Dickens wrote all the stories presented here during the 1850s as contributions to the special Christmas issues of Household Words, the weekly magazine he founded and edited. Included are fictional sketches verging on the autobiographical, recollections of childhood, reflections on past holidays and old friends, as well as tales of misunderstandings and lost opportunities. Humorous, tragic, uplifting, richly human, they reaffirm the virtue of nurturing our traditions, and offer a master storyteller's vision of the real meaning of Christmas.