James Herriot Centenary (Review of Herriot's Treasury for Children)

Today is the centenary of James Herriot, the wonderful vet and writer from Yorkshire. Born a hundred years ago today (October 3, 1916) as James Alfred Wight, he took the pen name of Herriot and produced wonderful stories about his life in the Yorkshire dales. I've loved them for many years and have been enjoying much of his writing again lately, during a season in my life when I've needed his kind of humor, beauty, and comfort.

In honor of the day, I went to my archives and pulled together the review I wrote of his Treasury for Children. I originally posted the review on Epinions.com ten years ago, after enjoying the book with my then four year old. She and I read it together for many years following, and she still keeps it on her shelf, even as a teenager. I hope you'll enjoy this old review!

Kittens, Dogs, Horses, and Sheep...and All in the Beautiful English Countryside
 
A number of years ago I spent some time visiting farms in the beautiful English countryside. Well, okay, I'll be honest -- I've never actually been to England. But I've certainly felt as though I've visited there because of the numerous trips I've taken through beloved books. Whereas some of my favorite English literary landscapes are completely fictional, I've also enjoyed visiting the very real Yorkshire farms of James Herriot's story collections All Creatures Great and Small, All Things Bright and Beautiful, All Things Wise and Wonderful and The Lord God Made Them All. These wonderful collections, beautifully shaped memoir-based narratives of a rural veterinarian, were originally published from the mid-1970s to the early 1980s.

In the mid to late 1980s, I read all four volumes, delighting in the keen observations and clear prose of James Herriot and in the funny and often touching stories he told about animals he'd cared for over the years (as well as their owners)! These stories had such flavor and such narrative shape that it's clear he must have "tweaked" some details here and there, but in general they were autobiographical. James Herriot was the pen name of James Alfred Wright (1916-1995) who served as a vet in the county of Yorkshire for many years, beginning in 1939 upon his graduation from Glasgow Veterinary College.

From 1984 to 1991, a series of children's picture books by James Herriot were published, one each year for a total of eight. These stories were culled from the larger grown-up story collections from the All Creatures Great and Small series. I remember a number of these books from when they appeared, large hardbacks, beautifully illustrated. I bought one of them for myself when I was in high school and I also used to read some of them to my young nieces and nephews, now grown.

In 1992, St. Martin's Press published all eight of the previously released picture books in one volume entitled James Herriot's Treasury for Children. Unlike some "treasuries," this one doesn't edit out anything. All eight stories are here with all their original illustrations, even the ones on the title pages. Basically they simply took all eight books, stitched them together, then added a table of contents and a new cover. I had no idea that one could read all eight of these treasures in one volume so I was completely excited to find it at our local library! Having spent a few pleasurable hours last week reading (and re-reading) some of these gems to my daughter, I have decided I really want to purchase this book for our home collection.

The Stories

Here's what you get in this delightful volume: the complete picture books of Moses the Kitten; Only One Woof; The Christmas Day Kitten; Bonny's Big Day; Blossom Comes Home; The Market Square Dog; Oscar, Cat-About-Town; and Smudge, the Little Lost Lamb.

The first two stories are illustrated by Peter Barrett and the final six by Ruth Brown. Though I prefer the Brown illustrations overall, both illustrators provide fine, detailed paintings that bring the animals, people and rural landscapes of the stories to vibrant life. Brown seems better at capturing more whimsical moments and her people are more realistic looking, especially in their expressions.

Most of the stories are narrated by Herriot, who tells each tale from his perspective as a country vet. Usually the action takes place during one of his visits to a family farm to help an ailing animal, though for the most part the story centers not on the sick animal but on another interesting or unusual animal on the farm.

Moses the Kitten is the story of a bedraggled half-frozen scrap of a kitten brought back to health in the warm stove of a farmer's wife's kitchen. On subsequent visits, Mr. Herriot is astonished to see which barnyard animal has become the kitten's surrogate mother!

Only One Woof is the sweet and funny tale of Gyp and Sweep, sheepdog brothers. Sweep gets sold, but the farmer keeps Gyp who turns out to be hard-working, loyal, and almost completely silent. In all the years they have him, his family only hears him bark one time. Mr. Herriot is on hand for the momentous event and relates it in his poignant style.

And speaking of poignancy, The Christmas Day Kitten tells the story of a stray cat who wanders into the Pickerings' farmhouse for food and momentary warmth by the fireplace, but who refuses to ever stay. One Christmas morning she shows up again, half-dead but carrying a tiny kitten in her mouth. She clearly wants to bequeath her kitten to the household before she dies. Buster grows into a fine looking cat who loves to torment Mrs. Pickering's basset hounds (some of the best illustrations in the entire treasury).

Bonny's Big Day takes us out of the realm of dogs and cats and into the world of cart horses. Bonny is a retired cart horse, and she and another retired horse, Dolly, are much beloved by Farmer John, an eccentric but kind man who recalls his their hard-working years with touching gratitude. When Mr. Herriot suggests that Farmer John enter Bonny in the "family pets" category of the upcoming animal show, Farmer John is skeptical. At least at first...

Blossom Comes Home is one of the funniest stories in the collection. It's really a tribute to the stubbornness and cleverness of a cow named Blossom who simply refuses to acquiesce to the fact that she's been sold!

