In Case You Missed It - Willie Wonka Cast

Did you see the cast of the 1971 movie, Willie Wonka and the Chocolate Factory, on the Today Show recently? In case you missed it, click the link to watch it!

No offense to Johnny Depp, but Gene Wilder really nailed that part. It's fun to hear a little on-set gossip about the making of the movie from long ago. Even if the fruity wallpaper really only "tasted like wallpaper"!

Of course, nothing can match the book itself, Roald Dahl's Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, but you can't help liking those portrayals of Veruca Salt, Augustus Gloop, and the rest. Note that the adult "Charlie" (Peter Ostrum) seems just as sweet as the child did. I got a kick out of seeing how each of those children turned out 40 years later.

And did you know that Roald Dahl went to school near a chocolate factory? Apparently the boys at his school were sometimes called upon to test the chocolates. No wonder he came up with such a great story!

A Review of The Candymakers by Wendy Mass

You're going to have to wait a few months for this one, which I read in galley form, but you might want to put it on your list. We're talking Charlie and the Chocolate Factory meets Kurosawa's Rashomon.

The Candymakers is told in four sections, essentially four novellas narrated by each of the four main characters, with some repetition of time frame as well as extensions of plot. In each section, we find out surprising information not provided by the previous section.

We also build from a very Dahlesque premise to a book that contains quite a bit of young psychological drama. In fact, I'm going to have a little trouble writing this without spoilers. But I will attempt to give you a taste of The Candymakers.

Four twelve-year-olds are competing in a sort of cooking contest. (Other contestants are gathering at other candy factories.) Each kid must design a new kind of candy. Our cast of characters includes Logan, guileless son of the factory owner, who might appear to have an unfair advantage; Miles, a candy aficionado struggling to get over seeing a young girl drown a few years earlier; Daisy, a cheery country girl who seems to like horses; and Philip, who just seems like a jerk. (In fact, for much of the book, Philip reminded me of a pint-sized version of Mr. Slugworth from the 1971 movie, Willie Wonka and the Chocolate Factory.)

But rule number one in this book is that no one is quite what he or she seems...

I started reading with a mild interest in the premise, but ended up hooked by the mysteries of the characters—their pasts, their worries, their hopes, and especially their secrets. In addition, someone appears to be a spy or a saboteur, intent on stealing the candy factory's secret ingredient, but who? And why? There's a lot of very fun sneaking around in this book, and the young characters are thoroughly likable, with the exception of Philip, and even he might win you over once you get his take on things.

Meanwhile, you will appreciate the sweet torment of questions like these: Why is Logan bad at candy making? Why does Daisy read the same romance novel all the time? When and where was butterscotch first created? And what is Phillip's secret talent?

By the end of the story, all four children have changed, and they come together in a really nice way to accomplish new goals.

The fifth character in the book is arguably the candy factory, Life Is Sweet, which has fantastical rooms and techniques that feel like an homage to Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. Who wouldn't want to visit the Cotton Candy Room, the Crunchorama Room, the High-Jumping Jelly Beans, or the chicle jungle in the Tropical Room?

I'm usually not fond of books that throw in pop psychology, and there's some of that here, but the storytelling tends to rise above it. Mass uses the approach from Rashomon (or Hoodwinked, if you will) skillfully as she builds the tale of The Candymakers. And of course, it doesn't hurt that you get to read about candy making... Look for this book in the fall!

Note: When I heard galleys were available, I requested one from the publisher, Little Brown. Currently scheduled for publication on October 5, 2010.

Enter Three Witches...

Part One

It's Halloween, so we really should address a burning question: Who are the best—or rather worst—witches of all time in children's literature? Obviously, we have to turn to fairy tales to get started. (Sorry, William! No bards allowed, despite the post title.) This move quickly produces the top two: the nameless Hansel and Gretel witch and the Russian witch, Baba Yaga.

Oh, wait, there's a broomstick jaggling across the sky, writing in hideous smoky letters, and it's not spelling out "Surrender Dorothy"; it's making a bid for number three. Well, the Wicked Witch of the West is number one in American culture, but in children's lit, she has to settle for number three. The movie Wicked Witch of the West is such a powerful image that she seems to have overtaken the print version originally created by L. Frank Baum in The Wonderful Wizard of Oz.

