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| Sunday, 4 January 2004 |
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Features |  |
| News Business Features Editorial
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What becomes of those greetings cards? 'Rip-read-bin' enters spirit of Christmas by Sumana Saparamadu What does one do with all the Christmas and New Year cards one receives? Are they displayed on the coffee table or cabinet, until the 12th day from Christmas and then made a bonfire of or do you dear reader, like that English woman who revealed to a columnist on the Daily Telegraph that 'when the cards start coming in, it is a quick rip open of the envelope, a glance at the name of the sender and then straight into the rubbish bin.' It was, she confessed, 'rip-read-bin, rip-read bin'. That is not entering into the spirit of Christmas is it? Perhaps she cannot cope with the avalanche of cards. The same may be happening here too, in some homes and offices. Just think, the card that you took so much trouble to select, buy, write, stamp and post is thrown into the 'wpb' with a fleeting glance at the sender's name. What was meant to bring joy has become an irritant. Some will say that greetings cards are getting out of control. Whatever the recipients' reactions, 'greetings cards' is a big industry. To gauge how lucrative the card industry is even in little Sri Lanka which isn't a Christian country, one has only to count the wayside stalls displaying greetings cards not only in the predominantly Roman Catholic north western coastal belt but also in the suburbs of Colombo and in other towns islandwide. If Sir Henry Cole the first director of London's Victoria and Albert Museum whose idea it was to send a greetings card at Christmas and his friend John Horsely, who designed and painted the card at Cole's request were to see the millions of cards sold in their native country alone, they would gape in disbelief. How would they react to the proliferation and commercialization of the Christmas card, that they invented? A thousand copies of the card designed by Horsely were printed and were sold at five shillings each, which was big money then in 1843. It is on record that the card shocked some temperance societies because it showed a family drinking wine at a Christmas feast. But the public liked it, greeting friends and relations with a card at Christmas. And the greeting 'A Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to you' (were the words Cole's or Horsely's?) has come down the years, exactly a 160 years, to Christmas 2003. Despite the public being enamoured by the card, the output of cards in the years that followed was small and slow. Nineteen years were to pass before the first commercially viable Christmas cards were sold over the counter - in 1862 - by G. Goodhall and Sons, and the industry has never never looked back. The introduction of a cheaper rate for post cards and unsealed letters was an impetus to the industry as more and more people used this facility, and by 1880 the Post Office was urging the public to 'Post Early for Christmas'. First cards As the custom of sending greetings cards at Christmas spread to the colonies of the British Empire and to other countries - in America the first cards came out in 1877 people of other faiths also began sending each other cards during this season, and then there emerged in those countries cards with only 'Best Wishes for the New Year' and these were followed by the Season's Greetings' cards which made no mention of either Christmas or New Year. As the card industry spread to the far flung colonies of the British Empire, the card went native. The robin and the snowman were pushed out by the Kangaroo and Kukaburra in Australia and by the fauna and flora typical of other countries. Trendy In more recent times the dove of peace became a trendy choice of cards, which also began to carry messages totally unconnected with Christmas or the New Year, like cards with birds and animals and conservation messages. Many cards were carrying paintings and drawings by old masters or contemporary artists. In this multi-religious, multi-cultural times, my guess/is that only about 20% of the cards depict Christmas themes. UNICEF was the first to see the Greetings Cards potential as a fund-raiser. The first UNICEF greetings cards were with the legend 'for the well-being of the world's children's' and season's Greetings and its equivalent printed in four later five languages accepted as international languages by the UN. The idea caught on and soon various charities were producing their own cards, and 50 years on since the UNICEF cards appeared, charity cards are vying for places on the shelves of card shops with the purely commercial cards. One of the nicest cards I received this year is the 'Australian Wild flowers' card, put on sale by the frontier service, the proceeds from its sale providing services to people in remote and isolated areas in the Australian outback. Among the local charity cards, are those sold by various children's charities viz SOS villages. The Crippled Children's Aid Association, The Chitra Lane School for the mentally handicapped etc., with drawings done by children in these homes, and catchy phrases like 'Sent by a friend of the otherwise able'. 'Hope hugs the differently able' says a card put out by the Resource Development committee of the Ceylon School for the Deaf and Dumb. Some corporate cards besides carrying the time-honoured wishes carry other messages or information as in this season's Central Bank card showing the Bank's multi-star eyed building with the Chatham Street Clock tower in the foreground. Unique "The lighthouse with clock tower is reported to be the only one of its kind in the world. Erected in 1857, it has been taken over and maintained by the Central Bank since 1997." I am grateful to the Central Bank for this information on one of the oldest landmarks in the city. |
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