I was a little shocked to see how long ago it was that I last reached into my children's book cabinet.
It was very last minute that I suddenly thought Halloween ... witches ... children's book ... ooooh, Eleanor Estes! ... re-read the book and threw this post together in one night (therefore the pictures in the shine of my reading lamp which might be happening more than once in the future).
My book today is "Die Kinder, die Hexen zaubern konnten", later published as "Die Hexenfamilie", the literal translation of the original title "The Witch Family" (spoilers ahead as usual).
They love to hear stories of Old Witch that Amy's mother is telling them, and they love to draw. So one day in February, they draw pictures of Old Witch, and Amy decides to "banquish" her (she likes to make up words or sometimes still has a problem with more difficult ones) to the bare glass hill because she's so mean and because little bunnies are her favorite food.
Then the girls remember that Halloween would be very boring without Old Witch, so she's allowed to come down on that one day, but only if she has been good for a whole year.
Amy explains to Clarissa that it's important to put things in writing. Luckily, she likes to write letters which a red cardinal takes to their recipients.
Amy also has an emissary on the glass hill, Malachi (which means messenger) the magical spelling bee who plays an important role throughout. Old Witch can't see him but feel his stings, only her cat Tom knows where he's hiding.
As a reward for being good, Amy eventually allows Old Witch to say an Abracadabra which brings her Little Witch Girl Hannah with her cat Little Tommy for company.
Hannah goes to witch school and on her birthday she's having a party with her classmates ... and Amy and Clarissa!
And after giving Hannah a best friend, a mermaid with a baby sister, Amy finally also fulfills the girl's wish for a baby sister of her own, tiny kitten included.
The border between the worlds begins to blur more and more.
One day, the girls draw rabbits painting eggs on their meadow and Old Witch can see that scene for real through her telescope.
Despite knowing the consequences, she swoops down on the rabbits and eats them and their eggs, at least that's what she thinks. Malachi has warned the rabbits who have been prepared for such a situation and put out toy rabbits and painted rocks which give Old Witch an upset stomach.
Amy, however, is generous because none of the real rabbits have come to harm and still allows her to come down for Halloween.
On Halloween, not only Old Witch is coming down, though. Hannah askdevoursr mermaid friend to babysit her little sister, so she can participate as well and fly to Garden Lane to see Amy and Clarissa. She meets Amy who wears a witch costume and they swap places, but Hannah uses the wrong spell for the broom which flies Amy back to the glass hill. Just in time, Hannah manages to give Amy a note with a spell for Malachi.
On the glass hill, Amy notices for the first time how cold and bare it is and that it can't be very nice for the witches having to live there.
After having to spend a whole night on the hill and a morning at the witch school, the little witches find out that she's the one who banished Old Witch. They threaten to turn her into a rabbit to give to the head witch, but Malachi saves her with his magical powers and takes her home. For Hannah, who has been waiting for her at Garden Lane, only two minutes have gone by.
The next day, Amy and Clarissa are drawing again.
Hannah gets a letter from Amy telling her to look around and she sees grass and flowers coming up everywhere, the house turns white, and there's even a lake, so the mermaids can visit them!
Even Old Witch likes how pretty everything looks now.
Clarissa is surprised about the decision, but says that Old Witch was "good ever after" now, right? Amy can't believe it.
Estes's book is from 1960 and the first German translation from 1971 which means the book was actually still quite new when I got it first from the library as a child. And then again. And again. I read it a lot and think the illustrations by Edward Ardizzone are just perfect.
I love this book so much and would still be able to show you the exact spot where it stood on the shelf, if the old library still existed, that is.
When I wrote this post, I only had the German translation and therefore looked for reviews that would help me with original names or words - there's a lot of wordplay (which is why I also ordered the original now) - and found an academic article (see below).
It describes the book as "an innovative work of metafiction, which explicitly engages with a number of philosophical and literary-critical issues central to postmodern and poststructuralist discussion".
I would lie if I claimed I understood all of it (the professor is an expert in the field) or even read all of it with full concentration, but there were some interesting points.
I couldn't help wondering what authors think about articles like this one? Was all of that "innovation" planned through or was it practice or did it just happen or maybe a bit of everything?
Of course, not everyone thinks the book is so great (as always). Some people find it repetitive or too old-fashioned, the characters flat or Malachi annoying with his spelling (which I kind of get in case of audiobooks or people reading it to children, but as a reader I always just ignore that and don't spell out in my head what he says), Amy too overpowering and Clarissa too reserved.
