Pa beats Laura for playing with Jack (their lovable dog) on the Sabbath. He then looks at her sadly and they cuddle as he regales her with stories of how much more difficult it was for little children–and especially little girls– back in her grandfather’s day.
Summer days in the Northwest are long, it stays light until about 10pm. By the time we are reading our kids to bed, it can be pretty late. My ability to edit what I am reading on the fly is usually challenged by a glass of wine, the day’s mental exhaustion, and the cozy kid I’m snuggled up to.
Wilder’s series are not safe, but neither was life back then. The family lives in the woods amongst wild cats, bears, and boars. Life is harrowing in the Big Woods and Little House on the Prairie tales, and as my wife was says, it is up to us to teach them about the dangers in the world–though, she definitely wants to do so in a measured and caring way. I do see that Pa and Ma provide a loving home during a time in our country’s history that was bloody, harsh, and ever-changing.
There are details on how the frontier family hunts and stores food which is sure to get any nouveaux city chef a total food-on.
Though I am reluctant to be the delivery mechanism for those dangers just as she is about to drift off to sweet kid-land slumber, it was not so many years ago that I would have banished the books on some type of moral high ground. Either I’m loosening up, getting tired or simply finding more gray in how I approach the world.
Fortunately, my daughter still likes the passionate, loving, non-fascist cartoons of Dr. Theodore Seuss. But who doesn’t?
{ 3 comments… read them below or add one }
Stopping by from Dad Blogs. I like your writing style. It’s easy and fun to read.
I read the original Curious George book recently and had to laugh about how George smokes a pipe in the book. Totally not acceptible today. Even childrens books have changed with the times. But Dr. Seuss remains forever a classic.
Thanks for the nice words, Otter. What is being written today that is going to be a classic? I agree, whatever it is will not include pipe smoking…which is kinda too bad, eh?
What I want to know is what is written today that will be considered unacceptable in 50 or 100 years. I loved The Giving Tree as a child but when I went to college I found out it was banned in Boulder, CO for being anti-environment, anti-tree. I am a tree lover and totally see their point, but how do I reconcile how much I loved that story? It’s really a martyrdom story. Wow, this books from our childhood/books we read to our children topic deserves a WHOLE blog of it’s own…don’t get any ideas, Mister. You have plenty of blogs!