The short novel “The Gift of the Magi” was written by O. Henry. It was mainly about a woman named Della Dillingham Young, who was frustrated about her poverty. It was Christmas Eve, and Della wanted to prepare her husband James a present, but she found that she had only got $1.87 to buy her husband a Christmas present. The Dillingham Youngs family had two things that they treasured. The first thing was Della’s knee-length brown hair that depreciated Queen Sheba’s jewelry. The other thing was James’ gold watch that had been his father's and his grandfather's, which made King Solomon jealous. Della went to a shop of a wig maker, Madame Sofronie, to sell her long hair and get $20. She bought a platinum fob chain that matched with James’ gold watch. When James came back home, Della gave him the gift, but James told her that he sold his watch to buy her a set of combs. From my own perspective, I don’t think it is worthy of doing so because of the following points.
First of all, either Della or James lost the thing that was precious and important to them. The sacrifice is not worthy because what they lost and what they had was disproportionate. In the story, Della sold her long hair that she was once proud of to buy a chain for James. James sold his gold watch to buy a set of combs for Della. Both of them sacrificed the things that they cared and treasured for each other, but is it really worthy? The answer is obvious, those things lost their value the moment they were sold out. Because of the original value of those items, the meaningfulness and importance that they brought to Della and James. They are the only things that the family can be proud of, but now they are gone, and the presents they bought using the money of those valuable things cannot be used anymore, is that really worthy?
Furthermore, Della and James’ gifts for each other became useless after they gave up the things that each other thought they would keep. The gifts that were intended to be useful turned out to be wasted, isn’t that not worthy? In the story, Della cut off her long hair to buy a platinum fob chain that matched James' gold watch. Unfortunately, James sold his gold watch to buy Della a set of combs. Della couldn’t ever use it until her hair grew longer, and James has got no watch to match with the chain, their gifts cannot be used. Both gifts were exchanged for their most precious possessions, and it was clearly not worth wasting them. Also, the essence of giving each other the gift was to show how much they care and love each other, but the truth is that they can still love each other without giving out useless gifts, and it is definitely not worthy.
Last but not least, considering Della and James’ current beggared situation, it is not a wise decision to sell the most worthy things just to buy each other a gift. They have to be clear that they were suffering from poverty, why can’t they use those precious things to create values instead of being formalistic? In this story, the author mentioned that their family was poor. Della only got an extra $1.87 before she sold her hair. And James, he was a very thin boy with only the age of twenty two but had to support the family by himself. This proves how poor their family was. The most important things of them was Della’s long hair and James’ watch, which can be beneficial for their family and can improve their situation. But as a result of those two things exchanged into two wasteful presents, their life in the future will become more miserable, because they lost the only valuable things for so-called love and ritual. Gifts are a form of celebration, but they can still celebrate Christmas without any tangible gifts.
In conclusion, I disagree with Della and James’s behavior in this short novel, I don’t think it is worth doing so. First of all, either Della or James lost the thing that was precious and important to them. The sacrifice is not worthy because what they lost and what they had was disproportionate. They are the only things that the family can be proud of, but now they are gone, and the presents they bought using the money of those valuable things cannot be used anymore, is that really worthy? Furthermore, Della and James’ gifts for each other became useless after they gave up the things that each other thought they would keep. The gifts that were intended to be useful turned out to be wasted, isn’t that not worthy? Last but not least, considering Della and James’ current beggared situation, it is not a wise decision to sell the most worthy things just to buy each other a gift. They have to be clear that they were suffering from poverty, why can’t they use those precious things to create values instead of being formalistic?
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