Christmas Stories

Goblins frolic in the graveyard of an early Dickens tale; a love-struck ghost disrupts a country estate in [Elizabeth Bowen](https://www.waterstones.com/author/elizabeth-bowen/292557)'s 'Green Holly'; devils, witches, Cossacks and peasants cavort in [Gogol](https://www.waterstones.com/author/nikolay-gogol/326898)'s 'The Night Before Christmas'. The plight of the less fortunate haunts [Chekhov'](https://www.waterstones.com/author/anton-chekhov/3808)s 'Vanka' and [Willa Cather](https://www.waterstones.com/author/willa-cather/28333)'s 'The Burglar's Christmas', but takes a boisterously comic turn in [Damon Runyon](https://www.waterstones.com/author/damon-runyon/1044449)'s 'Dancing Dan's Christmas' and [John Cheever](https://www.waterstones.com/author/john-cheever/239138)'s 'Christmas is a Sad Season for the Poor'.

From [Nabokov](https://www.waterstones.com/author/vladimir-nabokov/28870)'s intensely moving story of a father's grief in 'Christmas' to [Truman Capote](https://www.waterstones.com/author/truman-capote/52251)'s hilarious yet heartbreaking 'A Christmas Memory', from [Grace Paley](https://www.waterstones.com/author/grace-paley/492757)'s Jewish girl in the Christmas pageant in 'The Loudest Voice' to the dysfunctional family ski holiday in [Richard Ford](https://www.waterstones.com/author/richard-ford/50877)'s 'Creche' - each of the stories is imbued with Christmas spirit of one kind or another, and all are richly and indelibly entertaining.