A Christmas Memory

Winter, 1956“It’s always the same: a morning arrives in November, and my friend, as though officially inaugurating the Christmas time of year that exhilarates her imagination and fuels the blaze of her heart, announces: “It’s fruitcake weather! Fetch our buggy. Help me find my hat.”The person to whom she is speaking is myself. I am seven; she is sixty-something. We are cousins, very distant ones, and we have lived together—well, as long as I can remember.”And so, another shoestring adventure begins for Buddy, our narrator, his cousin Sook Falk, and Queenie, their little rat terrier, as off they scoot to gather windfall pecans - the first ingredient for dozens of fruitcakes that will be sent far and wide. But creating such a prize-winning confection requires many elements, whiskey being the most expensive and difficult to procure. Our band of bakers has saved every penny all year, and despite alcohol being considered sinful, they know just where to secure a bottle. After all, it isn’t fruitcake without a nip of the good stuff.“If you please, Mr. Haha, we’d like a quart of your finest whiskey.” His eyes tilt more. Would you believe it? Haha is smiling! Laughing, too. “Which one of you is a drinkin’ man?”“It’s for making fruitcakes, Mr. Haha. Cooking.”This sobers him. He frowns. “That’s no way to waste good whiskey.”Capote writes with the pen of a poet, and this touching short tale is a timely reminder that our fondest Christmas moments aren’t dependent on flashy falderal or glitzy goodies, but come from time spent with those we love who love us in return.

Short but lovely story.

Indiscutablement, Truman, le plus grand auteur contemporain Américain, mérite toutes les étoiles du ciel. A Christmas Memory, un livre si touchant, d'un style impeccable, nous promène à travers le temps à la rencontre de deux personnages unis par le destin, une certaine Sook, âgée, sa cousine, et lui, Truman, l'enfant abandonné par ses parents. Deux paumés à la recherche du bonheur. Un livre qu'on ne peut pas laisser tomber des mains, jusqu'à la dernière page. Une histoire hors du commun, qui nous donne envie de la lire et de la relire, sans fin. Le livre de Truman Capote, Œuvres, édition Gallimard, est et sera mon livre de chevet préféré.M. Petre

A magical story, simply told as all the best stories are. A must read for those who spent sunny childhood afternoons lying in the grass looking at the sky as opposed to playing on their Xbox indoors

Ondo jaso dut produktua, baina oso orrialde gutxi ditu eta erraz inprimatu lezake norberak etxean.Hurrengoan beraz, galdetegia ere euskaraz?AdeitasunezBittor