Monday, October 30, 2023
Finished reading: Charlotte’s Web by E. B. White π β βοΈ βοΈ βοΈ βοΈ βοΈ
Skip and dance, jump and prance! Go down through the orchard and stroll in the woods! The world is a wonderful place when youβre young.
It sure is.
What a hell of an amazing book to relegate to the unjustly dismissed “children’s” shelves. This book gets five stars, no question about it.
White manages to address, in my opinion, so many of The Important Things We All Should Learn About Rather Young If Possible, including misogyny/clueless men, bullies, transactional acquaintances, competition, the joy and sorrow of freedom, the dilemma of the naive but intelligent, parenting (well, let’s be honest, mostly motherhood), the distinction between pathology and an innocent’s rational-from-their-perspective perceptions, the rarity and value of adults who are aware of the immediately preceding concept (like the inimitable Dr. Dorian), evolution, religion, birth and death, and, of course, the intergenerational power of real, no-but-seriously-really-real friendship that reaches out beyond its originators and enriches those who come after, in ways known and unknown, for years or decades to come.
Like I said, just a hell of a book.