The Market Square Dog is probably my four year old's favorite. A brown mongrel with pleading eyes and a winning manner can often be found begging at the local farmer's market. One day he's struck by a car and hurt. Mr. Herriot is able to fix his broken leg, but will the sweet little beggar dog ever be able to find a loving home?

Oscar, Cat-About-Town is unusual because it concerns a cat that the Herriot family (James and his wife Joan) actually adopt for a while. They discover, however, that Oscar isn't content to stay at home even though he loves them. Oscar loves to roam about town and to join in group activities like rummage sales and soccer games! This story provides another of my favorite illustrations, of tabby Oscar sitting up and trying to bat the sliding trombone being played in the local brass band.

Finally, there's Smudge, the Little Lost Lamb. This is the only story in the collection told completely in the third person, and though I miss Herriot's first person narration, it's still a very sweet story. Young Harry, Farmer Cobb's son, is given one of the new lambs on the farm as his very own. But one day the curious creature squeezes outside the fence and can't get back in. We follow him on his exciting and sometimes perilous adventures (he even comes face to face with a bull!) until the satisfying conclusion when he makes it home again.

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So who are these stories for?

That may seem like an odd question since these are all part of a treasury "for children" but it's worth asking. The subject matter, the simple plots, the warmth and sweetness Herriot brings to each story, and the colorful and detailed illustrations all make these terrific picture books for kids. But they are not "easy reads." They're long, for starters -- each one takes at least ten and sometimes as much as fifteen minutes to read aloud, and there's plenty of text per page. And the vocabulary is challenging for young children; in pulling these stories from his collections for older readers, he did not dumb down the language in any way, bless him. I almost wonder if they've gone through any significant adaptation at all. It's unusual but somehow stimulating to find prose like this in a contemporary book marketed for children:

I had driven through and, streaming-eyed, was about to get back in the car when I noticed something unusual. There was a frozen pond just off the path and among the rime-covered rushes which fringed the dead opacity of the surface a small object stood out, shiny black.

Or this:

He was stepping daintily along the display tables, inspecting the old shoes, books, pictures, ornaments, crockery, and he looked really happy. Now and then he cocked his head on one side when something caught his fancy.

I have a feeling these books were originally marketed for children 4-8 or perhaps 6-10, and even though some of the vocabulary will be over the heads of the younger listeners in that range, the flowing cadence and the winning stories will carry them along. These make marvelous read-alouds and they'll learn words from context. (My four year old listened to some of them while quietly playing or drawing, and that worked really well.) If your child can sit through Beatrix Potter (who uses words like "implore" and "exert" with great gusto!) then she will likely enjoy James Herriot. Meanwhile, there's much here for older children and adults to enjoy. I love them as much if not more than my little girl. So yes, it's a children's treasury, but it's also a family treasury.

If you love animals and enjoy good writing, then you'll no doubt enjoy a trip to Yorkshire with James Herriot as your guide. He paints each anecdote with warmth and shows a tender understanding of the fascinating "personalities" of all kinds of animals, as well as a real regard for the people who love them and take care of them.

And he really makes me want to go to Yorkshire.

Happy traveling!

James Herriot's Treasury for Children
Illustrated by Peter Barrett and Ruth Brown
St. Martin's Press, 1992

Llama, Llama Red Pajama: In Memory of Anna Dewdney

The literary world was saddened this month to lose author and illustrator Anna Dewdney. Our household was saddened too.

Dewdney was the beloved author and illustrator of the Llama, Llama books for preschoolers. We discovered the original book, Llama, Llama Red Pajama not long after it was first published in 2005. Our daughter was the perfect age for the book then, and our family read it over and over, delighting in both its pictures and its rhymes.

I love what Dewdney once said: “A good children’s book can be read by an adult to a child, and experienced genuinely by both… A good children’s book is like a performance. I don’t feel my world really exists until an adult has read it to a child.”

There is great joy, as a parent, in helping your child discover the power and beauty of a classic book that has been around for many years before they were born, but there is also joy in discovering a brand new classic-in-the-making right alongside your child. That’s always how it felt when I would bring out Llama, Llama.

In honor of Ms. Dewdney’s life and work, I thought I would pull my October 2006 review of Llama, Llama from my archives and re-post it here. It was fun to revisit the delight our family found in the book when our daughter, now a teenager, was just four years old. 

Below is the slightly touched up version of that ten year old review.

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We love books that make us laugh! Ever since my now four year old daughter was an infant, we've enjoyed discovering books that make her smile, grin, or chortle. Those stories that inspire soft giggles? Even better.

But what's really fun is when we find a book that causes all those things and then some. Llama, Llama Red Pajama is just such a book. It doesn't just make her smile. It causes her to erupt in side-splitting shouts of laughter! And between the enjoyment we get from hearing our little girl laugh so hard, and the humor that ensues from repeated parental readings of tongue-twisty rhymes involving the phrase "Mama Llama," we laugh right along with her.

Be warned. Llama, Llama Red Pajama is a habit forming phrase. Once you've read this book -- and if you have a 2-6 year old in your house, you will likely be asked to read it at least a dozen more times -- you will find yourselves repeating this phrase, not only when you read together, but just at random and for fun.

