The Battle for Christmas is an interesting book that sheds some light on Christmas practices and traditions. The Puritans made Christmas illegal in New England becuase of its pagan roots. It's ironic that some will claim a 'war on Christmas,' which they believe is coming from the left, but in reality it's coming from the right. ( )

very interesting book which shows that Christmas was indeed a secular holiday, started by American PR companies. The church was opposed to the holiday because from the start it was a pagan feast with drinking and the like and later on was mostly for material gifts. Very enlightening. ( )

Nissenbaum has written a thoroughly researched history of Christmas in America. He argues that Christmas as it is observed today in millions of American homes is the result of deliberate efforts in the 19th century to domesticate an untamed, carnival holiday that was little more than an occasion for widespread misbehavior and rituals of social inversion. One important means of domestication was the publication of new literature with Christmas themes, such as "The Night Before Christmas" by Clement C. Moore, Washington Irving's "Sketchbook," and Charles Dickens' "Christmas Carol," all wildly popular in the first half of the century.

Nissenbaum argues that the rampant commercialism of the season we experience today, often decried in both the media and the pulpit, is not a recent phenomenon at all but was part and parcel of that same 19th century effort to tame Christmas and make it a more family-friendly holiday. He makes a convincing case. A weakness of the book is the relative absence of any discussion of Christmas as a major component of the church calendar and its meaning as a Christian observance.

The book, a Pulitzer Prize finalist, contains a plethora of endnotes, a full index, and many black and white photos and illustrations. ( )