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Six Christmas stories gathered by Ruth Sawyer appear here for the first time in book form, with one exception. "This Is the Christmas" was for a time published in a single small volume by The Horn Book; now it is available exclusively in Joy to the World.
Between the stories are carols, lovely in themselves, appropriate to each legend. Told with the magic that can be woven only by a fine storyteller, the stories and carols strengthen and broaden a reader's understanding of Christmas in other lands.
From Arabia comes the legend of the two lambs who set out to find the "child who was to be born of lowly folk, yet born to be a king." From Serbia comes the legend of Christ's visit to the blind boy, an outcast from all people.
From Ireland come the stories of the boy and the Holy Brother who saved their loved ones at Christmastime with the help of the fairies and woodland creatures.
From Spain comes the legend of San Froilan who brought the story of Christmas to the wilderness. Also from Spain comes the original true story of how the tourists brought Christmas to "a scrawny ill-fed little boy with eyes too large for his face."
With illustrations by Trina Schart Hyman
—from the dust jacket
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