Christmas and Lit Are a Lyrical Fit

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Yesterday was December 25, so I’m offering Christmas-time song snippets with silly revised lyrics about literature. 🙂

Sung to the tune of “The Twelve Days of Christmas”:

On the first day of Christmas
My book love sent to me
The Thorn Birds in a…trade paperback

Sung to the tune of “I’ll Be Home for Christmas”:

I’ll be Sherlock Holmes for Christmas
Because I have multiple personalities
Please leave clues and booze by the tree
And money to pay my therapy fees

Sung to the tune of “Frosty the Snowman”:

There must have been some magic (realism)
In that Isabel Allende book they found
For when they put it on their sled
They were House of the Spirits-bound

Sung to the tune of “The Christmas Song”:

Chestnuts roasting on an open fire
Herm Hesse nipping at some prose
The Steppenwolf in his character choir
Was not a wolf who hung with Eskimos 

Sung to the tune of “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer”:

Rudolph the red-nosed reindeer
Co-starred in The Red and the Black
And if you ever read it
Stendhal was clearly not a hack

Sung to the tune of “I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus”:

I saw Mommy kissing Outlander book nine
Underneath the mistletoe last night.
She didn’t see me creep
Through time-travel stones so steep
She thought I was watching reruns of Veep

Sung to the tune of “All I Want for Christmas Is My Two Front Teeth”:

All I want for Christmas is Zadie Smith’s White Teeth
Her novel White Teeth…

Sung to the tune of “Hark! The Herald Angels Sing”:

Hark! The Los Angeles Angels sing
Their player Mike Trout has a better swing
Than Vonnegut’s Kilgore Trout…d’oh
And John Grisham’s Calico Joe

Sung to the tune of “Jingle Bells”:

Dashing through the shelves
In your local library palace
The Lord of the Rings has elves
And hobbits with no malice

Sung to the tune of “Jingle Bell Rock”:

What a bright time, it’s the right time
To read more Reacher novels
Reacher book time, getting hooked time
As in left hook, right hook, villain grovels 

Sung to the tune of “It’s the Most Wonderful Time of the Year”:

It’s the most wonderful time of the year
With must-read-book gifts
You shouldn’t drop in snow drifts 
Because if you try to retrieve them
Your hands will be The Color Purple, I fear

Sung to the tune of “Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas”:

Have yourself a merry little Christmas
Let your Middlemarch paperback be light
From now on
The hardcover version’s out of sight

Sung to the tune of “It’s Beginning to Look a Lot Like Christmas”:

It’s beginning to look a lot like Tolstoy
Everywhere you go
There’s war and there’s peace
And a train that didn’t cease
Anna Karenina…NO! 

Sung to the tune of “Christmas Wrapping”:

So deck those halls, trim those trees
Raise a cup of Christmas cheer
Just don’t spill it on your Kindle
Dousing To Eternity, From Here

Sung to the tune of “Walking in a Winter Wonderland”:

Later on, we’ll perspire
As we dream of the fires
In Fahrenheit 451
Burning books isn’t fun
Squawking in a quite asunder land

Sung to the tune of “White Christmas”:

I’m dreaming of a Woman in White Christmas
Reading the best book Wilkie Collins would write
May your novels be classic and long
And better than this badly revised song

Sung to the tune of “Santa Claus Is Coming to Town”:

Making a TBR list
And checking it twice,
No one can read enough in their lives
Before The Grim Reaper is coming to town 

Sung to the tune of “Happy Xmas (War Is Over)”:

So this is Christmas, and what have you done?
Another year over, a new book just begun…

Any lyrics you’d like to offer? 🙂

My literary-trivia book is described and can be purchased here: Fascinating Facts About Famous Fiction Authors and the Greatest Novels of All Time.

In addition to this weekly blog, I write the 2003-started/award-winning “Montclairvoyant” topical-humor column for Baristanet.com every Thursday. The latest piece — about my town’s new mask mandate and more — is here.

100 thoughts on “Christmas and Lit Are a Lyrical Fit”

  3. We wish you a merry Christmas

    “We wish you a literary Christmas, we wish you a literary Christmas, we wish you a literary Christmas, and a stack of good books!”

    ????

    “Good tidings books bring, Whether great of small, Some are really good and some are not at all!”

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  7. HI Dave, this is a wonderful and fun post. I am sitting on my couch typing this with the ocean as my backdrop – so nice!
    “I don’t know what I buy for her I think I buy a book
    So when we need information inside it she can look: Jim Reeves Senor Santa Claus. Wishing you a happy new year!

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  8. Hark the Herald Angels sing

    Hark the horror angels sing
    Gory from Stephen King.
    Carrie wills
    Cujo kills
    The Shining’s lost its glow
    Bag of Bones
    Lies in Dead Zone
    Christine will drive me home.
    Hark the horror angels sing
    Gory from Stephen King.

    LOL!

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  9. To the tune of “Good King Wenceslaus”:

    God-king COVID he went ’round
    Countryside and village
    Spreading sickness through each town
    Peace of mind to pillage
    As he does through farmer’s field
    And all congregations
    Pray we must, in doctors trust
    To halt his march through nation.

