Slighted Children's Literary Characters #2

Taking the next look at some of our favorite kid's books and the neglected characters within,
from Margaret Wise Brown's book Goodnight Moon, pictures by Clement Hurd:
Slighted Children's Literary Character:   The Little Bunny

This book gives plenty of attention to inanimate household objects like telephones, pictures, clocks, lights, chairs and so forth.  Random creatures in the house also get a shout out - mice, kittens, bears and cows.  Gigantic pieces of rock (i.e the moon) and bowls of mush (I won't even comment on why we are presented with mush instead of soup, or cereal or even a candy bar) are spoken to.   A creepy, hushing lady even gets her time in the book. 




But the guy who appears the most in the book is woefully neglected.   Our friend the little bunny appears on seven pages, but does he get a "good night little bunny?"  Not at all!  He is even overshadowed by "nobody" as readers are given a "Goodnight nobody" page for some odd reason.

So here's some recognition, Little Bunny!  The book would never have become a best seller without your strong action in the background, resting and wiggling and looking around and sleeping.

***Note:  The part of the Little Bunny was actually played by an adult dwarf rabbit named Mr. Alfred Hoppertop. 

Slighted Children's Literary Characters #1

There are approximately 5 billion children's books available in the world.  Well, I'm not really 100% positive on that number.  I googled it but without a good answer within the first few lines of google results, I did some quick math and came up with this very statistically valid number.

And within this vast multitude of books, there are also a vast multitude of characters.   Let's just take the average of 8.32 characters per children's book and you have 41.6 billion characters out there.  This number increases daily.  Now usually there are 1-3 main characters in a book.  You have figures like Dorothy in The Wizard of Oz, Max in Where in the Wild Things Are, Pat in Pat the Bunny, and Mike Mulligan in Mike Mulligan and His Steam Shovel.  All good guys, but they seem to monopolize the story.

What about the minor characters?  Those who showed up for work on time to appear in the story, but were shunted aside, names forgotten (if even given one), misidentified, stuck in the background - always slighted to give more screen time to the glory-hogging title characters.

Well, this is their time.   A time for them to shine.  A time for you to get their names correct!

First up, from L. Frank Baum's book The Wizard of Oz, illustrated by W.W Denslow:
Slighted Children's Literary Character:   The Good Witch of the North


I must say up front, to clear up all misunderstandings perpetrated by the delightful yet inaccurate 1939 movie, HER NAME IS NOT GLINDA.  I am sure she would thank me.

Her only major appearance happened near the beginning of Baum's first Oz book, The Wizard of Oz.  She met Dorothy right after Dorothy slew the Wicked Witch of the East with her farmhouse, advised her to go see the Wizard in the Emerald City and gave her a magical kiss of protection.  She did her best to advise and assist Dorothy; however, in one of the few pictures we see of the Good Witch of the North, that glory hound Dorothy stepped in front of the Good Witch's pose, ruining what would have a been a great publicity shot.

To make matters worse, MGM decided it was too confusing to have two good witches in their movie, so they combined the Good Witch of the North with Glinda, the Good Witch of the South, and thus we have one of the greatest slights in children's literature history.  So from then on, I imagine that every time the Good Witch of the North attended a magical convention or fairy dance or whatever good witches do and introduced herself, she had to put up with, "So your name is Glinda, right?" 

Say no to Glinda!

And she later received even less homage.  When a subsequent Oz author, Ruth Plumly Thompson, wrote her into a new Oz book entitled The Giant Horse of Oz, the Good Witch was first given the imbecilic name Tattypoo, and was later magically transformed into an entirely new character, effectively disposing of the Good Witch forever.

So there you have it.   Give the good old lady some respect.   She carried a wickedly good wand.

And put aside the Wizard of Oz movie dvd, sit down and actually read the book to your kids.  They, and Tattypoo <groan>, will thank you.