Three Christmas Motifs Poetics and Deconstruction of a Part of Western Imaginary

The magic of Christmas lays the basis for an unreal experience close to hypotypose. Magic of a dreaming animism, this longing for the unreal shows in motives which bear witness to the existence of a ritualized imaginary world torn between two cultures: the sacred and the profane. Considering that the figure of Father Christmas is first and foremost part of a folkloric and fun image, it is not surprising that its tradition should gain momentum as the importance of the sacred wanes and the industrialization of cultural products makes it long-lasting. In that respect, the snow, miraculous on account of its metaphysical dimension and its merry plasticity, reenacts the power of a meditative, enchanted image. According to popular culture, love is meant to spread and thus acts as a structural power which would make a disenchanted world intelligible, the magic of Christmas finally comes from the development of human relations.