The Haunted Tea-cosy: A Dispirited and Distasteful Diversion for Christmas - Tapa dura

In the preface to "A Christmas Carol," Charles Dickens wrote that he tried "to raise the Ghost of an Idea" with readers and trusted that it would "haunt their houses pleasantly." In December 1997, 154 Christmases later, the "New York Times Magazine" asked our Edward Gorey, "the iconoclastic artist and author, " to refurbish this enduring morality tale. What is Gorey's moral? Don't eat fruitcake? Don't look for morals? Don't mess with the classics? Whatever. You decide. But don't think too hard, and have a Merry Christmas.

Edmund Gravel, known as the Recluse of Lower Spigot, is preparing to take tea by himself on Christmas Eve. Just as he is waiting for the week's teabag to steep, the tea-cosy twitches and from beneath it leaps a creature - the Bahhum Bug. Then they are joined by the Ghost of Christmas past.