That’s because the prhase is a fun rhyme in a book full of great rhymes accompanied by truly funny pictures. Llama, Llama Red Pajama is a young male llama who has trouble settling down to sleep at bedtime. Throughout most of the story, he's in bed cuddling his stuffed baby llama. He's wearing bright red pajamas, of course. Mama Llama in a blue dress, apron and pearls (looking for all the world like a llama version of Donna Reed) tucks him in, kisses him good-night, and heads downstairs to do the supper dishes.

That's when the fun ensues. As any young child knows, sometimes when your Mama closes that door at night and disappears, you start to wonder. Where is she? Is she coming back? What's she doing without me? You start to get lonely. You start to see things in the dark. You start to wonder if you need to go to the bathroom or get a drink.

Lllama, Llama Red Pajama (one wonders if that's his full name on his birth certificate!) begins to wonder all those things. In rollicking rhyme, we learn:

Lllama llama
red pajama
feels alone
without his mama.

Baby llama wants a drink.
Mama's at the kitchen sink.

And later on:

Llama llama
red pajama
waiting waiting
for his mama.

Mama isn't
coming yet.
Baby llama
starts to fret.

The book wonderfully captures the night-time insecurities and impatience of a young child, but in such a fun way that it creatively defuses them. First time author-illustrator Anna Dewdney captures those childish feelings just perfectly, right down to the fact that "Llama, llama" keeps attributing his feelings and the subsequent behavior (hollering, wailing, pouting, even jumping on the bed!) to his stuffed toy llama, much as a child might say it was her doll who needed a drink of water or an extra kiss good-night.

I appreciate it that this is not a story about deep, dark night-time fears. Many picture books want to deal with fears about monsters under the bed or in the closet. Those might be helpful if you need to find ways to creatively discuss a specific fear, but if your child hasn't struggled with those, you certainly don't want to introduce the specific fearful thoughts into her mind! Instead, this book is more about general night-time anxieties that all children can relate to, as well as the need that all toddlers and preschoolers feel from time to time for just a little bit of extra attention.

I certainly don't want my daughter emulating Llama lama's worst behavior, but I appreciate how she relates to his feelings. And it's worth nothing that she hasn't copied his behavior, perhaps in part because of its over-the-top silliness, and also because now that she's a big four year old she can feel mildly superior and amused about such fussy tantrums! This book has helped her to realize she's growing up. Gently laughing over such kinds of behavior is a backhanded way of defusing the anxieties themselves. It's a creative way of saying "see? Llama llama didn't need to worry. His Mama was right there all the time, and she came as soon as she could...she was just on the phone for a while!" The great thing is, you don't have to say that, because the story says it for you:

Little llama,
don't you know?
Mama llama
loves you so?

Mama Llama's
always near,
even if she's
not right here.

As much as we love the rhymes, the illustrations are what really make this story. I'm delighted you can see the cover which shows the wide-eyed little llama in bed. Every expression on his face, as well as his Mama's, is delightful. In fact the pictures are so expressive that you'd probably get the story (and even laugh a lot!) without the text at all. Dewdney claims that all the facial expressions she draws in her books are inspired by her own. All I can say is, she must be one expressive lady!

My daughter's favorite spread is actually the only one without any text. Llama llama finally works himself up into a "tizzy" (as Mama later calls it) and wails so loudly that Mama hangs up the phone and goes rushing up the stairs. There's a wonderful sequence of four pictures across two pages where you see her running, her own furry face crinkled with maternal worry, until she bursts into his room. Only to realize, of course, that he's fine.

I love that spread too, but I'm especially partial to the illustration of Llama, llama with his quilt pulled up over his nose. All you can see are his two huge eyes, his little hooves, and his long, floppy ears!

I will warn you that this book is not the most "settling" of bedtime reads, since it inspires so much laughter. If your child needs help calming down before bedtime (and what child doesn't from time to time?) you may want to choose a quieter story to follow. But sometimes a book of this tone is just right – especially if you want to help your child expend a bit of energy right before bedtime.

Llama, Llama Red Pajama is handsomely designed in bright colors, especially red and blue. The colorful, expressive pictures and the short stanzas of silly rhyming text combine to make this book one of our family's very favorite funny reads! 


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Review slightly revised and re-posted in loving memory of Anna Dewdney (December 25, 1965-September 3, 2016).

Reading Notes: James Herriot and Musings About Our Family Reading Life

I mentioned yesterday that I've been reading James Herriot again. His books make me want to share a cuppa with someone while we muse about the beauty of the Yorkshire dales.

I first found Herriot when I was in high school. I read through his semi-autobiographical memoirs (All Creatures Great and Small, All Things Bright and Beautiful, All Things Wise and Wonderful, The Lord God Made Them All) named for lines from the hymn by Cecil Alexander, and they've been on my list of books to recommend for the sweet girl's high school years as a result. He is a keen observer of human and animal nature. His stories manage to be warm and charming without falling into sentimentality, maybe because he's so good at providing detailed accounts of some rather gritty veterinary work with farm animals. 

I never forgot Herriot in the intervening years. I fell in love with his books for children (slightly adapted tales of the same kind you'd find in the larger books) when I was in college, and the sweet girl and I spent many wonderful hours reading and re-reading his Treasury for Children when she was little. I'm pretty sure I reviewed that for Epinions. If I can dig it up in my archives, I'll give it a quick revising and post it here.

