Now if you liked that little verse (and why not? It took us a full three minutes to make that) then you, friend, are exactly the kind of person who’d be thrilled to find ‘A Very Klingon Khristmas’ sitting under their tree or fairy-light strewn shrine to Kahless.
‘A Very Klingon Khristmas’ tells the story of the Klingon festive period: celebrating the birth of the fearless warrior Kahless, the yearly visit of the Klingon Kringle – Santa Qlas – on Khristmas Eve, and the many traditions of the season, all of which we Humans apparently stole and reappropriated. Interestingly there’s no mention of Klingons weeping at a damn John Lewis ad, so maybe that one’s ours.
Writer Paul Ruditis is our guide, with a humorous rhyming verse that invokes Clement Clarke Moore’s ‘The Night Before Christmas’ as it tells of such customs as naughty Klingon kiddies getting a Tribble in their stocking, and that Santa Qlas enjoys a snack of gagh and racht rather than a mince pie and a glass of sherry. Interestingly he never once rhymes the word ‘Klingon’ with anything, which makes you think that, for poets, Klingon might be the new orange. String on? Bring on? Cling on…? Hmm…
Patrick Farricy brings some detailed and frankly striking images to Ruditis’ words, including Klingon Shakespeare sat at his desk composing Hamlet (‘taH pagh taHbe’), and the Santa of Qo’nos in his Warp 20 sleigh drawn by nine Bird of Prey warships. It’s like peering into a beautifully rendered Michael Dorn fever dream.
To a non-Trekkie this is perhaps the weirdest use of 32 pages imaginable, at least until some Enterprising soul publishes a book on Andorian Easter or Romulan Mothers Day. And yes, it is weird, bordering on the committable even, but it is undeniably bonkers fun. And that’s what Christmas is all about really. Fun. That and a lovely roast targ. QISmaS!
Published on Thursday 7 November 2013.
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