Dear Editor—
I am 8 years old. Some of my little friends say there is no Santa Claus. Papa says, “If you see it in The Sun, it’s so.” Please tell me the truth, is there a Santa Claus?
The opening lines of the most famous newspaper editorial ever published come from an actual letter sent by a real-life eight-year-old girl. She had first inquired of her father as to the reality of Santa Claus and Virginia’s father, Philip, advised her to forward this inquiry to the editors of the Sun, one of New York’s most popular newspapers at the time. Although Virginia and the letter are quite irrefutably the real deal, the peculiar reference by such a young girl to her “little friends” has led to speculation that perhaps Philip did more than advise Virginia; perhaps he is the actual author of the letter sent in her name. Even if true, this fact alone would hardly cast any aspersions upon the legitimacy of the whole affair since it would be perfectly reasonable assistance.
Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus. He exists as certainly as love and generosity and devotion exist, and you know that they abound and give to your life its highest beauty and joy. Alas! how dreary would be the world if there were no Santa Claus!
The title of the editorial derives from the answer given to Virginia’s query. While it seems unambiguous enough, in actuality the editorialist proceeds to hedge his bets quite clearly. Originating from the perspective that Virginia is the true enquiring mind at work here rather than her father, what the question posed to the newspaper is quite obviously asking is whether there is such a person as Santa Claus who treks around the world one night a year handing out gifts. That is not the answer she receives. Instead, Church provides a response that treats Santa Claus as a metaphor rather than a literal entity. Complicating things even more is that this metaphorical vision bound up into the person of Santa not coincidentally bears a more than passing resemblance to portrayals of Jesus Christ. Complicating the issue even more is the irony here: Church was already famous for his editorials before this one, but that fame sprung from the infamy of his cynical and skeptical positions toward spiritual faith and superstitious beliefs. This chasm of irony certainly would account for why the response fails to deliver the concrete yes or no answer Virginia was hoping for.
Nobody sees Santa Claus, but that is no sign that there is no Santa Claus. The most real things in the world are those that neither children nor men can see.
This is really the key point in the entire piece when judged with clarity. This editorial became the most reprinted ever and, indeed, even in the 21st century every year it can be expected to pop up in one newspaper or another come Christmas. This popularity is doubtlessly due to its seeming sincerity and the desire to not crush a little girl’s fantasies prematurely with an unnecessary dose of harsh reality. If read more closely, however—within the contextual history of Church’s well-documented cynicism—it seems impossible to interpret it as anything other than a slyly executed takedown of blind religious faith. How else to account for the logic quoted above? Really? Nothing is “more real” than things that nobody sees? He then goes on to suggest that the fact that nobody has ever seen fairies dancing on their lawn should not be taken as proof that fairies do not exist. That the corrosively ironic message sailed completely over the heads of readers at the time should not be surprising. That it fails to land in the post-modern era is absolutely beyond belief.
