Hi, welcome to all the podcast minutes, where we put highbrow literature in conversation with lowbrow Christmas media. I'm Katherine. I'm Juliet. And today our Christmas media is the new Christmas classic. Carly Rae Jepsen says it's not Christmas till somebody cries. And our complimentary highbrow literature is, ooh,
Carly Rae Jepsen with a sword storming the barricade?
Yes. In other words, Les Miserables
Oh, the novel by Victor Hugo, I go Hugo.
Hey, so I thought we were doing the musical not the novel.
Oh, tell me a little bit about the musical.
Did you read the novel Juliet?
I read the novel! (laughing)
you read the 1500 page novel. And all I did was rock out to some songs that I've been listening to since I was 13. I'm sorry, Juliet, this is a an egregious mistake. Totally on me.
I really think the the musical though is going to be more accessible to the audience more than likely, in part because people have listened to the Les Mis musical in some form or another. And in part because people can listen to the latest musical easier than they can read the book.
It would certainly take less time.
And less like all consuming devotion and intensive focus to do so.
I will take your word for it. Because again, I did not read the small I but I do like the idea of taking a mega musical from the 1980s and treating it as high literature because people often think of musical theater as low growl, but I think there's a lot to be mined in terms of analysis and interesting discussion. So let's
and for what it's worth. I mean, I read an adaptation of Les Mills to write like, I read it in English. That's nice. It's not the language it was originally written in the there's a creation and destruction in the act of translation, whether that's to music or to English letters.
I wonder how many languages Carly Rae Jepsen has been translated into.
She's Canadian, so I think French and English is an adequate place to start. Enough. Did you know that leave is the musical was originally in French? Yes.
I didn't know that. I was once a 13 year old musical theater nerd. So I knew a lot of fun facts about Les Moonves.
I learned this today, in part because I think it's fascinating to think of I Dreamed a Dream in time gone by as an English back formation to fit them neither of us are they? They do no TV. Oh, what
does that translate to?
I had a dream of another life. Oh, interesting. Like literally like I was having a dream of an and other life. That's so sad. Who am I is como fer. There's a castle on a cloud is mom Prince I owe shame on the Shah, which is because that's something about that her prince is going to come for her
since we're doing the translations conversation now. I have been listening to lasers in Spanish. The recording, which my Spanish is not great, but I Dreamed a Dream is Sony on a Vita which I believe is I dreamed a life. Or I slept a life
I don't know. I dreamed a life most likely so far. And they always say merrily merrily, merrily, merrily. Life
is but a dream hmm
alternatively, To sleep perchance to dream
that they do all kind of really say that yes.
I can't wait until the year that we can do family. You know, when I took theater history, life is a dream was the first play that we the Spanish play from the 1800s. Yeah, for sure play that we actually started
oh my gosh, I taught that when I was a TA for theater history, and I cannot remember anything about it that would be useful for this podcast.
King and some stuff around a king. That's like, yeah,
I remember liking it. I think. Anyway, we
can remember plenty about the musical Les Miserables.
Alright, so lame is Rob is an epic musical based on the sprawling French novel, which spans many decades, many characters. Our main guy is John paljon, who was imprisoned for stealing a loaf of bread, and then runs away. And thanks to Santa Claus is able to start a new life as a mayor. Am I getting this right? So far?
Okay, okay, keep going. Okay,
so his adopted daughter because that falls in love with this really boring, rich boy named Marius whose friends are all poor students who get involved in a French Revolution. Not the French Revolution, but a failed June rebellion of 1832. Which I had to look up on Wikipedia. Much of Act Two is about this uprising and boiler it's sad.
Spoiler, it's in the title, like name
is Rob until someone cries.
That's a that's a great point. Are you familiar with the complete works of Shakespeare bridged a bridge?
Wait, what are you talking about? Possibly?
It's a semi famous play.
Yeah, I'm
one of the things in trying to study the musical game a little bit the book, but especially the musical made me think, because lame is typically is done in two acts. Right? Yeah. And you have the first act, covering literally decades and decades of time. Yeah. And the second act basically takes place in one day. Yeah. laughs Yeah. Incomplete works of Shakespeare bridge, like spoilers for a funny thing. They cover almost all of Shakespeare's plays in the first act. And then the second act is just Hamlet lets
you play. So you, like, described Julia in one show, I would be like AppleID is all of Shakespeare Act Two is just Hamlet.