A few years ago I dipped into the book Jim Herriot's Yorkshire, but it was just recently that I really got back to reading his wonderful stories of people and animals. His Dog Stories made me laugh and made me realize how much I'd missed his way with canines...and with words. I'm trying to revive our family read-aloud tradition by reading some of the stories with D and S whenever we can manage to sit down to a meal together during this busy summer.

It feels strange to say I'm trying to revive our family read-alouds. For thirteen and a half years, that was a daily habit. We always read aloud together. If you've followed along with my sidebar list of our family read-alouds, you've seen the long list of books we've read over the years. I seriously don't think I had missed a day of reading aloud since S was a baby.

When I got my cancer diagnosis back in February, we were in the midst of re-reading The Chronicles of Prydain. In fact, we were near the end of the series, in the final book. Although sometimes D and S do the reading aloud, I have typically been the main reading person. I had so little energy at night by the time we reached the final third of The High King that the sweet girl took over the reading and brought us home to the beautiful conclusion.

And then our read-alouds stopped. And so did nightly family gatherings and prayers, and my morning Bible reading and prayer time with the sweet girl, and any semblance of bedtime routine for the family, and most of our family meals (though those continued in some form without me, especially when my sisters were here helping during my chemo treatments). So many things we've cherished over the years fell by the wayside during the tsunami of survival season.

During that season, S had six months or so where she continued to grow and change. She had her fourteenth birthday a few weeks ago (so amazing!). She's gotten more into retro video games in the interim -- she is Mario crazy -- and in general has been spending a lot more time with a screen via her iPod as well as gaming. I know those things helped her through the difficult time of my chemo treatments, a period she described to me the other day by telling me she feels like I've come back from the dead or at least a really long trip. "It's like you were there but you weren't," she explains earnestly. And often adds, sometimes with a spontaneous hug that melts my heart, "I missed you! I'm so glad you're back!"

And she's suddenly telling me she is "too old for read-alouds" -- something I never thought I'd hear her say. We never treated read-alouds like a little kid phenomenon that you outgrow. It was just a natural part of what our family loved to do together, and I had assumed we would continue to do it as long as S lived here...and beyond (D and I were read-alouders long before we had a child).

There are hills one dies on in parenting, and hills you decide it's not worth the effort to storm. This one feels worth the effort. I have been trying to decide how to tackle it well. I know that things will never go back to what they were before we hit this difficult terrain in our family journey -- they couldn't really, even if we wanted them to. We've all changed and grown in so many ways. But I am trying to revive our long-established tradition of reading aloud, albeit in new ways and forms. Our morning Bible reading and prayer time has been re-established, although it's changed a bit (in good ways, I think). In terms of our family reading, nighttime doesn't seem to be the right time for us to gather anymore, but we're beginning to have more meals together again, and we're slowly getting back into the reading habit. We started with an article in a magazine, and now we've moved to short stories.

I'm kind of glad the stories are by Herriot. They remind me of S's childhood, even though they're different than the ones we read then. They remind me of my own youth (and yes, I've begun re-reading All Creatures Great and Small on my own time).  They remind me of my mother, who loved animals, especially dogs, and whom I miss with huge aching missing. They feel comfortable and familiar, and I need some comfort and familiarity in this time of so much change in myself and in my family.

The Origins of Cynthia in the Snow by Gwendolyn Brooks

One of my favorite poems to read each winter is Gwendolyn Brooks' "Cynthia in the Snow." I posted it here on the blog on a Poetry Friday about five years ago, and it has been, without a doubt, the most visited post on this blog. Apparently other people love this poem too, and go hunting for it, not just in winter but at other times of year. I don't think it's always that easy to find, and its musical playfulness is so lovely.

I first came across the poem years ago, when the sweet girl was very young, in a big collection of children's poems. I didn't know until today that this poem was actually part of a whole collection of poems that Brooks wrote for children, back in 1956, called Bronzeville Boys and Girls. Thanks to Brain Pickings, I now not only know that, I also know that Brooks worked on the collection with the wonderful editor Ursula Nordstrom, whom I've written about more than once here. Why am I not surprised that Ursula helped bring Cynthia into the world? Reading that today just felt serendipitous.

One of the nicest things about the Brain Pickings article is that it provides a big sampling of other poems from Bronzeville Boys and Girls, along with original artwork. Each poem is like a little gem, a portrait of a distinct child doing and thinking and creating and playing just like a child does.

Here's one I enjoyed, entitled "Narcissa."

NARCISSA
Some of the girls are playing jacks.
Some are playing ball.
But small Narcissa is not playing
Anything at all.

Small Narcissa sits upon
A brick in her back yard
And looks at tiger-lilies,
And shakes her pigtails hard.

First she is an ancient queen
In pomp and purple veil.
Soon she is a singing wind.
And, next, a nightingale.

How fine to be Narcissa,
A-changing like all that!
While sitting still, as still, as still
As anyone ever sat!

What a wonderful poet was Gwendolyn Brooks. 

September (A Poem by John Updike)

Not long ago, I came across this poem in my files. I thought it would be a wonderful thing to post in these waning days of September.

September
~by John Updike

The breezes taste
Of apple peel.
The air is full
Of smells to feel-
Ripe fruit, old footballs,
Burning brush,
New books, erasers,
Chalk, and such.
The bee, his hive,
Well-honeyed hum,
And Mother cuts
Chrysanthemums.
Like plates washed clean
With suds, the days
Are polished with
A morning haze.

