Final Part 2

I just read “The Gift of The Magi,” by O. Henry. This story was published in 1905 and seems to take place in that era. The story talks about the Magi who delivers gifts to everyone on Christmas. Due to some of the language used I would guess that the story takes place in England. The story describes a poor family trying to make the best Christmas possible with the little money they have.

The first line of the story grabs the readers attention. The line is written in all capitals, this line introduces the readers to the large role of numbers in the story. The first paragraph talks about money and introduces us to the lack of money in the household. From the first paragraph we are introduce to Della though the third person narrator who appears to be the main character.

Throughout the story there is a lot of crying and sadness.The sadness is driven by the fact that tomorrow is Christmas day and Della knows she doesn’t have enough money for presents. At first I thought the story would be boring but luckily for me it started to speed up after a few paragraphs. The build up of the story is that Della and Jim are both trying to get gifts for each other. They go to extreme to be able to buy a gift for the other. Della buys a watch for Jim and Jim gets Della combs. The ending is a bit of a surprise, after all the time and heart put into gifts, they don’t matter and can not be used. In the end it was just the thought that counted.

The moral of the story is all about giving and receiving. The story implies that it is better to give than it is to receive. Most other Christmas stories are happy and joyful while this one is not. This story may actually be more realistic, there are theories that depression rates rise during holiday season. Everyone feels stress about getting presents for their friends and family. This story is unlike others that I have read. The other stories have good content but they are unnecessarily long. While this story was nice and short and had a very interesting topic. I really enjoyed this story not only because of the length but also, it has a really nice message that I found valuable.