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A Kidnapped Santa Claus

L. Frank Baum

Book Overview: 

A Kidnapped Santa Claus is a Christmas-themed short story written by L. Frank Baum, it has been called "one of Baum's most beautiful stories" and constitutes an influential contribution to the mythology of Christmas.

The story opens with a quick overview of Santa's castle in the Laughing Valley. Its focus soon switches to the five Caves of the Daemons in nearby mountains. These creatures are pagan daemons rather than Christian demons, in that they are not servants of Satan or necessarily evil. Four of the five, the Daemons of Selfishness, Envy, Hatred, and Malice, certainly are bad, but the fifth, the Daemon of Repentance, is a more ambiguous figure.

The Daemons of the Caves resent Santa Claus because children under the influence of his gifts rarely visit their caves. They decide to frustrate his efforts and counter his influence. The Daemons first try to tempt Santa Claus to their own vices; they visit him one by one, and attempt to lure him into selfishness, envy, and hatred. Santa Claus merely laughs at their clumsy efforts. Failing at temptation, the Daemons instead kidnap Santa Claus; they lasso him as he is riding in his sleigh on Christmas Eve, and bind him in their caverns.

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Book Excerpt: 
. . .Christmas gifts to all the children that they become happy and generous, through his example, and keep away from my cave."

"I'm having the same trouble," rejoined the Daemon of Envy. "The little ones seem quite content with Santa Claus, and there are few, indeed, that I can coax to become envious."

"And that makes it bad for me!" declared the Daemon of Hatred. "For if no children pass through the Caves of Selfishness and Envy, none can get to MY cavern."

"Or to mine," added the Daemon of Malice.

"For my part," said the Daemon of Repentance, "it is easily seen that if children do not visit your caves they have no need to visit mine; so that I am quite as neglected as you are."

"And all because of this person they call Santa Claus!" exclaimed the Daemon of Envy. "He is simply ruining our business, and something must be done at once."

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Community Reviews

Excellent graphic adaptation of a little-known short story by L. Frank Baum. Alex Robinson expands on the story considerably, fleshing out some characters, adding others, and updating the whole thing in a way that brings it into the 21st century while still remaining true to the spirit and joy of th

The publisher HarperCollins has created a new imprint called It Books to capture the popular culture audience, so it is no surprise they would release three graphic novel representations of three Christmas stories

While their publicity claims these are Christmas classics, few will be familiar with L

It was a cute story, but my least favorite out of his other books that I've read. I think that the Daemons should have been mentioned in the first book for there to be a smooth transition into a sequel, and in the first book Claus a greed to always have the reindeer returned before morning on Christ

I mean... It's alright.
I picked it up because I wanted to get a little holiday spirit and I saw that it was by the author of The Wizard Of Oz. But if you're expecting something like A nightmare before Christmas like i did, maybe just put on the movie because this is like fourth grade reading level l

A lot of potential but it was too short

Fun, and strongly prefer this to the suggested Little Match Girl.

Who the hell came up with that shit? Why are so many Christmas stories about a little girl dying in the streets, or a little boy buying shoes so his mom can die?

I'm going to write the ultimate Christmas story. Sack of puppies in the cr

I will be adding "stuff and rubbish" to my daily vocabulary.

A lost classic from Oz creator L. Frank Baum.

A trio of demons are not happy with Santa. By giving kiddies gifts every year, there's less and less reasons for the little tykes to follow the ways of anger, selfishness and envy. So, the demons decide to ruin Christmas in hopes of keeping Jolly Ol' St.

A cute, quick read. The story teaches a lesson with strong characters leading the way.

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