Tuesday, April 14, 2015

Harriet the Spy

So I'm writing a book. I know. I know. Who isn't writing a book. Anyway, the book I'm writing is for kids, so I've been reading A LOT of children's books both new and old, creepy and kooky and if I'm lucky - both! Of course I had to revisit books from my own childhood like this one.



I'm sure I read Harriet the Spy as a kid but when I reread it recently the only thing that seemed at all familiar were the pictures which are so funny. The writer - Louise Fitzhugh - is also the illustrator.






This is Mrs. Golly -Harriet's nanny's mother. "She stood like a mountain. Her big ham hands dangling helplessly at her sides."










I highly recommend "Harriet the Spy" to both young and old. It is truly funny but also heartbreaking and kind of disturbing. I mean, Harriet can be a creepy, nasty little girl. She breaks into people's homes to spy on them and writes terrible things in her notebook about everyone! Don't misunderstand me. I like Harriet. She's awesome in the way she wants to know EVERYTHING and she is such an individual. But would I want to be friends with her? Maybe not. She is so bossy! And frankly, she's a Mean Girl albeit not a popular one. I sure wouldn't want to end up in her notebook. She'd probably rip me to shreds like she did this poor kid:










This is Rachel. If Harriet had a club she wouldn't let her in.









Come to think of it, I did have a friend in 6th grade kind of like Harriet. Her name was Claudia and before we became friends, she'd make fun of me for walking around with my nose in the air. To be fair, I did walk around with my nose in the air but that was because I was trying to keep my hair out of my face. Clearly I never heard of barrettes. Finally, one day my head was so high, I tripped right over her. We became friends shortly thereafter. She wrote in my yearbook, "Keep your head down, before you kill someone."

Back to the book. I do not need my protagonists to be particularly likable. They just have to be interesting and Harriet certainly is. Despite her faults, you will ultimately root for her. She just needs to figure out how to use her powers for good not evil!

Why you should like Harriet M. Welsch
  • She's smart although bad at math
  • Not a girly girl
  • Questions authority
  • Fearless
  • Observant
  • Sure she can be mean, but weren't we all kind of mean when we were kids? Some of us still are....

I Laughed out Loud
  • Harriet is a fiend for tomato sandwiches. She refuses to eat anything else for lunch. This has been going on for five years.
  • Harriet has a very antagonistic relationship with the surly cook who she is constantly annoying and running into. 
  • Pinky Whitehead - enough said!
  • Harriet spies on a couple that buy ugly, expensive stuff for their house and specifically invite people over to admire it. Other than that, they just sit around all day like lumps.
Harriet the Onion




Harriet has to be an onion in the school holiday play. (I had it worse. I had to be a piece of tissue paper in my school play.)













My Jaw Dropped
  • Harriet throws a shoe. At her father! Hits him right in the head.
  • Harriet writes for the school paper and she writes about a fellow student's father being "stoned out of his mind at a party" and about a teacher living in a rat hole. And they published it! Harriet's future career - Tabloid Writer.

This book is Old! More than 50 Years! But is it Dated?
  • Harriet wanders the upper west side of NYC all by herself. She's 11!
  • Children actually play outside and I'm not talking soccer.
  • Parents don't micromanage their children's lives. Although Harriet's and her friend Janie's mothers do try to get them to go to dancing school. This of course horrifies them. 
  • Harriet's best friend, Janie wants to blow up her school. In the 60s that was probably funny. If only it still was.

In many ways, Harriet the Spy hasn't really dated at all. At the time it was published - the 1960s - it was considered groundbreaking. There are the obvious technological differences of that era - no cell phones, computers/internet, video games but Harriet's problems are timeless. It you are a bit of a misfit or outsider, you will definitely relate to Harriet.


Funny things Harriet writes about people in her notebook
  • "I wouldn't like to have a dumb mother. It must make you feel very unpopular."
  • "I would like to write a story about Mrs Golly getting run over by a truck except she's so fat I wonder what would happen to the truck. I better check on that."
  • Harriet wrote this regarding Pinky Whitehead, "Does his mother hate him? If I had him I'd hate him."
  • "If Marion Hawthorne doesn't watch out, she's going to grow up into a Lady Hitler."
  • About her teacher, "I think Miss Elston is one of those people you don't bother to think about twice."

Ole Golly's ( Harriet's Nanny) Words of Wisdom
  • "It won't do you a bit of good to know everything if you don't do anything with it."
  • "Find out everything you can cause life is hard enough even if you know a lot."
  • "Rich people are boring."




I was excited to realize that Harriet actually lives very close to my sister in Manhattan. Unfortunately, I only realized this as I was on my way home on the train.

Next time I visit, I want to visit some of Harriet's haunts. Although the book was written in the 60s, some of these places do still survive. Don't they?










Harriet the Spy was made into a movie in the 90s, but I really wish they had made Harriet the Spy into a movie back in the 70's when I was a kid. I can think of two people who would have been perfect for the part of Harriet:

.
Jodie Foster






Visualize her with glasses. Am I right?
                Cousin Oliver





I know he's a boy but still!











One thing to note about Harriet the Spy -despite the humor, this is not a feel good book. It actually gets kind of depressing in Book Two.  But don't let that discourage you from reading this fine novel. Life can't be all fun and games!

There are two sequels to Harriet the Spy - The Long Secret and Sport. Unfortunately, Louise Fitzhugh died very young of cancer and so did not write many books. Another contemporary writer has taken over writing the Harriet books. I have not read them so cannot comment on these. I am a little curious though. There also was a Canadian made TV movie called Harriet the Spy: Blog Wars in 2010. Based on the reviews, I'd stick with the original book.


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