You know something, though? These kids are six. Some children have a lot of fantasy and others not as much. Sometimes one child is the leader and others run along. I have experienced that myself, both as follower and leader depending on the story. It doesn't mean Amy is automatically a bully and it doesn't mean that Clarissa will never have anything to say (which is hinted at in the ending, by the way, when Amy accepts one of Clarissa's ideas).
Maybe you sometimes have to give your inner child the chance to read along with the grown up you to retain the magic? What were you like as a child?
Back then, I just went along with those two worlds opening up to each other without even wondering if all of this was just Amy's imagination and what she learned from the story. I probably wanted it to be possible (just like the talking Kasperle).
I may have mentioned before that I told myself made up stories when walking somewhere. Imagine those had come true! I'm not sure I could have handled the responsibility.
Anyhow, the book's magic still works for me today.
Do you have a favorite witch book of your own?
Source and further reading:
Dawn Heinecken: The Reality of Fiction and the Ethics of Storytelling in Eleanor Estes’s The Witch Family. In: Children’s Literature in Education 41, 2010, 3, pp. 260–272
DOI 10.1007/s10583-010-9108-x (closed access)
It was very last minute that I suddenly thought Halloween ... witches ... children's book ... ooooh, Eleanor Estes! ... re-read the book and threw this post together in one night (therefore the pictures in the shine of my reading lamp which might be happening more than once in the future).
My book today is "Die Kinder, die Hexen zaubern konnten", later published as "Die Hexenfamilie", the literal translation of the original title "The Witch Family" (spoilers ahead as usual).
 |
| Gundel approves of a book with witches AND their three black cats! She gives it five out of five headbonks. |
One day, Old Witch, the head witch of all the witches, was banished. Amy, just an ordinary real girl, not a witch, said Old Witch would have to go away. So Old Witch had to go.Amy and her best friend Clarissa, both almost seven years of age, live on Garden Lane in Washington, D.C.
They love to hear stories of Old Witch that Amy's mother is telling them, and they love to draw. So one day in February, they draw pictures of Old Witch, and Amy decides to "banquish" her (she likes to make up words or sometimes still has a problem with more difficult ones) to the bare glass hill because she's so mean and because little bunnies are her favorite food.
Then the girls remember that Halloween would be very boring without Old Witch, so she's allowed to come down on that one day, but only if she has been good for a whole year.
Amy explains to Clarissa that it's important to put things in writing. Luckily, she likes to write letters which a red cardinal takes to their recipients.
"You must be good. You must not be bad. You must go and live on the glass hill always. But if you will be good, you can come back on Halloween night. So, please be good!"That's really hard for Old Witch who's head witch after all and a very good one, but not by Amy's definition of good (a problem that Otfried Preußler's "The Little Witch" from 1957 is facing as well - what is good?).
Amy also has an emissary on the glass hill, Malachi (which means messenger) the magical spelling bee who plays an important role throughout. Old Witch can't see him but feel his stings, only her cat Tom knows where he's hiding.
As a reward for being good, Amy eventually allows Old Witch to say an Abracadabra which brings her Little Witch Girl Hannah with her cat Little Tommy for company.
Hannah goes to witch school and on her birthday she's having a party with her classmates ... and Amy and Clarissa!
And after giving Hannah a best friend, a mermaid with a baby sister, Amy finally also fulfills the girl's wish for a baby sister of her own, tiny kitten included.
 |
| This has always been my favorite picture in the book. |
The border between the worlds begins to blur more and more.
One day, the girls draw rabbits painting eggs on their meadow and Old Witch can see that scene for real through her telescope.
Despite knowing the consequences, she swoops down on the rabbits and eats them and their eggs, at least that's what she thinks. Malachi has warned the rabbits who have been prepared for such a situation and put out toy rabbits and painted rocks which give Old Witch an upset stomach.
Amy, however, is generous because none of the real rabbits have come to harm and still allows her to come down for Halloween.
On Halloween, not only Old Witch is coming down, though. Hannah askdevoursr mermaid friend to babysit her little sister, so she can participate as well and fly to Garden Lane to see Amy and Clarissa. She meets Amy who wears a witch costume and they swap places, but Hannah uses the wrong spell for the broom which flies Amy back to the glass hill. Just in time, Hannah manages to give Amy a note with a spell for Malachi.
