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Show RRreOPE ROO DOP CET eee Ee The Salt Lake Tribune NATION/WORLD PE FE RIE eI A3 Sunday, December 24, 2000 The ‘Truth’ Behind Hit Santa Poem FINAL TOUCHES Literary sleuth says Clement Moore stole credit for ‘The Night Before Christmas’ BY RENEE TAWA read them to his six children. Enchanting story, agrees LOS ANGELES TIMES Doug Bowes and This much holds as true as the pen 0 ie & ally: the 19thcentury poem known as “The Night Before Christmas” is where America’s notions of Santa Claus spring — thejolly old man, his chimneydivewith a bundle of toys, his sleigh aloft with Dasher and Dancer and company. So beloved are the verses that the poem, “Accountof a Visit From St. Nicholas,” is wrapped up in family memories worldwide, twined with a snug bow, and wn but a Grinch would tug it loose’ is month, not even a simmering scandal about the poem could stop its traditional his daughters, 8-year-old Kat, center, and 7-year-old Kiandra,take a break from holiday shopping to carry a Christmastree to his parents’ house in south Winnipeg, Manitoba, on Saturday. Chris Procaylo/The Associated Press This Year, There Are Plenty of Rooms At the Inns in War-Torn Bethlehem KNIGHT RIDDER NEWS SERVICE BETHLEHEM, West Bank — As Christmas approaches,the decorativelights thatlit this town’s rebirth during last year’s millennium celebrations havebeen dark. Thegreen shop shutters, specially painted for the official 2,000th birthday of Jesus, remain shut. Manger Square is mostly empty. With few pilgrims flocking in, locals gloomily look forward to finding seats inside St. Catherine’s Church for midnight Mass for thefirst time. There finally is room in Bethlehem’s inns. Lots of it. “We can’t really celebrate Christmas this year, not while people are dying and mourning,” said Hiam Banoura, a motherof two girls whose house in neighboring Beit Sahour village is decorated only with bullet holes this year. “I will put the tree up for the children, but I am not happywith it.” After three months of bloodshed in the Palestinian uprising, a solemn pall sits over the town:of Christ’s birth at Christmas. For its Christian population, it hurts as much as Muslims not being allowed into Al Aqsa mosque to pray during Ramadan, or as much as Israeli Jews marking Hanukkah in the midst of yet another anguished struggle. Even as renewed peace talks in Washington broughta faint glimmer of hope last week, it is hard to find anyonein the Holy Landcelebrating the holidays with much joy this year. During the worst of thefirst intifada a decadeago, the city never had so many young men to mourn, nightly gunfire to fear ané an almosttotal blockade to overcome. @ No fast-coming peace in the Mideast it up, and what is even more outrageous, says Foster, he didn’t even write the verses that secured his reputation as author of oneofthe world’s mostbeloved poems. In his new book, Author Unknown: On the Trail ofAnonymous,Foster, 50, who teaches literature at Vassar College, identifies the author as Maj. Henry Livingston Jr., an obscure New York bon vivant, poet and Revolutionary War veteran. Foster’s revelation is the sort ofthing for which he has become famous. In 1996, he “outed” Joe Klein as the anonymous author of bk best-selling novel Primary ee rs. usual, fans are celebrating Bible professor Clement Clarke Moore,whois famous for writing the poem after a brush with an unlikely muse. (with a variation or two), Moore In his book, Foster claims to have invented “a science ofliterary forensics,” a method by which authors can be unmasked by their diction, their source materials and otherclues. What’s important, many peo- pen, Moore wrote down the words sue; the poem is still a jewel. “The Night Before Christmas” first was published anonymously in the Troy, N.Y., Sentinel on Dec. 23, 1823. By the time Moore died in 1863 at 84, he was revered as the “father” of Santa Claus. On a snowy morning in December 1822, the story goes AS Thefortified Jewish shrine of Rachel’s Tomb has been the frequent site of bloody clashes between stone-throwing youthsandIsraeli soldiers. Nightly gunfire from the quaint Christian suburbof Beit Jala resoundsacrossthecity. Israeli helicopter gunships haveretaliated with missiles. Israeli soldiers stopall traffic from Jerusalem at a checkpointerected after the 1993 Oslo peace accords. Mostother dirt roads now are either dug up orbarricaded with mounds ofearth, These days, the Church ofthe Nativity is nearly empty because almostno tour buses unload pilgrims into Manger Square. No crowds jostle for space on the steps down to the grotto beneath the church where the mangeris believed to have been. All pilgrims to