The Gift of Magi by O. Henry

The Gift of Magi by O. Henry

Introduction

Considered from a non-traditional perspective, O. Henry's best-loved story, “Gifts of the Magi,” published in the 10 December 1905 issue of the New York Sunday World Magazine, is much more than a sentimental Christmas morality. Though it has often been taken as the latter and is tagged with one of his conspicuous, ironic twists of plot, it is actually one of the strangest and most haunting stories he ever wrote.

There is a succession of curious, provocative features, a layered pattern of fact and implication, relating to the story's ...