1356. 🎄 A Philatelic Christmas Carol.

  🎄I am rather content to know that I shall pass a couple of hours or so on Boxing Day watching the Royal Shakespeare Company's 2018 production of A Christmas Carol at Stratford upon Avon. I've seen it more than once before and know that it is a splendid production of Charles Dickens' great story which defined an English Christmas and passed a lot of it on to a large part of the rest of the world.

  Over the 175 years since the story was first published there have been a goodly number of theatrical adaptations of the tale. Likewise there have also been numerous cinematic versions, including one starring the Muppets in tandem with Michael Caine as Scrooge and television productions including an unlikely version featuring Ross Kemp who played one of the notorious Mitchell Brothers in BBC's interminable Cockney saga/soap opera otherwise known as Eastenders.

  And as the years go by there are an increasing number of philatelic renditions of Dickens' story including a set issued this year by Guernsey Post with the name of Alderney printed on the stamps which commemorates the 175th anniversary of the tale's first publication. Royal Mail passed up the opportunity to commemorate the anniversary on its Christmas stamps though it did manage to present us with a very attractive collection of traditional British Christmas scenes without going all the way back to Victorian times. Other Commonwealth territories whose postal authorities have given us their philatelic versions of A Christmas Carol include Turks And Caicos Islands (an improbable Walt Disney issue featuring Uncle Scrooge McDuck, Mickey Mouse as Bob Cratchit and Donald Duck as Scrooge's ever cheerful and highly likeable nephew, Fred), Ascension Island, St Vincent and Dominica.

  Royal Mail issued an excellent set in 1993 to commemorate the 150th anniversary of the publication of A Christmas Carol which was made up of 5 stamps which featured the wonderful artwork of the great Quentin Blake. Some of the various Commonwealth issues are depicted below giving a philatelic version of A Christmas Carol without words. 

  Merry Christmas. Everyone of us!