ed.): The English and American short story . Scientific Book Society Darmstadt 1990, ISBN 3-534-05386-9 , p. 100 f. According to Gadau, this anecdote is presented in several of O. Henry's biographies, albeit in two versions that are contradicting the details.
  8. ↑ a b Cf. Claus Gadau: O. Henry: “The Gift of the Magi”. In: Klaus Lubbers (ed.): The English and American short story . Scientific Book Society Darmstadt 1990, ISBN 3-534-05386-9 , p. 101.
  9. ↑ Claus Gadau: O. Henry: “The Gift of the Magi”. In: Klaus Lubbers (ed.): The English and American short story . Scientific Book Society Darmstadt 1990, ISBN 3-534-05386-9 , p. 101.
  10. ↑ Cf. Manfred Durzak : The German short story of the present. Author portraits, workshop discussions, interpretations . Reclam, Stuttgart 1980, ISBN 3-15-010293-6 , pp. 122-124.
  11. ↑ See the corresponding entries in the Internet Movie Database [1] , accessed on December 18, 2014.
  12. ↑ See Christmas Opera, American: German premiere of David Conte's “The Gift of the Magi” in Berlin . In: Neue Musikzeitung , December 19, 2010. Accessed December 18, 2014.