A Christmas Memory facts for kids
First edition in solo book form (1966)
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| Author | Truman Capote |
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| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Publisher | Random House |
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Publication date
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1956 |
| Pages | 45 |
| OCLC | 716694 |
| Followed by | "The Thanksgiving Visitor" |
"A Christmas Memory" is a short story by Truman Capote. Originally published in Mademoiselle magazine in December 1956, it was reprinted in The Selected Writings of Truman Capote in 1963. It was issued in a stand-alone hardcover edition by Random House in 1966, and it has been published in many editions and anthologies since.
The largely autobiographical story, which takes place in the 1930s, describes a period in the lives of the seven-year-old narrator and an elderly woman who is his distant cousin and best friend. The woman was Nanny Faulk, elder sister of the household where Capote’s wayward parents deposited him as a young boy. Nanny, whom everyone called Sook, was thought to be developmentally disabled. But Capote later wrote a friend, ‘’I had an elderly cousin, the woman in my story ‘A Christmas Memory,’ who was a genius.”
The evocative narrative focuses on country life, friendship, and the joy of giving during the Christmas season, and it also gently yet poignantly touches on loneliness and loss.
Now a holiday classic, "A Christmas Memory" has been broadcast, recorded, filmed, and staged multiple times, in award-winning productions.
Adaptations and recordings
Television
"A Christmas Memory" was adapted for television for ABC Stage 67 by Truman Capote and Eleanor Perry. The production starred Geraldine Page and Donnie Melvin, and Truman Capote was the narrator. Both the teleplay and the program's star, Geraldine Page, won Emmy Awards. The production also won a Peabody Award. This production is available on video under such titles as ABC Playhouse 67: A Christmas Memory or Truman Capote's "A Christmas Memory". This version starring Geraldine Page was also released in cinemas by Allied Artists in 1969 as part of Truman Capote's Trilogy.
The story was also adapted for Hallmark television in 1997. This production starred Eric Lloyd as Buddy and Patty Duke as Sook. Eric Lloyd was nominated for a Young Artist Award for Best Performance in a TV Movie/Pilot/Mini-Series – Young Actor Age Ten or Under. This version was criticized as being inferior to the previous film.
The story has also been adapted as part of Short Story Anthology, a 16-part series available from Children's Television International. "A Christmas Memory" comprises episodes 11 and 12 of the series.
Recordings
For the live-audience Selected Shorts series, broadcast nationally on NPR stations, actor John Shea recorded "A Christmas Memory" in the late 1990s. Shea's sensitive reading was anthologized and sold on cassette, and the anthology, Selected Shorts, Vol. XII, was the winner of AudioFile Magazine's Earphones Award in 1999.
A CD of the story read by Celeste Holm is included in Knopf/Random House's 50th Anniversary 2006 printing of the book.
Truman Capote's own reading of "A Christmas Memory" was recorded in 1959 and issued on LP. An abridged version of the 1959 LP was featured on the NPR radio program This American Life in 2003. Capote was also recorded in 1976 reading the story to a live audience at the University of North Dakota Writers Conference.
Theatre
In 1991, a musical stageplay adaptation by Malcolm Ruhl and Russell Vandenbroucke, Holiday Memories, was published, which combines both "A Christmas Memory" and "The Thanksgiving Visitor."
In 2010, Capote's "A Christmas Memory" was adapted into a full-length musical by Broadway veterans Larry Grossman (music) and Carol Hall (lyrics). Duane Poole, who had written the original teleplay starring Patty Duke, wrote the musical's book. A Christmas Memory received its world premiere at TheatreWorks in Palo Alto, California on December 4, 2010, starring Broadway veteran, Penny Fuller. The musical had its Off-Broadway premiere at the Irish Repertory Theatre in Manhattan, starring Tony Award-winner Alice Ripley as Sook. It ran November 25, 2014 – January 4, 2015 at the Irish Rep's temporary home, the DR2 Theater in Union Square.
Opera
In 1992, Capote's "A Christmas Memory" was adapted into a one-act opera by American composer Samuel Jones. The opera was first staged by Gaitley Mathews at the Deep Ellum Opera Theatre in Dallas in December, 1992, to critical acclaim. The composer fashioned the libretto from the story and the Eleanor Perry/Truman Capote television screenplay, with their personal approval. The composer also created an orchestral suite from the opera.
Sequels
Truman Capote further explored the lives of Buddy and Sook in his story "The Thanksgiving Visitor," which also was adapted for television. The 1967 television production of The Thanksgiving Visitor earned Geraldine Page a second Emmy Award. Capote's third short story about Buddy and Sook was "One Christmas", published in 1983, and televised in 1994.
See also