Isn't that a wonderful poem? It has many elements of a list poem; its simplicity and concreteness could also make this a great poem for children to model.


In fact, it was written for children, a fact that surprised me a little given Updike as the author. I actually went hunting online to discover if the poet was truly the John Updike, because I never knew he wrote anything specifically for children. It turns out that he actually wrote an entire collection of poems about the months of the year. It's called A Child's Calendar and the "new edition" published in 1999 has illustrations by Trina Schart Hyman, whose picture book St. George and the Dragon I love. 

Although I love the list-iness of this poem, I'm especially fond of the first lines:
The breezes taste
Of apple peel.
The air is full
Of smells to feel-

Breezes we can taste and smells we can feel in the air. Might be a cool way to introduce the concept of synesthesia to children.

Reading Round-Up: Early Summer Edition

Summertime! Our recent trip to Virginia to see family, coupled with the fact that school is out, means I am getting some long overdue reading time. Even though I have a heavier teaching load this summer than usual (at the seminary) I am still enjoying some good reading time.

Here's a peek at some of what I've been reading lately.

Young Fiction

The sweet girl (aka Jedi Teen...who by the way truly has officially reached her teen years now!) has been busy recommending books to me, deep into her own summer reading. Some of these she's found on her own and some we've ferreted out together via book lists. So far I have really enjoyed Savvy by Ingrid Law and One for the Murphys by Lynda Mullaly Hunt, two mid-grade books I might not have read but for the sweet girl's encouragement. I enjoyed Savvy, an interesting mix of fantasy and realism, for its creative story-line and highly creative use of language. One for the Murphys, the debut novel of author Hunt (whose second book Fish in a Tree the sweet girl and I both enjoyed earlier this year) is the story of a young girl in foster care. It reminded me a little bit of Katherine Paterson's The Great Gilly Hopkins, though Gilly had less overt sentiment.

Jedi Teen and I reviewed the graphic novel Smile together, and she's gone on to read two other graphic novels by Raina Telegemeier (I've started Sisters, but haven't had a chance to finish it). We both also read the seventh (and perhaps last, though we're not sure) Clementine book by Sara Pennypacker, Completely Clementine. It's so funny to realize that the sweet girl started reading these when she was about Clementine's age. Clementine has only made it through her third grade year in these seven terrific books, while my daughter has shot past her by years. But we both still love them, almost the way you love to and return to a good Ramona book. And that's saying something.

Mysteries

I've needed a lighthearted return to mystery reading this summer, and decided to dive back into my exploration of the books of Patricia Wentworth.  I'm not sure quite how many of the Miss Silver mysteries I've read now, but I know I've done three since late spring: She Came Back, The Gazebo, and Out of the Past. All of these were written in the 1950s, I think, and she definitely had her formula down by then. I'm cottoning on to what makes a Wentworth a Wentworth -- I actually managed to guess the murderer in the last one -- and I'm very much enjoying the camaraderie between Miss Silver and Inspector Abbot, who looks upon this school-teacher-ish maiden-aunt woman with both amusement and awe. I love that he trusts her detecting instincts so completely that he'd pretty much follow her blindfolded in a snowstorm. It's a great early example of an amateur and professional partnership.

Non-Fiction

So much really good non-fiction on my plate right now...it's sort of an embarrassment of riches. I'm inwardly singing with joy over the beautiful essays in James K.A. Smith's Discipleship in the Present Tense, which seem to be "speaking my theology" in ways I've only felt with a few authors in the past. I'm revisiting a gem of a book I loved years ago and recently rediscovered in a library book sale: Henri Nouwen's Return of the Prodigal -- and I need to hear what he has to say just as much as I did then. It's one of those beautiful gospel-centered books that we all need to revisit from time to time for the good of our hearts. And it's reminding me how much I love the artistry of Rembrandt and his Prodigal painting in particular.

I'm learning a ton of history I never knew from David Garrison's A Wind in the House of Islam, a book that is both challenging and encouraging. It's a carefully researched and well-written account of some of the many amazing things that God had done among Muslim communities in centuries past and is currently doing among Muslims in this century. I was going to call it a book of mission history (which it is) but I'd rather give it the bigger parameter of Christian history or just history (thinking about Justo Gonzalez' reminder that we too often separate the study of missions from the rest of church and world history).

I'm still working my way through N.T. Wright's Paul for Everyone: 1 Corinthians, which is taking me longer than I expected, mostly because I find myself wanting to chew thoughtfully on his insights. I keep meaning to jot some of the things that are particularly speaking to me -- from Wright, Nouwen, Smith, and Garrison especially -- here on the blog. Maybe I will have a chance to do that soon.

Reading Round-Up: August (and the "Slim Little Volumes")

I’ve been reading a lot of small books lately. The smallness describes their physical size, not necessarily their content. It’s interesting how reviewers often pick up on a book’s diminutive size as if surprised that a book with relatively few pages and a thin spine can contain something of worth. During my ten years of regular reviewing, I know I sometimes lapsed into the phrase “slim little volume,” which I now recognize as lazy writing, a sort of shorthand to express surprise that writing gems can be found in such little packages. It’s a strange sort of assessment. All we have to do is look to the world of humanity to understand how strange it is, since sometimes absolute dynamos (William Wilberforce, Mother Theresa, just to name two) are small in stature.