It's a fascinating thing. I think it fits the modern style, to to cover quite a lot, and then wreck the focus in to the most dramatic, inconclusive action part. Yeah.
And I really love how act one ends with one day more. And it's like we're spending these decades building up to what's going to be just a short amount of time, kind of like how Christmas, I don't know, I feel like there's something to be said about all the anticipation, like an entire three months
here, really, really a year.
And then it's over, you know, in a day.
I think if we take Christmas as a liturgical season, you have from January 7, all the way to mid to late December, in which we start getting into Advent. Yeah. And then we have Christmas. And then we have the Christmas season up until epiphany. And so we have this like this long, wait. And then we have the day of celebration of Christmas itself. And so we have this year of time being compressed. And then we have this day. Citing another cool thing from the the story. There's a character that I really love in an interaction that I really love, which is the bishop who shows up very early on, who you describe as being very Santa Claus, like he has a incredible conversation if I could, like, separate out just one chapter of the 365 chapters that makes up this book. Of the five volumes and many books and then many chapters of those books. It would be this incredible section With Mosuo, beyond renew the, the kindly Santa Claus esque Bishop going and giving the last rights to a, quote, former member of the convention, ie, a former revolutionary who is old, who was old when he was a revolutionary who is now dying. And they have this beautiful, wild conversation between the kindest man in the world who is still a bishop, and a man who is kind of right about most things, except for his assumptions about the bishop, but who is dying, and who is despised and who is a former revolutionary and he talks about that all of this history has been forming that this this storm has been building for all of these years. Oh, wait, watch this. We've got a recording from the text by Max Nuland.
The member of the convention continued, alas, the work is incomplete. I admit, we demolish the ancient regime in deeds. We were not able to suppress it entirely and ideas to destroy abuses is not sufficient. Customs must be modified. The mill is there no longer the wind is still there. You have demolished it may be of use to demolish but I distrust a demolition complicated with wrath. Right has its wrath bishop and the wrath of riot is an element of progress. In any case, and in spite of whatever may be said, the French Revolution is the most important step of the human race since the advent of Christ. In completed may be, but sublime, it set free all the unknown social quantities, it softened spirits it calmed, appeased, enlightened, it caused the waves of civilization to flow over the earth. It was a good thing. The French Revolution is the consecration of humanity. The bishop could not refrain from murmuring Yes, 93. The member of the convention straightened himself up in his chair with an almost Lagoo Breus solemnity, and exclaimed so far as a dying man is capable of exclamation. Ah, there you go. 93, I was expecting that word, a cloud had been forming for the space of 1500 years, at the end of 1500 years, it burst, you are putting the Thunderbolt on its trial.
And that those who, you know, have a problem with the methods in the specifics of the French Revolution, are putting, quote, The Thunderbolt on trial, that this storm has been building for all this time that like the terrible atrocities of the monarchy and the aristocracy and the kind of system of of you know, peasantry and fealty, and then oppression on the young by by the bourgeois and in all of these different things, the all of these injustices have been building up for all this time, and that they break out in this moment of violence. Don't blame the Mon of violence, blame the time building up before it, which I think you know, that very early chapter before we even meet John Val zone is like a really interesting then reflection of how we think about the later rebellion and how we think about Christmas.
Very cool. There's so many ways to approach levers that we could talk about how I launched producer Cameron Mackintosh his reign of high budget mega musicals. We could talk about it as a pop opera with recurring musical motifs. There have been many interesting adaptations of Llinas, including a movie by Tom Hooper and a production by Liesl Tommy and Dallas, which was set in modern day America, which is pretty cool. There's a lot of like, directions we could go and my 13 year old self is freaking out, but because this is a Christmas cast, miss. Let's turn to our Christmas media and see if that can help hold it our conversation with a useful lens.