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  14. As Liz said, Dave, here above, its the Tolstoy “one” that I thought most appropriate to the present time. However, I also very much like Hermann Hesse’s Steppenwolf and that the road of
    healing leads across humor and acknowledgment of our personal inabilities! Many thanks for all your amusing ideas:)

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          • Oh they are the most deliciously awful people Dave. Had to leave their last house because she fell out with an upstairs neighbour , saying how she was an unfit mother because she was working and had children. So the woman basically made her life hell. (Always best to live above someone actually than below them that way. ) Now you think that would be a salutary lesson but no and despite being terrified that will all come out–I do think knowing secrets is quite important in life— they have in their time here fallen out with every person in this end of the street, every person before these folks and the ones before them, every tradesperson of these folks, every tradesperson of their own, Every visitor to these folks, randoms in pubs, shop assistants. you name it. They bullied the old lady below us and they are now bullying the new owner. We were the only ones they have not fallen out with but now we have drawn a line in the sand in regard to the lady downstairs and their continual interference in everything that is nothing to do with them. So yeah I felt my rendition was inspired. LOL. As I always say to people in life, what you see is what you get, I won’t get in your face, don’t get in mine but if you do I will take you out. The Mr did feel the other day that in this latest nonsense that the neighbouring Mr knew he had made a mistake and was what we call ‘ bricking it’

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            • Wow! They sound truly awful. 😦 And as is usually the case with people like that, there seems to be little self-awareness of how wrongly they’re behaving. (Though, according to your last line, the man seems to have had a brief glimmer of introspection.) Very sorry that couple is in your orbit and your street’s orbit.

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              • The rest of the folks round about…it is a funny street split by one way systems and it is ls quite a long street so you just know those in the immediate orbit, …they are nice folks, or they’ve not been here long and keep themselves to themselces cos it is also a street of high old walls and in the main big old houses. But this lot??? Mind you I do love writing of unselfaware people.

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    • Thank you, Mary Jo! 🙂

      So glad you’re reading the new “Outlander” book. Can’t wait to do that myself! I LOVE that series, and just purchased “Go Tell The Bees That I Am Gone” yesterday. But first I have about 900 pages to go in Herman Wouk’s “War and Remembrance.” 😮

      How are the first 300 or so pages?

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      • Gabaldon often revisits and fills in the blanks of her previous book while advancing the narrative very slowly. It’s helpful for me, because I’ve forgotten so much and refuse to read synopses online. But for others it could be frustrating. We’ve been in the colonies for several books now, so we should begin to see some action of historical import…eventually 🙂 Most fans simply love the characters’ relationships, of course. I’m particularly enjoying the day-to-day minutia about the culture. Food preparation, healing, etc. I feel her writing skills are better than ever.

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        • Thank you for that excellent summary, Mary Jo!

          You’re right that Diane Gabaldon likes to advance the plot slowly and fill in backstory readers might have forgotten. I happen to be an “Outlander” latecomer who read the first book in 2019 and the next seven in 2020, but it’s been quite a few years for those who read the books when they were first published.

          The characters’ relationships ARE depicted SO well, as are the current events and culture of the 18th century. Love the cameos in previous books, too — George Washington, Benedict Arnold, etc. And if Ms. Gabaldon is writing better than ever, that’s some seriously good writing!

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  19. Hmm, well okay, time to step away from the eggnog Dave. But while your there I challenge you to do one that rhymes with Gulag Archipelago. I remember a few lines from one back in the day re: Jingle Bells: Jingle Bells Batman smells, Don’t recall anything more than that although there was something, something about Robin, ha! Thanks for the Christmas earworms– Love and Peace to you and yours and hopes for wonerful New Year, Susi

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  20. Awesome post Dave !

    ” Reacher book time, getting hooked time
    As in left hook, right hook, villain grovels ”

    Chatty Reacher writes the book this time !

    Dashing through the shelves
    In my local library place , got the wrong book with tiny letters,
    Why did yoy Mary T do that ?

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    • Thanks so much, bebe! 🙂

      Ha — your Mary Trump-related line. 🙂 But sorry about the small type size. I definitely like her anti-Donald sentiments; she knows firsthand how awful he is. Took some guts for her to publicly call him out.

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      • Okay Dave, so I started reading the book, skipped chapter one altogether and started with chapter two. She knows the history so well. .
        It is all about Donald as She adresses him as such !
        But also she is a page filler, with no gaps.
        it is beyond me, a lady who made so much money with her previous book decided on such tiny letters to make the book small.

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                  • Thank you, bebe! MANY great books mentioned, and I liked the way the NYT presented the results.

                    I don’t think “To Kill a Mockingbird” is the best book of the past 125 years, but it’s a fantastic novel and certainly up there in the top 10. 🙂 What do you think?

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                    • Was my favorite, could be I was biased due to Ggregory Peck in the movie and great cast. The one of the worse would be Go set a Watchman,good you skipped that book.
                      So many fantastic books thanks to your blog i`ve been following for more than ten or more years.
                      Dave you survived and the sleeping beauty is long gone.

                      Liked by 1 person

                    • The movie was indeed tremendous, bebe! Great acting, as you note, and pretty faithful to the stellar novel.

                      I’m happy and grateful that you’ve been a LONG follower of this blog, including the 2011-2014 version on that other site whose founder does seem to have mostly disappeared from public view.

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                    • But it is a book that manages to comfort American readers on the topic of the goodness resident throughout our great land in decent brave people, however few, who stand out from the milling mob accordingly, even when the topic is race hate and the social cost of staying upright in the face of it is daunting.

                      In other words, it is a most alluring piece of fiction, well-made by Harper Lee, and made to sell by editor Tay Hohoff, who knew her market: us, always happy to find a new way to think better of ourselves than we may deserve.

                      TKAM must certainly qualify as among of the very best best-sellers of the last century and a quarter, in any event.

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                    • Good, absolutely fair points, jhNY, and well-said. Knowing there are some fictional American “heroes” and “heroines” out there can indeed make many Americans feel better about themselves. Whereas in real life, the few people like Atticus Finch who do exist and have the courage to be public about it might be slammed by the right for being “communists,” “traitors to their race,” naive, or whatever. The history of the U.S. is unfortunately embodied more by the likes of Trump, Joe McCarthy, J. Edgar Hoover, and John C. Calhoun than by the likes of Atticus Finch. 😦

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