It’s possible, I suppose, that I’m drifting to smaller books in my non-fiction reading time because in fiction-world, I am still enamored of the work of P.D. James. My twelve year old sometimes gets an almost pained look on her face when she sees me bring home another James novel from the library. “Another P.D. James?” she’ll say a little skeptically, or sometimes just “that’s a loooonng book.” They are long books, full of slow, detailed prose, but I’m enjoying them immensely. I haven’t raced through James’ canon the way I raced through Deborah Crombie’s a couple of years ago. I seem to need breaks, sometimes of a few months or more, between outings. But when I get onto a P.D. James kick, I usually don’t stop with one. And I’m starting to prematurely mourn that I only have a few volumes left before I run out. I’m up to The Murder Room, which means that her detective Adam Dalgleish has actually embarked upon a romance, something I’m still a bit ambivalent about.

Whether or not I am moving toward smaller books because my brain needs a break from hefty mystery novels, the fact remains that the books on my nightstand (or rather in the unwieldy floor pile by the bed) are all fairly short right now. I’ve mentioned two of them here recently: I’m re-reading Justo Gonzalez’ The Changing Shape of Church History and I’m reading Macrina Wiederkehr’s A Tree Full of Angels.

Both of these books take me back to earlier seasons in my life. Gonzalez is the author of The Story of Christianity, my first real foray into the study of church history seventeen years ago. I will always feel indebted that he was my introduction to the discipline; he writes beautiful, readable historical chronicles. I was introduced to Wiederkehr even longer ago, when I worked for the Cabrini sisters (it’s been over 21 years now since I started my four and a half year stint with Cabrini, and I’m still learning from the time I spent with them). I’m pretty sure most of the Wiederkehr I’ve read was in excerpt, brought to prayer rooms on photocopied pages – the sisters and lay people I worked with there always brought beautiful poems and snippets of prose to prayer and meditation time. I’ve had one line floating in my head for two decades now, which I’m fairly certain is Wiederkehr’s, though I’m not sure of the context: “This is a trust song, Lord. I am in your hands like clay.” (If anybody knows where she says this, I’d love to be reminded.)

I’m also reading – or maybe it’s re-reading, I’m not quite sure – C.S. Lewis’ The Weight of Glory. I would have told you that of the five essays included in that volume, I had definitely read two or maybe three of them. I go back to the title essay, “The Weight of Glory,” probably once a year. This summer I decided to move straight on from there and read everything else in order, and so far I’m remembering them all, so perhaps this is a re-read. No matter. Everything Lewis wrote is worth reading and then chewing on again.

Lewis is one of the few writers in my life that I actually sometimes wake up feeling I need to read. It happened again this morning. I find myself thinking “it sure would be nice to spend some time with Jack this morning,” and I reach for whatever book happens to be handy (I’m blessed we have a lot of his books on our shelves, and there are a lot more right down the road at the seminary library). This morning, Jack wanted to talk with me about “Learning in War-Time,” and I was happy to listen again. The slightly browning edges of the page and the note underneath the title “A sermon preached in the Church of St. Mary the Virgin, Oxford, Autumn, 1939,” gave me a moment’s pause, as it suddenly occurred to me that this voice that feels so fresh first spoke these words seventy-five years ago. It’s strange that a mere one-line description of the sermon itself could move me so much, but it somehow made the whole thing feel more rich and real as I sat there on my bed and the morning sun slanted silver through the blinds. As I read, I found myself feeling like I’d slipped into a pew of the church, right behind a lady wearing a WWII era hat. When I left the pages, no doubt I would find myself traipsing down an English road lined with trees whose leaves were turning red and gold. 
 
In the “slim little volume” category (sorry, I couldn’t resist), I’m also reading More Baths Less Talking, Nick Hornby’s witty collection of literary columns. This was a Christmas gift from my sister last year, and it’s been mostly sitting on my desk intriguing me with its title. Not long ago I found myself drawn to it on the new non-fiction shelves at the library (“what a funny title!”) and then realized that I’d thought that before and the book was at home on my desk. It’s my first dip into Hornby’s work and it’s delightful. He has a droll sense of humor and an insightful way of cutting right to the heart of a book and what it meant to him.

I’m re-reading Meindert DeJong’s The Wheel on the School. I decided recently that I wanted to get back to my literary devotional project, and saw that I had broken off (sometime last year) in the midst of ideas for a devotional based on this book. At that time it was fresh in my mind because I’d just read it aloud, for the second time, to the sweet girl. I thought I’d better give it a quick re-read to refresh my memory, since my notes were not entirely jogging my brain. But it’s such a beautiful story that reading it quickly feels almost impossible. I’m also having that interesting experience of realizing how different it is to read a book silently (and just to yourself) after having gotten to know it while reading it aloud.

My quest to read everything Gary D. Schmidt has written continues with his early novel Anson’s Way. I’m not very far into it yet, so I will probably take this one (along with the new P.D. James) to the peninsula when we head out on our few-day vacation soon.

From Marmee's Library: Alice's Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll

Lewis Carroll loved wordplay so much that even his pen name was playful. Born Charles Lutwidge Dodgson, he created his pseudonym by dropping off his last name, coming up with Latin translations of his first and middle names (“Carolus Lodovicus”), bringing those translations back into English as Carroll Lewis, and reversing their order. If that sounds convoluted, just wait until you read his books!