So I think one theme we could potentially pull from the Carly Rae Jepsen song, and it's certainly reflected in Les Mis is a kind of benevolence in misery. That's an idea, the idea that even if your circumstances are wretched, I even if they are negative, if there are stressful or painful or hurtful, that there's still an opportunity to To show kindness towards your, your fellow man, as they would say, and I'm curious how you might see that reflected in lame is. Yeah,
so benevolence in misery that's, I really liked that as a idea linking these two because John valladon is I mean miserable, the very first thing we find out about him is that he had to steal bread. He's somebody who's really struggling, and
it's so hard to say,
I stole a loaf of bread. No, as you said, and over the course of the musical, we just see him over and over again, exhibiting kindness going out of his way to do the right thing, even when he might not be rewarded for that even if it puts him into greater risk or greater danger, or greater potential for misery he still consistently practices benevolence
towards others. Yeah, thinking about both jungle John's, you know, kindness towards hunting like in her misery, he finds an opportunity for for benevolence. We think about a lot of things that evolution does to save Morris's life, that there is in this state of definitive failure available to this rebellion, he finds benevolence, that, that there is this attitude to kind of project into the world, which in many ways he learned from the bishop from I, as I say, most of you will be on the new this bishop who has this fun little couplets of lines in the musical, and is the main character for the first full book of Amos around. And who I of course, am absolutely fascinated by because he is, as you say, kind of a Santa Claus figure, which I think ties into the theme as well, because what is Santa Claus, right? Benevolent in misery, it's bestowing gifts upon those who who don't have them. That's the idea of Santa Claus that, that there is an opportunity in the coldest and hardest and darkest part of the year, to have kindness shown to you to have an opportunity for that, like, that's what this figure represents. And the fact that he is literally a bishop of you know, Christ, that there's these kind of connections to this Christ mess as as an idea, but his generosity and his benevolence to the miserable valladon. And also the fact that the bishop
is like,
so not real to reality. He is so kind and good he he's the drill candles meme, but the candles part of his budget is taking care of the poor. He, he goes in, he gets like a carriage dispensation, which is the thing that bishops are allowed to get. So like, he will get paid money for his carriage. And then he doesn't spend it on a carriage. He spends that money on widows, and he says somebody like to help people and he just walks everywhere. Instead, he doesn't have multiple, like outfits of this stuff. He just has one big coat and stuff and he walks around and he he's just like, what if goodness, existed in a way that it doesn't in reality that like there aren't. I hate to say there aren't people who are benevolent in places of power in this way.
is a lie. It's a lie.
It's a question that gets brought up in it's not Christmas till somebody cries in the bridge. My nieces and my nephews jump in on my head to keep on asking questions like a Santa ally. Well, it's not Christmas to somebody Christ. It's Belgian Santa. Cool. Bear with me.
I'm thinking about that song in my life and the musical where because that is coming of age, she's growing up and she's singing to those on who has adopted her as a child but never told her the truth about his past life. And why he's always on the run and their lives are kind of chaotic. So she has a line and the song in my life. I'm no longer a child and I yearn for the truth that you know, so dark, so dark and deep. The secrets that you keep Beep she's basically asking like our arguable lie, dad like what? What's the deal? And if she knew the truth about his past? Well, John is afraid that she's going to see him differently. Maybe like no longer see him as a Santa Claus figure or as this? I don't know, idealized father figure. Oh, actually, I haven't asked him one more time is Santa ally?
So not if one man is all men, then we're all Santa Claus.
Amazing, thank you.
But really, I think our classic Boghossian saying one man is all men is interestingly reflected in John valladon. Who is one, he's a bunch of different men. He's Musil, Madeleine Masiello Libya. He is like, so many different names, and so many different men in so many different like presentations of himself. You can look at, you know, okay, there's the man before the prisoner, and then there's the prisoner. And then there's like, the, the convict who's kind of not a particularly good person, but that's because he's surrounded by like, people being truly just the worst possible to him and everything. And then there's like, the reform stuff. And then there's him with coset. Like, you can look at that. But like, just in the musical alone, like just during that time period, that the musical covers just in the presentation, he's still presenting different selves in all of these different ways. He's like, going by a lot of different names. He's going through these different things that he's still find opportunities for. I mean, one of the things he is is quote, The Philanthropist during the whole yield section with Marissa seven cannoli in all of this this stuff. He is a giver of love to humanity, except it's complicated because he also sets himself at such a specific remove from like, the Direct Love of other people. Which I think makes him a lot like Santa Claus.
Can I counterpoint your Valentine is all men because he wears all these different hats and goes by different names? Sure, because
the part that y'all put on a Santa or okay, maybe well, no, God guys.