Besides, I give you two words: gingerbread house. It's right up there with glass slippers and poisoned apples as a fairy tale icon. The witch's trickery is scary in and of itself, but so is the juxtaposition of two stereotypes, kindly old grandmother who cooks for you with evil old witch who wants to cook you. The best retellings of Hansel and Gretel I've seen are James Marshall's classic and Paul O. Zelinsky's 1985 Caldecott Honor winner. Another intriguing version is Anthony Browne's—he's an illustrator perhaps best known for characters who are melancholy monkeys and gorillas. I also like Michael Morpurgo's lengthy retelling of the folktale, beautifully illustrated by Emma Chichester Clark. Morpurgo is the former Children's Laureate of Britain, and he adds some unusual twists to the story. Another impressive version is Newbery award-winning author Cynthia Rylant's retelling, illustrated by Jen Corace.

Now, some people might argue that Baba Yaga can't snag the number two spot on our list of witches because she's not especially well known, but instead, let's consider the criterion of scariness. Please include the cannibalism factor, which, you will note, is shared by the H&GW and Baba Yaga. Not by the Wicked Witch of the West. She just wants to kill people and take over the world—which happens regularly on prime-time TV, whether you're watching cop shows or the nightly news.

But eating little kids? Let's all shudder in unison!

Though I bow to the familiarity aspect of the witch from Hansel and Gretel, I personally like Baba Yaga for number one. This witch is scary-cool. She has iron teeth and flies around in a giant mortar, steering with the pestle. What's more, she lives in a hut that walks through the forest on chicken feet. When it stays in one place, the fence around her house is made of human bones topped off with skull torches.

For this story, I recommend Baba Yaga and Vasilisa the Brave, a retelling by Marianna Mayer with illustrations by Kinuko Y. Craft. The art's gorgeous, though I have to say, the portrait of the witch is so scary that the artist added a little joke at the bottom to lighten it up. The story basically consists of a wicked stepmother sending Vasilisa into the forest to borrow fire from the witch. Neither the stepmother nor the witch knows that the girl has a magic doll, a gift from her dead mother, that will help her prevail. Mayer's version includes the second part of the story, in which, having escaped Baba Yaga's clutches, Vasilisa makes a shirt for the tsar and ends up marrying him.

Another book I adore is a shorter variation that includes different fairy tale conventions: e.g., kindness to animals—and gates—pays off, and a flung mirror turns into a lake. (The same version of the story is the centerpiece of a 1997 film called Lawn Dogs, featuring Sam Rockwell and a young Mischa Barton.) Bony Legs is the title, and it's also the name of the witch in this easy reader, though the house on chicken feet and interest in eating little girls clearly marks her as Baba Yaga. Kids in K-2 and struggling older readers really like Bony Legs. Part of the fun is that the witch instructs the girl to take a bath so that her dinner will be nice and clean... but the cat helps our heroine trick old Bony Legs.

I also own an out-of-print book called Baba Yaga and the Wise Doll, retold by Hiawyn Oram and illustrated by Ruth Brown. The Vasilisa character in Oram's version is much younger, and she is called Too Nice. By the end of the story, she learns not to be quite such a pushover. [Update: Check out this post by author Lucy Coats about Baba Yaga at Seven Miles of Steel Thistle.]

So the Hansel and Gretel witch, Baba Yaga, and the Wicked Witch of the West are my top three. And, speaking of poisoned apples, Snow White's stepmother is number four. (She should probably be tied for #3, but witches aren't much for sharing.) There are a lot of versions of this one, but I like the one retold by Josephine Poole and illustrated by Angela Barrett. Nancy Ekholm Burkert's version won a Caldecott Honor in 1973. Charles Santore's Snow White is really lovely, too—take a look at the painting of of the princess fallen on the floor of the dwarfs' cottage, for example. The inimitable Trina Schart Hyman has also illustrated Snow White, with the retelling done by Paul Heins.