I first tried reading Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland as a little girl, without any guidance from adults. Sometimes that’s a happy thing. In this case, I could have used a little help. With no one to tell me it was supposed to be nonsense, I just thought I somehow wasn’t “getting it” and reluctantly closed the book and put it back on the shelf for many years. I think had my early diet of nonsense been richer, I might have realized more quickly that this story was supposed to be fantastical and funny. A college Victorian literature class taught me to appreciate many of the enjoyable puns and plays on words, but truly, this isn’t a book to encounter initially in a literature class as much as a book that should be read-aloud, preferably with others, some of them young, and enjoyed for its absurdity.

That’s what my family and I recently did, and it proved to be a delightful exercise. After all these years, I finally feel that I “get” Alice, not because of any sudden “a-ha!” moments, but because I just flat out enjoyed it along with my husband and eleven year old daughter.

As a teacher and a parent, I enjoyed being able to introduce my daughter to a classic book that has become such an engrained part of literary and popular culture. The lack of coherent story-line in Alice hasn’t given it the narrative staying power of some classics, but its images and turns of phrase are iconic. Given the fact that the story is an unfolding dream sequence, it’s perhaps not surprising that the images stick with you as they do. Even if you’ve never read the book, you’re likely to have some inkling that it includes a fall down a rabbit hole, the grinning Cheshire cat, Alice swimming in a pool of her own tears, the Queen of Hearts and all the playing cards who attend her, and the Hatter (often referred to as the Mad Hatter) at the tea-party.

Alice was originally published in 1865; it’s been adapted, retold, and illustrated countless times on stage, screen, and page. My best early associations with it were a ballet adaptation I saw in grade school, and the 1951 Disney film. Though John Tenniel’s original illustrations are themselves iconic, my daughter loved the brightly colored, whimsical work of Alison Jay in the 2006 reprint we picked up at the library. They were a big part of her enjoyment. 

Alice provides a great introduction to the concept of parody, though many of the poems that Carroll parodies are unknown to modern audiences.  That might decrease their humor to one level but the humor is definitely still there, and in the places where the source material is still familiar – such as when he turns “Twinkle Twinkle Little Star” into “Twinkle Twinkle Little Bat” – the double pleasure in the nonsense shines through.

As a reader and writer, I appreciated the way Carroll keeps you off balance. I mean that in the most charitable way. We don’t often think of 19^th century children’s literature as quickly paced, which makes Alice’s madcap adventures all the more interesting. She moves from one adventure and fantastical encounter to the next with nary a place to breathe, and it’s all the more confusing because her own perspective (hence ours) keeps changing.

Our family had some interesting discussions about how old we thought Alice was supposed to be. In Through the Looking Glass, she claims she’s seven and a half, which surprised us all – though as my daughter pointed out, there’s no reason to assume it’s a sequel; it could just as well be a prequel. I think we all thought, during our reading in Wonderland, that she was a few years older, primarily because her experience of feeling either too small or too big for everything, as she grows and shrinks, captures that “tween” sensibility so perfectly.

The learning resources for such a treasured classic are numerous. You might want to start at the Resources page for the Lewis Carroll Society of North America. There’s so much there, you might not need to look anywhere else. 

Reading Roundup, Early May

Having enjoyed Alice in Wonderland, our night-time family read has us nearly to the end of Through the Looking Glass. I’m not sure how this can be true, but I think it’s my first time through the whole book. So much of it is familiar though – this is really where so much of the great Alice stuff happens! Jabberwocky! The Red and White Queens! The talking flowers! The Walrus and the Carpenter! The White Knight and Six Impossible Things Before Breakfast! It’s unevenly paced for a read-aloud, but we’re having too much fun to mind.

In the mornings, we’re almost done with The Door in the Wall, Marguerite de Angeli’s beautiful medieval novel about a lame boy named Robin. It won the Newbery award in 1950. This is actually a re-read, but the sweet girl was so young the first time we read it together, she doesn’t remember it. I really do love de Angeli’s beautiful prose.

As for me, I am still on a P.D. James tear. I’m reading her books more or less in order, and have finally made it into the 1980s with the Dalgleish novels. I’m bogging down a bit this week with A Taste for Death (“what a terrible title!” my eleven year old scolded me, though I did point out that it was a quote from a poem) but I’ve got a feeling that I’m about to turn a corner and pick up the pace soon.

I’m also perusing a lovely medieval costume book that’s helping me think through clothing and fabrics for my work-in-progress. Yes, I’m at work on the novel again.

Phantom Tollbooth Tech Week, Alice in Wonderland...and Lots of Other Nonsense!

So it's tech week for our household, that time each spring when my dear husband goes into "round the clock" mode as he shepherds a couple of dozen 4th-8th graders through the final week leading up to their play performance! This year it's The Phantom Tollbooth, and while we've missed...sort of...having Smaug the Dragon in our dining room (last year's play was The Hobbit) we've enjoyed helping to paint cardboard signs to mark Milo's journey to Dictionopolis and Digitopolis. D. built the tollbooth last weekend (it has to be something that can be assembled on stage) and we're all rooting for a great performance for the kids this coming weekend. And on Sunday we'll cap everything off with a celebration of D's birthday!