So in the musical at least one of the most defining moments of his character comes about halfway through act one ball. Exactly. He sings a song Who am I which rests on the fact that there is only $1, John, lunch, John Bell, Sean, and this man, one man who is on hold up. There's a man who has been caught who's up there thinks it's Sean bells on. No, because why this word and says, if he's weighing it out in his head, because he knows the extreme danger of he puts himself out there, he's going to lose everything he's won, including being a mayor in a position of power where he is arguably as benevolent as one can be in that position. And he weighs the lives of all the people he mayor's over and divvy that up in exchange for this man who is not John Donjon but maybe he does that because he knows that this one man is all men.
Mm hmm I'm fiercely I think it's worth saying for the listener home that the idea that one man is all men is something of a canard. But
does that word mean an inside joke between Julia and Catherine?
No, it's a thing that you put up that you know isn't real. Okay. So didn't Juliet and Catherine a certain extent possibly. I have an inside joke that we share with the with with the reader at home. I hope so. It is interesting that that that other man this is holdings it was shot Matthew, who people think is John Bell, John, in part because he looks like him and had a similar job to Chavo Shawn, which was pruning trees. That was apparently John's job before he was convicts. And people think that there's evidence that this man is alone because John Paul Jones mother's name was Matthew. So John Matthew could become schomp Matthew as one word, and that's this guy's name and everything. And there's this whole sequence of things where everyone thinks he's guilty of hiding the fact that he's Shan Shan, and therefore, he's guilty of stealing this branch of apples, that was a loaf of bread yet, because we think you're guilty of this one thing, therefore, we're confident you're guilty of a second. It's fascinating. And they accused him of some stuff that it's like, so how does anybody know that John Doe? John does this that like I really think that a lot of the things happening in the trial is like, just inside versions head? Oh, it's such a. The book is long. There's a lot of things that aren't that interesting. And there's a lot of things that are like, wait a minute, that's really interesting. Anyways, I think this question about jumbo Shawn, and Santa, as you say, you know, kind of going back to cars, that right? Well,
the thing about cars that she's, in some ways, the face of Les Miserables, at least in the marketing, because if you see the musical logo, it's this like, sad girl in front of the French flag, which is always really interested me because the sad girl only gets one song. She's on stage, very briefly. And she becomes an icon representing the whole musical. And it's like, well, what does she really singing about? She's thinking about the North Pole. Okay. Castle on a cloud.
helped me out here.
So the song is there as a castle on a cloud. I like to go there in my sleep.
Okay, it's a castle on Cloud, north. Oh, they've known me for so sweet. Because it's all covered in snow.
I don't know if that's how it goes. But the point is that the castle on a cloud is not a real place. It's a fantasy that she tells herself for comfort. And maybe she really does believe in it. Just like kids really do believe in Santa. But it becomes a place where she can imagine a better world in the form of a castle in the clouds where a woman who's probably a stand in for her mother sings her a lullaby and she finds great comfort in singing the song.
I mean, she's being abused by the sun or the A's, right? Like, this is part of what inspires her to sing this. And this is why she needs a little song. She sings to survive. Yes, it's not castles. Fill somebody clouds. Oh, that sounds right.
Yeah, well, I
guess me sauna clouds. I like to see me to survive.
So I think just putting these two songs next to each other really emphasizes when you talked about the benevolence in misery, its benevolence as a coping mechanism. Possibly. It's not necessarily like, cheesy Oh, there's still good people, even though they're sad. But it actually is a tool. It's a strategy to be able to cope, to kind of accept that, okay, it's not Christmas. So somebody cries. The Crying is part of our song, we can accept that we can sing about it, we can still hope for something that are the castle on the cloud. But we also are kind of grounded in this embracing of the messiness of the holiday or of our lives. So
fell, Shawn is Santa does learning the truth about him make her cry?
Um, we'll see. She doesn't find out the truth until her wedding day, which is the day she dies. So she probably does cry. Because it's sleeping. Everybody cries a lot. But she's crying not because she's miserable. But I think it's also crying by the realization of how much Val John loved her that he was telling this lie, because you wanted to protect her and he wanted her to have a more sheltered life, she made all these sacrifices for her. And he wanted her to believe that the world could be something other than you know, we're on the Rhine because I steal a loaf of bread. And now this cop is out to get to get us which
half the time it's tonight a and his men who are about to get him around to get it. It's very funny to me that he keeps being like, the most fish out there in his bed. We must get out of here. If we can shut this door on this this life and live another day and everything. It's like, No, you either doesn't know you're going to shove it out as you really it's no, that's some dramatic irony, right?
Is that? I think that's part of the book. I'm not quite sure, or what you're talking about.
