From: Beth Wright <bethlibrarian>
Date: Wed, 19 Jul 2006 11:41:00 -0700 (PDT)

On the topic of new versions of older books:

I just read Rachel Field's Hitty: Her First Hundred Years and Rosemary Wells' 1999 "adaptation" of this 1930 Newbery winner about a well-traveled wooden doll and her various owners. I use the quotation marks around adaptation not to disparage the Wells version, which I found very enjoyable, but because I'm not sure if adaptation is really the right word. It's more like a paralell universe story, with different secondary characters and different plot twists but some of the same settings as the original book. Wells also removed many cultural stereotypes present in Field's original text. The new version is much more heavily illustrated than the original, with full-color spot and full-page illustrations by Susan Jeffers throughout. Altogether I thought it was a very appealing update to a story that deserved a new lease on life.

Beth Wright

Beth Wright Youth Services Librarian Fletcher Free Library Burlington, Vermont
(802) 865-7216 bethlibrarian at yahoo.com

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Received on Wed 19 Jul 2006 01:41:00 PM CDT