I am not a traditionalist about Christmas, if something doesn’t work for you or your family then it should be ignored. Jettison what doesn’t work, keep what does.
One thing I keep to is Christmas ghost stories. Scaring yourself silly is an old midwinter tradition but the Victorians gave it some welly. Dickens gave us a Christmas Carol, Wilkie Collins made a career of unsettling people, Henry James got in on the act. Festive chillers were all the rage.
The King of them all was Montague Rhodes James. M R James wrote ghost stories for his Christmas Eve drinks with friends and they are still frightening now. On Christmas Eve BBC4 is celebrating his work with a documentary about his life by Mark Gatiss at 9 pm which is followed by adaptations of his work and Dickens’ The Signalman. I will be watching with the dog by my side and telling myself they are just stories as I head to bed.