It's, it's it's touch. It's glanced on in the musical. But I think the dramatic irony part of it might be in the book, if that makes sense. But speaking of, you know, kind of constructing this world for a child and dramatic irony. Isn't Santa Claus a lie parents tell to their children out of love. They want their children to have a magical experience they want them to believe and get excited about the impossible.
Can I share a really sweet anecdote,
if I can share really sad when afterwards? Great. So my Christmas still somebody cries, right?
So my boss from my summer job who I adore, as a kid who really believes in Santa I don't think he does anymore. He's in high school now. But he really did like through middle school. And there was a year where I think it was a pandemic year, things were just really tough because global pandemic, child you want to protect from disease, all of that. Parents, overworked, tired, still want to make Christmas magical. They did something cutesy with like reindeer footprints and like dropped carrots or something? Oh, I don't know, there's some really cute setup they did to make it look like Santa had been there on
stage manifestations. But not quite. The theater, which is raising a child. Sure, put it out.
So they went through a lot of effort to make it look like Santa had been there. And this child who was starting to kind of age out of the age where you'd like kids usually start doubting Santa probably like maybe fifth grade, I think he was in seventh grade. And he said, I know Santa is real. Because my parents do not have the energy to come up with this. They're so tired. They're so overworked. Like he has to be real. There's no way my parents could pull this off.
What a fantastic, like, proof of the existence of God.
Do you know what I mean?
Like in the classical sense,
Can you unpack that? Sure.
I mean, well, okay, Natalie visit a bunch, but only one of the Barricade boys has this whole bit about the mouse plus the cat is the revised uncorrected proof of creation. Okay, there's these classical ideas of you set up a hypothesis and a conclusion. And invariably, however you get there, the conclusion is that God exists. It's like a logical formal proof. And so board has has this classic one where you see a bunch of birds. Oh, wait, here's Max Nuland to read it for us.
The Argumentum or mythological? By Jorge Luis Borges. I close my eyes and see a flock of birds. The Vision lasts a second or perhaps less. I don't know how many birds I saw. Were they a definite or indefinite number? This problem involves the question of the existence of God. If God exists, the number is definite. Because how many birds I saw is known to God. If God does not exist, the number is indefinite. Because nobody was able to take count. In this case, I saw fewer than 10 Birds let's say and more than one, but I did not see 9876543 or two birds. I saw a number Per between one and 10, but not 98765, etc. That number as a whole number is inconceivable, ergo, God exists.
But that number must exist, and therefore that number must be known by someone and therefore, therefore that number must be known by God since it is not known by any of us, Therefore, God exists. In Victor Hugo's Les move, there's this bit that's like, listen, the existence of the cat and the mouse together, prove that God exists in here's Max Newland to read it for us.
Dawn awakens minds as it does all the birds all began to talk. Jolie perceiving a cat prowling on the gutter, extracted philosophy from it. What is the cat, he claimed, it is a corrective. The good God having made the mouse said hello, I have committed a blunder. And so he made the cat, the cat is the erotism of the mouse, the mouse plus the cat is the revised and corrected proof of creation
because it will just just the mouse, mice would go crazy and destroy everything. The fact that the cat is there to hunt the mice, and like Keep the mouse population in check. And that the mouse exists there to feed the cat means that God is there. And God is actively like, involved in correcting and affecting the world. And like making changes upon the active world, which is a thing that comes up again, with what revolution is that that God revolution is God putting his thumb on the scale to correct the world when it's gotten too bad, which is also kind of the idea of Christmas that Christmas is like literally God putting his thumb on the scale of the world and saying it has gotten too bad. Let me give a gift. Right, let me
back up, because he will just lead to a whole other thing. And I was gonna pick your thoughts there.
A similar way that this this lovely kid, this, this teenager now is like, my parents are too tired to do this thing. And yet this thing happened. Therefore, magic must be real to like, see, the clock must be real. In the same way the characters in lame is and in history, see something happen and go. Therefore God exists. Because l is just like us pattern of logic that you use to ascribe to
things. Technically, the musicals approach to God is very close to the end. To love another person is to see the face of God. And what I love about this story with this kid is that Len, maybe she does no there's no Santa, and he's just humoring his parents. Because they know it gives them joy, too. Give this to him. But if he does it if he really does believe in Santa when he reaches the point that he realizes there's no Santa, he will look back at this and realize, Oh, my parents just loved me that much. That's what the God was. That's what Santa was. It was how much my parents were willing to sacrifice to give me a good Christmas.
