Thursday, November 20, 2008

A Dickens Christmas

Welcome to my favorite day of the week, Thursday! Sadly for her readers, Lisa the Apron Queen is no longer able to host Vintage Thingies. However, Suzanne, the Colorado Lady has jumped in and will be our new hostess! She will do great job, since she is such a VTT lover, too.
After you finish admiring my display this week, visit Suzanne and the other Vintage Thingies Thursday participants at Colorado Lady. I think every Thursday will be vintage Christmas items through New Year's Day, I have so much for you to see and envy!
I have a pretty cool vintage book to share this week! Most everyone knows the basic storyline of Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol, featuring the famous character of Ebeneezer Scrooge. Dickens wrote two other stories for the holidays, The Chimes, and The Cricket on the Hearth. All three are in this vintage book, Christmas Stories. Of course Charles Dickens first wrote these stories in the 1840s, but this particular book was published in 1939.


The book cover is a chocolate brown linen with some kind of a matte coating. The illustration and writing are lightly pressed into the cover and the ink is orangy-red.
My mother bought it at a yard sale in the early 1970s. The book has the name of a previous owner stamped on the front end papers several times, and my mother wrote her name in red at the bottom of the front page.

The Chimes is the story of Trotty Veck, a poor ticket porter, whose view of life changes from despair to hope by the spirits of the chimes on New Year's Eve.
A Cricket on the Hearth was published as a holiday story in 1846. It is a story of hope and family love.

Next week is Thanksgiving! I hope you all have a wonderful day with your families and have much for which you give thanks.

14 comments:

Justine said...

Wow, that looks like a real treasure to have!!!!!!!!!!

Justine :o )

blueviolet said...

Wow! You've got something really special there. You're a lucky girl!

Abounader Photography said...

HOla! Stopping in from SITS!

Laura Ingalls Gunn said...

Oh what a treasure!

Miri said...

What a great treasure-I've never heard of the other two stories-will have to check them out. I've also posted VTT and am using Suzanne's comment posts as a way to find others :)

Chris said...

You know Elizabeth, I just love coming to your blog. You tell me about books that I have read or not. I used to read a lot, but seems like I just don't have the time any more to really get into a novel. Maybe if I stopped visiting everyone in Blogland I might be able to. LOL

Hugs,
Chris

Coloradolady said...

Oh, what a great book. I love the illustrations inside. Can you believe Thanksgiving is next week....where has the time gone the last few months?

If you tried to like to my VTT link, I had a bit of trouble with it this morning. Sorry. You can try and link back again to the post if you like. I will get this worked out.

Jewelgirl said...

Great Book! The two other stories
in the book are new to me. A Tale
of Two Cities by Dickens barely kept me awake (yawning now) but I enjoyed A Christmas Carol it is a the major
holiday classic.

Terrie's Lil' Piece of Serenity said...

Elizabeth, What a treasure. You're lucky your parents keep such wonderful things!!
Hugs, Terrie

Amy said...

Awesome books - Dickens is a favourite of mine!

Amy said...

Awesome books - Dickens is a favourite of mine!

Happy To Be said...

What a great treasurer Elizabeth,,thanks for sharing..hope you have a great day...hugs and smiles Gloria

squawmama said...

What a wonderful book you have there... I love Dickens and would love to have something like that in my antique collection... Thanks for posting this I loved it....

(((HUGS)))
Donna

~TAMY 3 Sides of Crazy~ said...

What a great Christmas treasury of stories!