“Gift of the Magi”, short story by O’Henry, and Gift of the Magi, directed by Lisa Mulcahy, is about a young newlywed couple that sell their most valuable possessions to get each other what they want for christmas, yet discover the true gift they got was love. The conflict in Gift of the Magi has many differences and yet few similarities. The conflict between both the short story and film is that Jim, the main male protagonist, and Della, Jim’s wife, struggle to purchase gifts for each other for christmas. In the short story, Della gets her hair cut off to buy Jim a chain fob for his watch, and Jim sells his watch to buy combs for Della. But, in the movie, Della sells her camera because she didn’t make enough money at her second job, and
Not only do “The Gift of the Magi” and “How the Grinch Stole Christmas” both show the theme that the best gifts are received through actions, they also both develop the theme through symbolism. In the story, “The Gift of the Magi”, when Della was explaining to James as to why she cut her hair, Della clarifies, “‘Maybe the hairs of my head can be counted,’ she said, ‘but no one could ever count my love for you.’” (O. Henry, 5) This shows that Della’s hair symbolizes her love for James, and how it meant more to her than her most valued possession. By stating, “‘no one could ever count my love for you,’” demonstrates that even though their love cannot be seen, their love was eternal and her love will never succumb to anything else, especially
In "The gift of the Magi" and "Bert and Ernie's Christmas", both show various similarities and differences. The first similarity was they both were short on money and on time, causing them to trade their treasured possessions for money in order to buy a gift for their loved one. One difference in " The gift of the Magi" there status was husband and wife, while in "Bert and Ernie's Christmas" they were just friends. Despite their different relationship status, in both stories they gave up their prized possessions for each other, not knowing they needed their belongings in order for them to properly use the gifts they had received. As an example in "The gift of the Magi" the wife, Della, sacrificed her hair to buy her husband a
The story was written by O’Henry in 1906. The story was centered around a seemingly poor couple who did not have enough money to buy each other the gifts that their significant other deserved. The story took place during Christmas. The Gift of the Magi is like a classic wisdom story in the bible. O’Henrys choice of title depicts symbolism between the three magi that brought gold, frankincense, and mur, to the baby Jesus and the gifts that Jim and Della had given to each other which mainly consisted of selfless love, Della’s hair and Jims pocket watch. This itself ties into the theme of his story. These gifts all entail the act
In The Gift of the Magi, by O. Henry (1906), Della is one of two main characters, the other being her beloved husband, Jim. On Christmas Eve, Della has saved very little for a present for Jim when she decides to sell her most prized possession, her long beautiful hair, for more money. After doing this, and buying the perfect gift,
The Magi story and the Sesame street video are similar and different in a variety of different ways. Something the video and the story have in common is that all of the characters are poor, and cannot afford a Christmas present for one another. While comparing both the video and story, we can see that all of the characters care about each other so much, they are willing to trade their most prized possessions to put a smile on the other person's face. When contrasting the video and the story, you can see that the setting and characters from the video are from sesame street, while the couple in the Magi story are very much human and it is taken place in an older time. A distinction between the video and the story might be what their prized possessions
The twists and turns of the plot as it unfolds within O. Henry 's “The Gift of the Magi” are what simply captivate the reader in such a short amount of pages. The story of Jim and Della on a cold Christmas Eve at the turn of 20th century America is centered around what is remarkably relevant to what many readers have experienced in their own lives; the inevitable stresses, sacrifices, and joys of the holiday season.
"The Gift of the Magi" and the Sesame Street video are similar and different in a variety of ways. For example, both the story and the video have two people who couldn't afford a gift for each other. However, the relationship of the two people are different because in the story they are husband and wife, whereas in the video they are roommates. Furthermore, when it comes to the gifts, the story and the video are similar because they both give each other gifts. Despite their similarities, in the story the gifts are a watch fob and combs, unlike video where the gifts are a soap dish and a cigar box. The last way they are alike is that they both have to make sacrifices, but what's different is at the end of the story, the two people don't
Della was a pretty girl with long nice hair, "So now Della's beautiful hair fell about her, rippling and shinning like a cascade of brown waters." (O. Henry, 2). Della only had a dollar and eighty-seven cents with her. She wanted to get something for Jim's watch. She ended up going to the store to cut off her hair to sell and buy that.