So that that was the sweet anecdote and now I'll share the sad one economical fact about Juliet's is I never got the chance to believe in Santa we we just didn't have Santa we had like, Santa is like, I went to kindergarten was like why is everyone talking about Santa and everything? It's like oh, Santa Claus is a like, liberal secular myth to like dilute the truth of Christmas being just about you know, the Christ child in everything. I was like, oh, CSI, that thing from Coca Cola cans, like, like that was the the sum in total in like, limit constraining function on the possible potential magic of Santa. And,
you know,
we look at the Dow Jones building this like, cathedral of mistruths of not quite sharing the truth as an act of loving cause that we look at this team's parents kind of constructing this Farago as an act of love for the team to like keep the magic in their lives. And it's like what do you call it when parents have no interest in magic existing their child's life?
Okay to play devil's advocate, I mean, there could be something said for parents wanting their kids to know the truth. Yum. I don't know not that that's really what's going on in your case. But I do know somebody.
Christmas still somebody cries right.
Now I know a parent who their kids straight up asked is our Santa. And the mom was like, Do you really want to know? And the kid said, yes. So the parents said, there isn't. But your younger sister doesn't know that. Can you help us? Like, can you pretend even though like, I'll tell you the truth, but can you pretend for the sake of the people who want to see you get excited about Santa basically? So I mean, there is potentially something respectable about if a child really wants to know the truth like because that does to tell tell her I mean, I think because that especially is at an age where she can handle the truth. And arguably, there is something unfortunate, almost miserable about the fact that her father like feels the need to continue to coddle her just to play the other side of this.
But if millstone showed up to close it, yeah, it was like, I'm your new father. There are no castles, there are no clouds. You ever give you the opportunity to dream? Really.
And it's accurate. So somebody cries, the kids ask a Santa a lie. We don't technically find out if she tells them or not. But we can deduce from her repeating it's not Christmas or somebody cries. She has made the children cry by saying there's no Santa.
I have a slightly different interpretation. Yeah, if that makes sense. Yeah. Which is also a different interpretation of this song, as a whole rain i which is going to be slightly difficult. So I'm going to do my best to get this thesis out there. And it also has to do with laborers, which comes back to the idea of revolution, right? Revolution, both meaning like dispersed but also this thing that's coming back around. Okay, Christmas, like a revolution keeps coming back around. Suffering is part of the cycle. We have Christmas in response to suffering, just as we have revolutions in response to suffering. We do not suffer because it is Christmas. We have Christmas to bear the suffering. So my
question is, does Carly Rae Jepsen tell the kids that Santa is a lie, or now?
I think the children who are asking the question
already know, oh,
that's the answer. They they are doing the thing of imparting stress on to an an aunt or an uncle by putting them in a difficult situation when the child has power over the adult because that's the thing that happens at family gatherings and things like that. And so Carly Rae Jepsen has to deal with the like slight stress of like, do I continue this facade? And this child is just mocking me? How do I am I the one to break it to this child? That can't be like, Why am I stuck in this situation? Well, to a certain extent, is a thing that happens when people come together that shouldn't stop us from coming together. We have Christmas as an opportunity to come together. And as an opportunity to win their stress from coming together at Christmas when fighting and tears break out. When we come together at Christmas. We at least came together for a reason. And there's something that we can agree on at the core and there's something that we can go away. We performed the act of Christmas together it in the act of Christmas together in the act of coming together in the coldest darkest time of the year, that we're able to bear the suffering of the rest of the year and bear the suffering of coming together because coming together is still worth it. Beyond that the magic of you know the culture of encounter is still worth it, so that we can bear the suffering of the rest of the year. Because if we just were on our own, that would be worse than going to Christmas and crying while there. That, to me is the thesis of it's not Christmas to somebody cry. It's not Christmas that causes the crying. Christmas exists, you know, cathartically as part of the cycle of crying,
which is super interesting in the context of failed revolutions, which is the heart of act to blame is everybody's miserable, because they're all dying in this revolution. And I think it's easier, it's easy to walk away from this shell and think this is such a downer. It's saying, don't even bother trying, like, there's no point. Everything is just suffering. But I think the reason the show is so popular is that it's really not saying that it, it's showing all this suffering, but there is a hope in it. There is a cycle to it, if you will,
which I think is think about ending with do you hear the people sing? Right? Yeah, yeah, I
was gonna say like, it's encapsulated in the finale song, which the show ends with John Bel John on his deathbed, and he dies. Boohoo, it's quite sad. Because we spent the whole show watching his life. And when he goes, presumably to heaven, or whatever, after life, that is the the culminating thing of everything he's experienced, he dies. This the stages filled with people singing. Do you hear the people saying, which has the line? Is there a world you want to see? And it's like, yeah, there totally is a world we want to see. We want to see the world where they want the revolution. We want this things to be better than they are. And the
show right every single time just for the record, every single time. The finale, do you hear the people saying, really joining our crusade? Who will be strong and stand with me somewhere beyond the barricade? Is there a role the long to see? Yes, do you hear the Distant Drums is the future that they bring when tomorrow comes?