Bethlehem have to pass through Israel. This year, tour companies are allowed to take pilgrims to the checkpointso they can walk 100 yards to buses waiting on the other side, but few business people would take that chance. “My agency has completely forbidden me to make this kind ofarrangement andas a matteroffact, they have forbidden me to enter Bethlehem with tourists,” said Yossi Granit, an Israeli guide. “Imagine a stray bullet hitting one of our tourists. We would end up carrying the flag of responsibility{for the death of the entire tourism industry to Israel.” Expectations wereso high after the millennium party and thevisit of Pope John Paul II, who held a Mass in Manger Square in March. ‘ThePalestinian Authority’s Bethlehem 2000 agency renovated downtown and banked on more investmentandtourists. rode a one-horse sleigh to New York’s Greenwich Village in search of a Christmas turkey. He the lines in his head at the urging of a plump neighbor who suggested a poem aboutSt. Nicholas. At home, with a quill ple say, is not the authorship the poem in Li 's that credibly could be dated before the Troy Sentinel published the verses. But. Foster ae eae apparently oe not know the oe of wn reindeer. In the Sentinel’s version, St. Nick calls out to “Dunder and Blixem,” a Dutch exclamation meaning, “Thunder and ‘tin, Moore’s 1844 Poems collection, he refers to “Donder and Blitzen.” Moore,Foster contends, did not know Dutch. Livingston, who was ofDutch ancestry,did. Moore was fine man, but a sourpuss, Foster writes. Moore was not shy about slap. ping his name onthe work of others, Foster charges. He autographed a book in 1811, taking credit in his inscription for translating the work from its oe French, but the aj sole translator as Tranels Durand,a fact Moore overlooked. Livingston was a bankruptcy court commissioner who wrote comical and children’s verses. His prose, Foster concludes, is peppered with the same offbeat exclamation marks that appear in . original Sentinel text. One Year Later, ‘Real’ Millennium Approaches ‘THE ASSOCIATED PRESS NEW YORK Forcalendar purists,it’s a one-ina-thousand chance to get things right. For cities whose parties flopped a year ago, it’s a chance for redemption. Get ready — or not — for the Real Millennium,as opposed to the boisterous but mathematically incorrect celebrations that swept the globe when the Year 2000 arrived. The number was nice and neat. But under the widely used Gregorian calendar, which started with the year 1, only 1,999 years had elapsed since the start of the first millennium. The third millennium doesn’t begin until this coming New Year’s Eve gives wayto Jan. 1, 2001. For mostof the world, the evening will be more or less routine with few extraordinary festivities. But America’s official timekeeper, the U.S. Naval Observatory, will hold a first-come, first-served open house for 3,000 people at its Washington headquarters to welcomethe new millennium “We always said the Year 2000 was the odometer effect — all those zeros turning over,” said astronomer Steven Dick, the observatory’s official historian. “We get the occasional letter or e-mail congratulatingus for setting the record straight.” The observatory’s party will be relatively sedate —noalcohol allowed. The mood may be different in Las Vegas and Denver, where civic leaders vow to make amends for egregiously unsuccessful celebrations a year ago. “This is the real millennium,” said Denver Mayor Wellington Webb.“Everybodyelse got it wrong, and we've gotit right.” Denver officials were red-faced last year after extensive security measures, imposed because of previous post-Super Bowlriots, resulted in a nearempty downtown. This year, upward of 100,000 people are expected for a fireworks extravaganza in downtown,capping daylong festivities on Dec. 31. Las Vegas is also determined to redeem itself after on national last year. It intends to explode $500,000 worth of fireworks in 10 minutes this New Year’s Eve, CLOSED SUNDAY & MONDAY SHOP EXTRA HOURS TUESDAY 7 AM-11 PM’ LOOKING UP INTRODUCING NEW! ANTI-GRAVITY FIRMING EYE LIFT CREAM NEW!You've seenit coming. A loss of suppleness,fine lines, dulling skin around the eyes. Now watchall that change. With Clinique’s new Anti-Gravity Firming Eye Lift Cream. Densely hydrating, this patent-pending formula actuallylifts up,firms up skin in the vulnerable eye area. Helping erase the lookoflines. How? By boosting natural collagen to renewelasticity. Building supple cushion backinto time-thinned skin. Even providing brightening ingredients. So everywhere youlook,this fragile skin appears toned-up,less lined, more luminous. Seeingis believing. 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