Number five is probably the witch in Rapunzel, who confiscates the baby of a salad thief. When the child is older, the witch imprisons her in a tower, with the only access the girl's long braid. Upon discovering that a prince has been visiting her charge, the furious witch dumps Rapunzel in the desert and then ambushes the girl's suitor, pushing him from the high window. He ends up being blinded on the brambles at the foot of the tower. Eww. See Paul O. Zelinsky's Caldecott-winning edition. (Or try a spoof, Leah Wilcox and Lydia Monk's Falling for Rapunzel. No witch, but very funny!)

For number six, let's say the sea witch from Hans Christian Anderson's story, The Little Mermaid. I don't have a favorite edition, though Charles Santore and Lisbeth Zwerger have both illustrated it.

Since I felt the ghost of Walt Disney breathing down my neck with numbers four and six, for number seven I'll pick an obscure witch from the Brothers Grimm tale, "Jorinda and Joringel." The crone hobbles around the forest turning young girls into birds, which she collects in cages in a huge room inside the tumbledown castle where she resides. When a courting couple walks too close to the hag's lair, Jorinda is turned into a nightingale while Joringel is frozen helplessly in place till moonrise. It is only by means of a dream that the boy eventually finds the key to freeing his love—and all of the other girls trapped in the castle. ("The Blue Light" or "The Tinderbox" is another Grimms' story with a witch in it.)

For number eight, how about a witch from Isaac Bashevis Singer's original Jewish folktale, The Fearsome Inn? Doboshova is an innkeeper who, with her devilish husband, enchants and robs travelers. She also keeps three young girls prisoner to serve guests. But the new guests are no ordinary youths... This story, illustrated by Nonny Hogrogrian, won a Newbery Honor award in 1968.

I'll admit I'm partial to wicked witches, but the good ones deserve a turn here, too. Number nine can be Strega Nona, Tomie DePaola's cheery Italian creation.

Witch number ten is another nice one. We meet her in The Talking Eggs: A Folktale from the American South, retold by Robert D. San Souci and illustrated by Jerry Pinkney. I read all the great picture books I could get my hands on to a first grade class one year, and I kid you not: This 1990 Caldecott Honor book beat out every single one of the others. Maybe it's because the strange old woman in the woods is able to take off her head and set it on her lap to comb her hair, or because the eggs out in the henhouse can talk. Also, the mean sister gets her comeuppance. (The original Grimms' tale is "Mother Hulda," by the way. Since the woman in that story is in charge of snowfall, she strikes me as a minor deity as much as a witch.)

And because every Top Ten list should have a number eleven, I'll add Audrey and Don Wood's Heckedy Peg to my collection of witches. She's the title character in an original "folktale" that involves—you guessed it, a cannibalistic witch. As is typical of the Woods' collaborations, the illustrations in Heckedy Peg are simply glorious. A witch kidnaps seven children while their mother is away and turns them into food. She is just about to start her feast when the mother shows up. Then a rather unusual guessing game begins.

Part Two

Of course, other than The Wizard of Oz, I haven't even touched on middle grade fiction, where we find countless wonderful and horrifying witches. I'll mention several, though I'll stop with the rankings already. To begin with, pointy black hats off to the witch from The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe by C.S. Lewis. The White Witch is a standout, not only because she stars in a classic, but because she memorably uses Turkish Delight to bribe young Edward into treachery. (She is also reminiscent of Hans Christian Anderson's cool-as-ice Snow Queen, a witchy character I probably should have listed above.)

My own favorite witch in middle grade fiction is Tiffany Aching from Terry Pratchett's The Wee Free Men, A Hat Full of Sky, and Wintersmith. Pratchett's best witch ever is actually from his Discworld books for grown-ups, and Granny Weatherwax makes cameo appearances in the Tiffany Aching books. Tiffany seems like a young Granny Weatherwax at times, but I do think she holds her own in these books for young readers, a strong character in her own right.

Another notable witch in middle grade fiction is Mrs. Coulter from Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials trilogy. The woman is eventually revealed to be the mother of our heroine, Lyra Belacqua. Mrs. Coulter's greed and evil are only tempered by her secret love for her child. (I'll admit that Mrs. Coulter may not technically be a witch, but she is awfully witchy!)