It's so heartbreaking, because tomorrow doesn't come. And yet. It does. It comes every year. It's Christmas, it's not Christmas. But it comes in the sense of its people coming together to dream of this better world. And it might be a lie that we're telling ourselves. But that's all we can do. Like that is the thing that makes it worthwhile. And that is well John's heading, the heading is a he dies, and he goes off to the castle on the cloud. The Heaven is who dies. And he's with all these people who have given up their lives for this ideal in that this idea of not just accepting the hardship, not just saying these conditions are the best we can hope for but for dreaming that there is more and constantly striving towards this better future and knowing that things aren't going to be perfect, and that maybe this better future isn't going to come. But you can still find pockets of perfection in the journey of getting to
that better world. I think tying this together as well makes a lot of sense with to love another person is to see the face of God. Yeah, we're in both individual acts of kindness. But also like, why are the people rebelling? It's not just because French people will happen to be rebellious and like, like, revolutions. It's like, even if our revolution might fail, does that mean it's not worth doing? The answer is no. Why is our revolution with doing our revolution is is worth doing, because of our love for our fellow man, our love for the people who are oppressed. And that love drives us even to create a whole you know, fictional persona that love drives us to know we are being scammed in still give money away that love drives us to forgive the person who's been persecuting you and hurting you. That love drives us to set up a barricade and die on it for the potential possibility in the idea that you can't just say, I don't see you. You can't just say that doesn't affect me. Like you can't you can't do that. You have to fight for that. Even if it entails crying. More time. It's
something at There's a lot of examples of this in our world, but it's something that I see in climate change activists and people who no climate lies, the future is bleak. But to see another person is to love another person is to see the face of God to still want to save humanity, even in the face of things are going to get worse. How can we still come together sing the song to survive, find ways of resisting and tread forward,
even in these dismal circumstances? The secret is to sing a little song to survive, and
to celebrate Christmas with your loved ones and find those moments of eggnog and cheer. Not accepting your conditions constantly trying to move towards a better future, knowing that things won't be perfect and finding the perfection in the imperfections to accept that it really isn't Christmas until somebody cries Exactly. Oh
ho. Thanks for listening to iob pod for cast miss, brought to you by the moonshot, network de
moonshot.
I'm Juliet, you can find me online at co host.org/foley And they show at Christmas on CO
hosts. And I'm Katherine, you don't need to find me.
The art for Alby podcast miss is by Ryan Jensen. In the voiceover for this episode is by Max Newland, for episode coming out on the 23rd we'll be going over lame is Rob It's not Christmas still somebody cries, and the bar has short story, the form of the sword. And if you haven't read that short story next week in this feed, you'll hear the dulcet tones of Max Newland reading you Jorge Luis bar has his short story, the form of the sword. This month you can also catch me guesting over at unnatural selections. Another podcast on the moonshot Podcast Network, talking about Charles Dickens is the Christmas Carol and the Muppet Christmas Carol, a very fascinating adaptation that I imagine if you're listening to this might have a special place in your heart as well. Until next time, happy customers to haul it to all a pod tonight. We'll talk about Gavroche next time.
Lights Camera adaptations ever watched your favorite book become a movie and said Oh, well that certainly was a weird decision. Oh, of course you have. Hollywood is constantly making changes for their adaptations. And this podcast aims to answer the question of why Join host Emma shin and a different guest every month on unnatural selection, a new moonshot network podcast as they talk about a film its source material and what makes an adaptation good, faithful and less commonly good and faithful.
