A Christmas Story and The Little Birds Who Won't Sing: Similar Theme, Lack of Spirituality
The two short stories, A Christmas Story by Annie Dillard and The Little Birds Who Won't Sing by G. K. Chesterton have a similar theme: both discuss the lack of spirituality in the modern world. G.K. Chesterton and Annie Dillard are religious writers, who contemplate the creation and the existence of the universe with a sense of mystic wonder. As it can be deduced from their writings, the two authors try to warn the modern man against the pitfalls of civilization and materialism which alienate him and enfeeble his perception of God and of the truth. Both A Christmas Story and The Little Birds Who Won't Sing are constructed as allegories on the theme of spirituality in the contemporary world. Thus, the titles of the two texts are very suggestive, as they seem, at first glance, unrelated to the content of the stories. A Christmas Story literally depicts a huge, almost disproportionate banquet given by a "young man of tremendous wealth and power", at which all the world takes part. The feast goes on all night long, and people continue eating of the sole course served at the enormous table: a soup that seems to contain the ingredients of all the other foods. The young man who watches the banquet from a balcony lifts the curtain that
The story is centered this time on singing, and especially on chorus singing, that Chesterton finds it is no longer possible in the modern world. Dillard's message is therefore clear: the modern man can no longer wonder, as he should, at everything that surrounds him. It too constructs an allegory, although less direct than in Dillard's story, with very deep religious significations. His story, The Little Birds Who Won't Sing, has a very similar message with that written by Dillard. The images then grow more and more, until he is able to see the tomatoes ripening beneath his eyes and to see and feel the whole ocean with the swarming life that lies in its depth. But when he has read the scriptures and knows a little of Buddhism, mountains are no longer mountains, waters are no longer waters, and trees no longer trees (i. " Singing here represent more or less the same loss of spirituality that Dillard criticized in her story. But not one person has seen or really understood the excellence of that soup. ]with us the super-human is the only place where you can find the human. " The many decorations that cover the table cloth and the tableware are again symbols of the way in which every man should be able to understand the world. This is what the author implies when she advocates that people fail to see the "excellence" of even the minutest things in our universe:"All night long people have been eating as much soup as they wanted, and then coming back to the table for more. There are however essential differences between the texts; in terms of style, Chesterton 's text is more direct and the authorial voice interferes with commentaries, whereas in Dillard's we only have an allegory.
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Acceptance Essays