And who can forget the title characters from Roald Dahl's book, The Witches? Dahl does something fresh with the idea, of course, giving us witches who can smell children—and hate the smell. The witches have no hair, so they must wear wigs, and they wear gloves to disguise their clawed hands. They have no toes, either. Perhaps most deliciously creepy of all, witches have bright blue saliva. As a group, Dahl's witches are dedicated to destroying as many children as they can, in an organized campaign.

Considering the Harry Potter books have been vilified for having witches in them, I can hardly neglect to mention them. Not counting talented young witch Hermione Granger, the best of the good witches is no doubt Minerva McGonagell, with Sirius Black's evil cousin Bellatrix Lestrange "winning" as the worst of the bad witches in the series.

A book that should make you laugh is Eva Ibbotson's Which Witch, about a wizard named Arriman the Awful who is in need of a wife. What follows is a mixed-up version of the Dating Game, complete with magic, cheaters and nefarious behind-the-scenes plotting.

Eleanor Estes' The Witch Family is a cackling classic. Though bits of it may seem cloying to today's readers, the good parts are really good. In other words, certain second and third grade girls will eat this up. It's the story of two girls inventing an old witch who is so scary that she takes on a life of her own, but eventually she is tamed by the addition of a witch girl and even a witch baby to her household. This one's just plain cute!

I might as well throw in Elizabeth George Speare's The Witch of Blackbird Pond, which won the Newbery in 1959. Even though the book is only about an accused witch, it skillfully raises the specter of the Salem Witch Trials, showing us how easily someone who's a little different can be flagged as a witch. Plus it's a really good story, albeit a little dense for today's rush-rush young readers.

And let's not forget the Witch of the Waste from Howl's Moving Castle, a book I talked about in last week's post on Diana Wynne Jones.

A few more witchy picks, mostly picture books: editor Daisy Wallace and Trina Schart Hyman's Witch Poems, The Witches' Supermarket and The Witch's Walking Stick by Susan Meddaugh, Guess What? by Mem Fox and Vivienne Goodman, and Shake Dem Halloween Bones by W. Nikola-Lisa and Mike Reed. So there you have it, a cavalcade of witches plus a non-witchy bonus (Shake Dem Halloween Bones, a very fun read aloud). Please feel free to suggest other good witch books in the comments section!

By the way, I spent this morning carving pumpkins with my students, a thoroughly satisfying endeavor. The kids are planning to be zombies, vampires, and green Barneys for Halloween. Their favorite candy seems to be a tie between Reese's and Snickers.

Here's witching you a Happy Halloween!

Note for Worried Parents: If witches are offensive to you for religious reasons, then this post simply isn't for you. If they aren't, you may still find some of the books a little alarming. For example, the other day I overheard a parent worrying that Hansel and Gretel might be too scary for their child. What I've found, say, in reading Bony Legs to first graders, is that they just peg the witch as a bad guy and cheer for the girl as she makes her escape. I guess my point is, most kids don't seem too concerned that tomorrow they will run across a house on chicken feet inhabited by a cannibal witch. But if your child is very sensitive, you know best! (I would say that if the Disney witches scare your child, then so will these books. If not, then not.)

Update: Two more classic witches in the picture book category are Patricia Coombs's Dorrie and The Witch Next Door by Norman Bridwell, the creator of Clifford, the big red dog. Patricia Coombs is no relation, though I was once mistaken for her! I also read a review that reminded me of a middle grades classic, The Wednesday Witch by Ruth Chew, so look for that at your library.

Anarchy of the Imagination: Why I Love Children’s Books

The only law I’ve ever been inclined to break is the speed limit. I believe humans need some kind of social structure in order to live well, and I’m basically a solid citizen. Among other considerations, social anarchy strikes me as being shortsighted.

But when it comes to the imagination, I’m all for anarchy. And children’s book writers are some of the most subversive people I know. One obvious example is Maurice Sendak’s Where the Wild Things Are, AKA the best picture book of all time. This book actually makes my mother uncomfortable, I suspect because she’d rather not be reminded that kids can be little monsters.

The audacious thing about children’s books is that they cast children as heroes and then refuse to spare them from the law of consequences. In the best children’s books, parents are generally absent from the scene as young characters struggle, problem solve, and pretty much take over the world, sometimes even saving it. In contrast, parents are the ultimate deus ex machina, so they are wisely avoided for pages on end. Max and his mother forgive each other at the conclusion of Sendak’s book because that’s what families do, but in the meantime, Max bravely faces and tames his own ravenous monsters.

