The story in one page
Della Young has exactly one dollar and eighty-seven cents saved for a Christmas gift for Jim. She stands before the pier glass in their eight-dollar-a-week flat and cuts off her knee-length hair, selling it to buy a twenty-one-dollar platinum fob chain for Jim’s heirloom gold watch. When Jim arrives home, he stares at her short hair in a trance before producing a package containing the expensive tortoise shell combs Della had long admired in a Broadway window. Having both sold their most prized possessions to provide for the other, they realize the chain and the combs are currently useless, and they settle down to a quiet dinner of mutton chops.
Who's who
- Della Young
A devoted wife who sells her hair to afford a gift.
- Jim Young
A $20-a-week worker who sacrifices his grandfather’s gold watch.
- Madame Sofronie
The cold hair-goods dealer who pays $20 for Della’s hair.
- The Magi
Wise men who invented the art of giving Christmas presents.
What it's really about
- Sacrifice
- Giving up one's identity for the beloved.
- Irony
- Gifts rendered useless by the act of giving.
Why it's memorable
- Della’s hair rippling like a brown cascade down to her knees.
- Jim falling onto the couch and suggesting they put the presents away.
The ending, explained
Spoilers — show the ending
Jim reveals he sold the watch to buy the combs, and as they set the gifts aside, the narrator observes that these two foolish children who sacrificed their greatest treasures are the wisest gift-givers of all.
For your book club
- The contrast between the apartment's $8 rent and the couple's million-dollar devotion.
- Why the narrator considers the sacrifice of physical treasures a sign of wisdom.