We've loved The Phantom Tollbooth for years, but having D. direct the play sent us back to the book. We've enjoyed the annotated version, though it was our old paperback copy we recently read from together. Re-reading Milo's journeys in odd and faraway lands got us thinking of other classic bits of literary nonsense. And it suddenly occurred to us that the sweet girl had never met Alice in Wonderland.

She'd encountered some of the poems from Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass (she memorized "How Doth the Little Crocodile" a few years ago, and we've enjoyed Jabberwocky more than once) but she'd never made the entire journey through Wonderland. We picked up a beautiful reading copy at the library, with illustrations by Allison Jay, and have been enjoying the humor and word play. The sweet girl has been inspired by Jay's artwork and has done some of her own terrific Alice sketches. One of my favorites is her version of Alice falling down the rabbit hole, which she is kindly letting me share here!

In all honesty, I've never been a huge fan of Alice, though I came to a greater appreciation of it in a college Victorian Lit. class. This time through has definitely been my favorite read, partly because we're enjoying it as a family and partly because it's eye-opening to read it on the heels of Tollbooth and to think about the similarities and differences. While there's no doubt that Juster must have had Alice in the back of his mind somewhere when he created Milo, I truly love that for Milo, the real "wonderland" turns out not to be the lands he visits in the fantasy section of the story, but his own everyday world. Alice falls into Wonderland and returns to the "dull reality" of the real world; Milo learns lessons in the land of wisdom and returns home to find true wonder, to discover that "everything looked new -- and worth trying."

First of Some New Features: Marmee's Library (Literature Reviews for Parents and Teachers)

It's been a busy month, and I've been writing "in the cracks and crevices." I've been missing my weekly review writing for Epinions.

One of the things I've realized, with the closing of that platform, is that review writing is in my blood. The other thing I'm realizing is that I can look at this season as a fresh new start and begin to craft some reviews, especially of children's literature, that are tailored more specifically for parents and teachers.

At some point I may collect these elsewhere. I've been considering launching a new blog, not to replace my journal space here entirely, but to provide a more specific resource space. But for now, I will be posting these reviews here under the heading of "Marmee's Library." If you find them helpful, I hope you will pass the word on to other readers, writers, teachers, parents, and homeschoolers!

I'll launch the first Marmee's Library review here tomorrow. Stay tuned!

Literary Christmas Moments

We're still meandering our way through the sweet girl's first read-through of Little Women. The timing is rather perfect, because we'll hit the second Christmas scene (Mr. March's homecoming) right on Christmas Day.

Thinking about that lovely scene, and my even more favorite LW Christmas scene from the year before, when the girls share their Christmas breakfast, got me thinking about other literary Christmas moments. Do you remember...

When Betsy Ray goes to the magical city of Milwaukee to spend Christmas with Tib and all her German-American relatives?

When Laura Ingalls holds her new rag doll Charlotte in her arms and just stares and stares at her in wonder?

Or the Christmas when Mr. Edwards meets Santa Claus and Mary and Laura get their new tin cups, their candy sticks, AND a shiny penny apiece? 

When the Austins' new baby brother is born late one Christmas Eve?

When Harry Potter opens yet one more jumper handmade by Mrs. Weasley?


When Lucy, Susan, Peter and the Beavers receive their gifts from Father Christmas, whose coming is a sure sign that Aslan is on the move and the witch's reign in Narnia is coming to an end?

When Matthew Cuthbert goes dress shopping for just the right dress (with puffed sleeves) for Anne of Green Gables?

When awful old Imogene Herdman sits there, dressed as Mary in her crookedy veil, and just cries? 

When Ramona isn't sure she wants to be a sheep in the pageant when her mother doesn't have time to finish her costume? 

When Buddy and his cousin dance in the kitchen while they make fruitcakes?

When Ebenezer Scrooge exclaims "The spirits have done it all in one night!"

These are just a few of my favorite Christmas literary moments. I'd love to hear some of your's!

Homer's Looking Pretty Good For His Age

We’re studying ancient Greeks as we head down the homestretch of this semester and totally enjoying Rosemary Sutclif’s Black Ships Before Troy, her rendering of The Iliad.

It had been a long, long time since I’d read Homer (or even a re-telling of Homer). I overdosed on Greek literature as a young adult. We read a lot of Greek drama and The Odyssey in my senior high literature class, and then I seemed to get both The Iliad and The Odyssey (not to mention Oedipus) over and over as a literature major in college. After a while, it just felt like…well, homework.

Encountering Homer again after all these years, and in a re-telling for younger readers, has been utterly delightful. I opted to turn Black Ships into a read-aloud because…well, it’s a telling of The Iliad, for goodness’ sake, based on an epic poem by a bard who himself knew the story from ancient oral traditions. Sutclif’s prose has a definite music to it.

(For those interested, I’m supplementing our reading time by having the sweet girl read up on the various gods and goddesses encountered in the story. After our read-aloud time, she reads assigned pages in D’Aulaire’s Greek Mythology and writes up what she learns about the given character. I’m having her keep a list of the major immortal players.)

The story really is thrilling, the characters so relatable. I’m reading it in my best style, sometimes just letting the prose carry us along with its high, galloping drama. Yesterday I read at lunch so D., home from work, could enjoy it too. When I paused for breath in the middle of a chapter, the sweet girl exclaimed into the sudden silence: “This is the most exciting story ever!”

Gotta love those learning moments when the past feels vivid enough to be stalking around your kitchen.