Roald Dahl is another author known for his anarchic tendencies. The adults in his books are often despicable, for example the aunts in James and the Giant Peach or the headmistress and parents in Matilda. It’s easy to get caught up in this child-against-parent dynamic and feel, like my mother, vaguely troubled by it. However, Dahl’s adults are ultimately peripheral: what’s more important is the creative problem solving practiced by his young characters. After all, if your guardians are deeply evil, it’s a fantastic idea to befriend some oversized bugs and escape in a giant, rolling piece of fruit.

Where most television shows emphasize predictable solutions to paltry problems, children’s books offer their readers endless possibilities. These books go beyond encouraging kids to think outside the box. In fact, said box lies moldering and forgotten as children travel into enchanted forests or ride swift horses into the distance or follow winding paths of friendship in more realistic settings. The promise of unexpected possibilities is one of the great gifts of children’s literature.

I noticed that an Amazon customer recently reviewed Ingrid Law’s book Savvy with disdain. She was particularly bothered by the fact that Mibs and her friends and siblings choose to get on a bus with a stranger, clearly a high-risk social behavior. But Law isn’t writing a TV episode about serial killers, she’s describing an archetypal journey. Questions of protection are left behind when literary characters dive down rabbit holes, walk through wardrobes, or fight secret wars with their peers (see Printz winner Jellicoe Road). Two of the challenges Mibs faces are figuring out how to get where she’s going—in part by solving the discouraged Bible salesman’s problems—and how to make her savvy serve her cause even though it isn’t what she wanted it to be. Not talking to strangers is an easy real-life lesson to remember. Mibs’s problems require far more effort, imagination, and courage.

In Mo Willems’s books, characters are inclined to make assumptions about the world, and those assumptions regularly turn out to be wrong. That’s what it’s like to be a child, of course. Elephant and Piggie work it out together, but Pigeon is on his own, fighting an inexplicably uncooperative, faceless team of grown-ups. When his assumptions get turned upside down he must adapt, and fast, learning to think in new ways. For example, the Pigeon is sure he will love having a puppy—right up until he encounters one. But his enthusiasm is not squelched. Instead he quickly comes up with a fresh solution, a shiny new goal for himself.

In my favorite chapter of Neil Gaiman’s The Graveyard Book, young Bod sets out to buy a headstone for his new friend, the ghost of a witch. Like Voltaire’s Candide, he is not nearly as frightened by the obstacles he encounters as he should be. When Bod’s original plan doesn’t work, he comes up with a new one, never losing sight of his compassionate purpose even when he must escape from a menacing pawnshop owner.

The cleverness, courage, and creativity of children's book heroes is one kind of anarchy: these young characters defy the limited expectations of their elders. A more overt type of anarchy is the necessity of avoiding adult supervision in order to accomplish the tasks of the plot. This is so familiar to readers of children's books that we tend to overlook it. Anarchy can also be a literary theme or a character trait. As such, it may be celebrated openly, as in Brock Cole's picture book Larky Mavis or a YA I just read, The Disreputable History of Frankie Landau-Banks by E. Lockhart. Other times anarchy is a whisper, really just the power of a character being so thoroughly him- or herself. Winnie the Pooh is quietly determined to do his own thing, as is supposedly sweet Sara Crewe in the classic, A Little Princess. These subtler heroes may be just as powerful for the young reader as those more obvious warriors clankingly clad in full armor.

I was just talking to a teacher who gave his new student a typical writing assignment to test her skills: "Describe your favorite place." When she handed in her paper, my friend expected to see yet another description of "My Room" or "The Beach." But this girl had chosen well: Her favorite place was her mind.

Together, children’s book writers conspire to build a vast, edgeless playground of the imagination where children can deal with surprising situations in surprising ways. In this space, moral behavior is often rewarded, but so is creativity. Whereas in the real world, kids encounter few true opportunities to stretch their creative muscles and take risks, children’s book writers trust their young characters and the readers who accompany them to accomplish miraculous feats in the land formed from ink and myth.