Vintage Children's Fiction

Day 294 of the "What are you reading, and why?" project, and today is Louisa May Alcott's birthday, so I am riffing on vintage children's fiction. Of course, though I read Little Women as a child, it would be shelved as young adult fiction in a library or bookstore these days, due to its thickness and big words and lack of pictures.

My son loved the movie of Little Women, the 1994 version, with Susan Sarandon, Winona Ryder, Claire Danes, and Kirsten Dunst.  As he would have been four then, he saw it a year or so later when it appeared on cable television at his grandparents' house, probably at Christmastime. Maybe a year or so after that, confident of his reading ability, I gave him the book for Christmas...but the moment had passed. Actually, he was still in the Batman, Xena: Warrior Princess mode when he fell in love with Little Women, and that moment had passed, too.

I read several of the Oz books as a child, and Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass, by Lewis Carroll, but my daughter didn't. She had her own tastes--children's historical fiction for a while--and grew up in a film and computer culture. Today in the store, a young woman was talking about reading the Wicked books, by Gregory Maguire (OMG, I am linking you to his "Shopping-Enabled Wikipedia Page on Amazon.com," a thing I just discovered in this moment, showing that 1) I am clueless, and 2) we live in a shopping culture, but 3) I don't) and I realized, while referring to the original Oz books, by L. Frank Baum, that she had no idea what I was talking about.

Which leads me to the Mad Hatters' Review, the "demented" brain child of Carol Novack (a goddess in yesterday's blog entry, a mad hatter in today's), an online multi-media magazine subtitled Edgy and Enlightened Literature, Art and Music in the Age of Dementia, and "staffed solely by mad hatters" (so the plural possessive is indeed correct)! And if that's not enough, here is her blog, where you can find out how to get hold of Giraffes in Hiding, which yesterday's Marcus Speh will be reviewing. Here is his blog, Nothing to Flawnt.

According to Novack, mad hatters were "mad" because their working conditions exposed them to mercury poisoning.

Me? I'm just a little crazy. And a lot grown up. But a child at heart.

Today a young man walked out of the store with vintage grown-up short stories, by John Cheever, William Maxwell, etc., in a New Yorker anthology. He was Christmas shopping but hadn't spotted the perfect book yet, so he was getting this for himself.

But he was sure tickled when I told him about Sarah's 30 Days of Christmas project with the new Babbitt's Books blog, so I am telling you, too! Pictures and descriptions of fabulous gifts!  (And it's working, as I see cross-outs, meaning some of those books already sold!)  (Wait, maybe I am part of the shopping culture.)

The Wonderful CoincidOz

Day 122 of the "What are you reading, and why?" project, and two more random women are reading, or will be soon, the first in the Stieg Larsson trilogy, The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo, and so am I, because the movie is coming to town in two weeks. We did not have it in the shop, but the next day book two appeared...and is gone again already.

And people who entered the Anabiosis Press Chapbook Contest are reading Fragrant Inferno by Meghan Brinson, the winner, because it just arrived in their mailboxes. This is a fascinating book of contemporary poems that echo various myths of the Garden of Eden. An introductory note lays out the main characters of Adam and Eve, Lilith, Lucifer, and Samyaza, in the Book of Genesis, Book of Lilith, and Book of Enoch.

And today I handled a bunch of Oz books. Some were later printings of books in the series by L. Frank Baum, and some were written by other authors, based on the originals. One of the authors is John R. Neill, an illustrator, but not the original illustrator, who was W. W. Denslow. Others included Ruth Plumly Thompson and Jack Snow, with various illustrators other than Denslow and Neill, including Jack Kramer and Dirk.

Coincidentally, I also handled books by Gregory Maguire in the Wicked Years series, that re-see Oz from the witches' perspective.

And, by further coincidence, I pondered all this in the context of the upcoming cemetery walk in our town--upcoming in October, but auditions are in June--that takes place in the cemetery where Dorothy is buried, the real Dorothy, who died young.

And I got to experience my own joyful good fortune by way of the arrival, on roller skates, of my children on the sidewalk outside...come to borrow the car and receive some baklava. What a wonderful life! Anyway, it's my son's birthday. And Judy Garland's.