“The Gift of the Magi” is a short story by O. Henry that entails the story of Jim and Della, a husband and wife of a struggling middle class family. In said story, Della sells her long beautiful hair for money to buy a nice band for her husband’s watch. After Della presents Jim with his gift, Jim tells Della he no longer has his watch due to the fact he sold it so he would be able to buy a nice set of combs for Della’s long hair that is no more. This story of love and selflessness is complemented by the author’s style of writing. Specifically, O. Henry use of figurative language and imagery in “The Gift of the Magi” emphasizes ideas and enhances the reader’s understanding of the story.
Stories of love and sacrifice abound in literature. Perhaps one of the most well known stories among teens and adults is the tale of a poor, young couple struggling to find the perfect Christmas gifts for each other using their very limited means. They each manage to get what they think is the perfect gift for the other, but only accomplish this by selling a prized possession which effectively makes the new gifts impractical. This bittersweet narrative, “The Gift of the Magi” by O. Henry, illustrates the moral idea that a person, motivated by nothing but love for another, can possess a willingness to give in a self-denying way which necessitates that the reader consider that wealth be measured by something more than having money
The Gift of the Magi is a short story about a poor couple, taking place on Christmas Eve. The story was published to newspapers roughly around 1905, later being transferred into book form on the tenth of April, a year later. The Gift of the Magi has adapted into various forms over the years, varying from films to plays. The widely known ending of the story revolves around situational irony.
“The Gift of the Magi” is about a couple trying to buy each other the perfect Christmas gift. At the beginning of the story we meet Della while she’s worrying about how to get her husband a Christmas present when they have no money. After mulling it over in her head, she decides to chop her long and beautiful locks off for money. She then buys a chain for her husband’s pocket watch.
“My purpose is to show that in every human heart there is an innate tendency towards a respectable life; that even those who have fallen to the lowest depths in the social scale would, if they could, get back to the higher life…”(Rollins 7-8 ). O`Henry came up with this philosophy when writing his many different, entertaining stories. “The Gift of the Magi” was initially published in 1906 in O`Henry`s second collection of stories. “The Gift of the Magi” is a perfect story to illustrate how people do anything for the ones they love. The main characters each sell their most valued possession in order to buy the other the perfect Christmas present. They each bought the other something to complement their prized possession. Ironically, they had both sold their prized possession to get the other a gift.However, they bought gifts that were now useless to one another. Themes have some aspect of life, general truth, or moral that is shown throughout the story by the author. The themes in this short story really stand out to the reader. The way in which the two main characters demonstrate their selflessness for each other helps to emphasize the three major themes: poverty, love, and sacrifice.
"The Gift of the Magi" is a heartwarming original short story by O. Henry. To different readers, different themes may be more palpable than the rest, and as the audience reads through this story, they begin to notice that there are many different topics that all tie together to form one narrative. The story is of a young woman, Della, that is determined to find and buy a Christmas gift for her loved one. The couple does not earn much, as the author clarifies in the genesis of the story, "One dollar and eighty-seven cents. That was all. And the sixty cents of it was in pennies. Pennies saved one and two at a time..." (261), yet she finds a way to get enough money to buy her husband a present through a few snips of conflict. Della ends up cutting her hair, oblivious to where her husband was and what he was doing and sells it for enough money to buy him a unique, hand-made watch chain for his watch that is held only by a leather strap. For the watch, the two held great pride in, just as her beautiful, brown waves of ankle-long hair as the author states, "Now, there were two possessions of the James Dillingham Youngs in which they both took a mighty pride. One was Jim's gold watch that had been his father's and his grandfather's. The other was Della's hair." (262). Knowing that he deserves more, she hopes and prays that when her husband comes home, he will not discontinue to love her without her gorgeous locks. Instead, the man returns to reveal her gift from him, and how he had
Situational irony is another element that is present throughout the short story. Della and her husband both buy each other gifts for Christmas at the end of the story. Ironically, Della and her husband bought each other gifts for what they gave up: Della bought her husband a wrist watch strap and Jim sold his watch to buy Della the combs she wanted for her hair. In the short story, Jim is seen grieving about the fact that she had cut her hair off, “I sold the watch to get the money to buy your combs. And now suppose you put the chops on,” (O. Henry 121). The ending is situational irony because the reader was expecting that Della would buy her