Politically Correct Holiday Stories: For an Enlightened Yuletide Season

This is obviously the wrong season to be reading holiday books, but I'm very much anti-Christmas so anytime of year is the perfect time to read about a more enlightened holiday season! Garner's prose is simple, engaging, and quietly witty, which really sets him apart from some of the other writers of satirical holiday stories. I thought his interpretation of Dickens' Christmas Carol was particularly well done, since it gave readers the expected cycnical take on the story, but twisted the finale to be far less predictable. People may change, even the old Scrooge, but even with carefully planned crash-immersion therapy people act in unpredictable ways and are able to continue taking advantage of the system!

Delightful collection of rewritten Christmas stories--the author explaining, in character, that he has modestly undertaken the "task of liberating the holidays from the oppressiveness of tradition". He dedicates the work to a campus "where mistletoe has been officially banned as a holiday decoration, because...it tends to sanctify uninvited endearment".

Begins with comic versery - "Twas the Night Before Solstice...and all through the co-op, Not a creature was messing the calm status quo up." Etc.

Next, a re-write of "Frosty the Persun of Snow", so as not to offend those who are snow-challenged. Then the "Nutcracker" story is revised so as not to offend serfs or pre-adults. Or the tribal mice.

"Rudolph the Nasally Empowered Reindeer" is show more the elevated biography of that unique individual of the luminescent olfactory organ. And no, we are not spared the suffering he endured as the victim of bullying from peers, and of cruel or ignorant care-givers. Sadly, the tale ends badly.

This small well-crafted book concludes with five staves of "A Christmas Carol", rewritten so as not to offend the "spiritual facilitators", or other celebrants. No Christians were harmed in the retelling of sweet Dickens' Scrooge bio. show less

Very well written and humorous.

This is a book with a collection of Winter GHoliday stories rewritten to be "politically correct." Some of the references are dated at this point.

People who are politically correct may enjoy this for the extremes it shows, those who think being politically correct is humbug may enjoy it even more as I'm sure they will find things to validate their feelings.

It was a fun read and quick, but something I plan on keeping to reread every holiday season. I think the idea is funnier than the actual book, "Frosty the Persun of Snow" and " Rudolph the Nasally Empowered ed Reindeer" were my favorites and I think the funniest.

Generally correct, but despite claims to be "politically correct," he's made the politically INCORRECT error of ASSuMEing that female reindeer are unrepresented among Santa's sleigh-pullers. Is "Vixen" a traditionally male name? I think not. Plus, of course, we have the politically incorrect, chauvanistic attitude that antlers and strong pulling ability must, by default, represent the male of the species. As many knowledgeable about reindeer will attest, the only antlered reindeer around Christmas are pregnant FEMALE.

This is a GREVIOUS, right-wing, anti-progressive, ultra-conservative error and entirely unacceptable for a book that purports to have the blessings of being "politically correct."

I first came across James Finn Garner’s schtick of running long-standing and beloved stories of western culture through the PC sanitizer in high school when I read his Politically Correct Bedtime Stories. What made that first book so funny was that it was original and pointed out the ridiculousness of the then small voice of the PC police. Oh, if only we knew then how that voice would grow and become the bully it is today!

In this holiday version of the original book, Garner revisits our favorite Christmas stories, some with more success than others. The first is a modernized and sanitized version of Clement Moore’s 1823 poem “A Visit from St. Nicholas”, and the best offering in the whole book. The narrator of the story (a man or show more woman, we never really know.. though, it sounds like a shrill hippy-feminazi) argues with the Santa about everything from Christmas trees to Barbie dolls and toy guns.

This particular section of the book is, in my opinion, the only part of the book worth reading. It’s clever and pulls into focus exactly what is at stake with the PC craziness and who suffers the most. Children are more and more being forced to worry about what they say and how it might be received. They are forced at ever earlier ages to consider how their words and actions might be taken out of context.

Overall, Politically Correct Holiday Stories by James Finn Garner was just meh.

click for full review: http://thekoolaidmom.wordpress.com/2009/12/28/politically-correct-holiday-storie... show less

I was lookin for a quick funy holiday book and sadly this did not deliver. It was inventive and unique, for sure, but... mot what I wanted to read at all. Thankfully it was only 99 pages or I never would have finished it!

This tiny book is a collection of short re-imagined holiday tales that have been politically corrected. The reindeer lobby for better rights, Clara won't go off with the nutcracker because "such a journey is symbolic of the violent abduction that occurs in the wedding night [she then mentions that Dorothy and Alice have never been the same]," Frsoty melts due to global warming, etc.

Clever but I just wasn't having it.