# A Social Call explained — Poetry

> Chapter companion for Poetry by Ambrose Bierce.

## What happens

The narrator addresses Old Father Christmas with cynical familiarity, accusing him of being a drunken fraud while reflecting on his own long, unrewarded struggle for virtue and honesty. He notes that admiration is stolen rather than earned, and that the public praises those he criticizes. The poem ends with a farewell and a somber hint at his own mortality.

## Themes in this chapter

### Hypocrisy and Corruption

Old Father Christmas is portrayed as a drunken fraud with a thin pretense of virtue, and the narrator laments that admiration is stolen rather than earned.

### Mortality and Regret

The narrator speaks of another year of pain behind him, the final folding of empty hands, and the possibility of being missed next year.

## Character check-ins

### Old Father Christmas

Addressed directly as a scamp and drunkard, with a thick neck and thin pretense of virtue.

### Unknown

The speaker reflects on his own five-and-twenty years as champion of good, his egotism, and his approaching death.

## Key lines

> Well, well, old Father Christmas, is it you, With your thick neck and thin pretense of virtue?

The narrator greets Father Christmas sarcastically, accusing him of being a hypocrite.

_Opens the poem with a cynical unmasking of a beloved figure._

> For admiration is, like linen left Upon the line⁠—got easiest by theft.

Admiration is most easily obtained by stealing it, not by earning it.

_Expresses the narrator's bitter view of public acclaim._

> Yet now whose praises do the people bawl? Those of the fellows whom I live to maul.

The public praises the very people the narrator spends his life attacking.

_Highlights the narrator's frustration with society's misplaced admiration._

> Next year you possibly may find me scolding⁠— Or miss me altogether: Nature's plan Includes, as I suppose, a final folding Of these poor empty hands.

Next year I may be gone, as death will finally still my hands.

_A somber acknowledgment of mortality and the end of his efforts._

## Links

- HTML: https://www.betterreads.online/discover/poetry_se/chapters/a-social-call
- Book: https://www.betterreads.online/discover/poetry_se
- All chapters: https://www.betterreads.online/discover/poetry_se/chapters