On the glass hill, Amy notices for the first time how cold and bare it is and that it can't be very nice for the witches having to live there.
After having to spend a whole night on the hill and a morning at the witch school, the little witches find out that she's the one who banished Old Witch. They threaten to turn her into a rabbit to give to the head witch, but Malachi saves her with his magical powers and takes her home. For Hannah, who has been waiting for her at Garden Lane, only two minutes have gone by.
The next day, Amy and Clarissa are drawing again.
Hannah gets a letter from Amy telling her to look around and she sees grass and flowers coming up everywhere, the house turns white, and there's even a lake, so the mermaids can visit them!
Even Old Witch likes how pretty everything looks now.
Clarissa is surprised about the decision, but says that Old Witch was "good ever after" now, right? Amy can't believe it.
"Wicked Old Mean Old Witch? Good ever after? Clarissa, are you a nope[sic]?? Of course, she wasn’t. She was still awful sometimes. The rest of the time she was good. Only when she was awful she was not good. Clarissa, listen to me. She IS Old Witch, isn’t she? What is the good of Old Witch if she is good all the time?"Then she asks her mother to tell them about Old Witch again ... the story goes on.
Estes's book is from 1960 and the first German translation from 1971 which means the book was actually still quite new when I got it first from the library as a child. And then again. And again. I read it a lot and think the illustrations by Edward Ardizzone are just perfect.
I love this book so much and would still be able to show you the exact spot where it stood on the shelf, if the old library still existed, that is.
When I wrote this post, I only had the German translation and therefore looked for reviews that would help me with original names or words - there's a lot of wordplay (which is why I also ordered the original now) - and found an academic article (see below).
It describes the book as "an innovative work of metafiction, which explicitly engages with a number of philosophical and literary-critical issues central to postmodern and poststructuralist discussion".
I would lie if I claimed I understood all of it (the professor is an expert in the field) or even read all of it with full concentration, but there were some interesting points.
I couldn't help wondering what authors think about articles like this one? Was all of that "innovation" planned through or was it practice or did it just happen or maybe a bit of everything?
Of course, not everyone thinks the book is so great (as always). Some people find it repetitive or too old-fashioned, the characters flat or Malachi annoying with his spelling (which I kind of get in case of audiobooks or people reading it to children, but as a reader I always just ignore that and don't spell out in my head what he says), Amy too overpowering and Clarissa too reserved.
You know something, though? These kids are six. Some children have a lot of fantasy and others not as much. Sometimes one child is the leader and others run along. I have experienced that myself, both as follower and leader depending on the story. It doesn't mean Amy is automatically a bully and it doesn't mean that Clarissa will never have anything to say (which is hinted at in the ending, by the way, when Amy accepts one of Clarissa's ideas).
Maybe you sometimes have to give your inner child the chance to read along with the grown up you to retain the magic? What were you like as a child?
Back then, I just went along with those two worlds opening up to each other without even wondering if all of this was just Amy's imagination and what she learned from the story. I probably wanted it to be possible (just like the talking Kasperle).
I may have mentioned before that I told myself made up stories when walking somewhere. Imagine those had come true! I'm not sure I could have handled the responsibility.
Anyhow, the book's magic still works for me today.
Do you have a favorite witch book of your own?
Source and further reading:
Dawn Heinecken: The Reality of Fiction and the Ethics of Storytelling in Eleanor Estes’s The Witch Family. In: Children’s Literature in Education 41, 2010, 3, pp. 260–272
DOI 10.1007/s10583-010-9108-x (closed access)
No wonder Gundel gave the book top marks: a good story, black cats and some really lovely drawings (I also like the ones with the flying witches and the dancing ones). Now, when it comes to witches, apart from the classic fairy tales, the first thing that comes to mind is Witches Abroad by Terry Pratchett. It was the first Discworld book I ever read. I remember buying it because of the cover. And although I know I missed out on a lot of laughs because of my poor English, I still had plenty of them!
ReplyDeleteOh Mercè, you've got to be kidding me. That was my first Pratchett book, too (obviously we were meant to know each other)! Had I told you that I had originally planned to call Gundel Gytha Ogg? The name was chosen before was she even there, though, and she when she came, she was so small and skinny that I just couldn't see Nanny Ogg in her. Gundel Gaukeley was a smaller witch and had black hair, so it seemed a better match.
DeleteThe headbonks were literal ones, by the way. It took me several attempts to get a picture because she kept bonking the book!