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| Illustration by Lois Lenski, annotation by MHL, designed by Julia Nephew. |
First of all, Betsy Tacy friends are everywhere. I was looking for the image above and found a WordPress site with a slick bibliographic rundown of BT and then started poking around the site and found that it was created by Julia Nephew who I have heard speak at conventions and who is an all around lovely person. The bibliograpic info is here and there are some great links up top too!
Now if you haven't read Betsy Tacy, this is not going to make sense. So go read it. Just the first one... Although, really, you might just want to devote the next few days to reading the whole series. Or 40 years of your life to obsessively reading it. Whatever your comfort zone is.
There is a group re-read on the Facebook as I type this and it is fascinating. I like the conversational tone of it. I have done group reads of the BT books before, but it has been on the list-serv where people write in long form and then others reply, or we have a series of questions that sometimes go off into "What in your life was inspired by this plot point or character?" kind of discussions which are interesting in other ways. Both methods have their selling points.
I am in the process of typing out the longhand notes I took whilst doing a very close read of BETSY WAS A JUNIOR last winter and it is a slog. First of all, what kind of human being can't read her own handwriting?? The Ohio Public Schools failed me with regard to penmanship. Thank goodness that the computer revolution has killed handwriting. I would hate to have to take the rap for that crime alone, but a case could be made. Secondly, I get into some weird shit. I am not sure if I am doing the world a favor of a disservice in opening up the workings of my brain.
So I am going to consider this a test run. I will look at the way that sand runs through the book - like, well, sand through the hourglass! Ha! If this were a drinking game, take a shot when I reference the title of the blog post. Hey, it can only help...
So...sand...
One of the the things I love about BT is that is shows how self-entertaining these girls are. They make their own fun. The storytelling, the piano box, the dressing up and going calling - all these things show a kind of imagination that has been, for many kids, squelched by the constant stream of available entertainment.
As a kid, I could see my mother's internal struggle - does she tell me to put down the book and go play or just bask in the glow that she gave me a hunger for reading that precluded physical activity and just allow me to turn into a novel eating larvae that rarely got off the couch? (Spoiler - she chose door number two!) How much harder is if to fight against 4,000 channels of TV, YouTube and video games?
But I digress. (Get used to it.)
After Easter egg dying, Betsy saved the dye because possibly she was a tiny hoarder but you never know when you are going to need it. And since there was sand available due to a new building project (more on that later) she and Tacy decided to color it and sell it.
Part of Maud's gift is showing how these girls mature. When they dye the eggs, Katie and Julia are in charge. They "put on big aprons and acted important, but not too important. They let Betsy and Tacy help, coloring the eggs." (p.57) Oh, you just know that B & T LOVED being "let" to help. They were having fun, but their eternal resentment of their sisters' bossiness was still a tiny flame burning in their hearts, I am sure.
Payback is a bitch, as we all know and later on when Julie and Katie come down from their big business on the Big Hill to see the magnificence of the sand they say, "Well, for goodness' sake!" which is practically admitting that Betsy and Tacy are the coolest kids in Deep Valley. They had it coming... Julie and Katie offer to help put it into bottles after dinner. Who are the boss-ladies now, big sisters?
[Yes, I have an older sister. Yes, she was perfect. Yes, Maud perfectly hit the tone of love/resentment/idealization that is ever so familiar to all of us who are middle children - over and over again!]
SO now they are going to sell their art. But who is their demographic? Well, from the illustration on page 71 it is clear that Mrs. Benson is clearly their market. Her house is as busy as a Oriental Trading Company catalog. This woman is LONGING for more crap to buy. And also, she is the best.
Mrs. Benson doesn't appear to have kids. Or if she does, they are grown and gone. But she knows just how to interact with little girls. Later on, when Betsy and Tacy dress up and go calling she is just brilliant in the way that she never breaks character. She treats them like the grown women that they are pretending to be and it is just perfect.
They make a butt-ton of money selling some of the sand to Mrs. B. It is at least 9 or 10 cents. These riches lead to their near-purchase of the chocolate colored house and the eventual friendship with Tib.
The sand is available because of the new build on the house - for Robert Ray Junior - aka Margaret.This is foreshadowing which I can't believe I never noticed before. Good grief... So many new relationships. And the end of others. (RIP Baby Bee, I can't even with the bird flying to heaven.)
The most important new person is Tib. When B&T call on Mrs. Benson, they also drop off TWO of Mrs. Ray's calling cards at the chocolate colored house. Because they have no idea that they are making Mamma look like a stalker. But on the bright side, Mrs. Mueller "returns" the call and that is how they meet Tib. They are nervous about this kid. Julia and Katie love her when they meet her, but she sounds like kind of a prig. They go to see her, though. And she can stand on her head. Nailed it, Tib!
One final thing, in the chapter where they take a magic milk cart for a ride, I was trying to think of the way that "Deep Valley" is laid out and I was thinking - "Wait - this isn't how the town is laid out! I can't believe that she is describing a turn from Front Street to Broad Street - they run parallel!!" And then I remembered - when you are a kid, you don't know how streets are laid out, unless they are right in your neighborhood. Betsy has no idea how streets downtown are laid out at this point in her life. Nailed it, Maud!
There is a group re-read on the Facebook as I type this and it is fascinating. I like the conversational tone of it. I have done group reads of the BT books before, but it has been on the list-serv where people write in long form and then others reply, or we have a series of questions that sometimes go off into "What in your life was inspired by this plot point or character?" kind of discussions which are interesting in other ways. Both methods have their selling points.
I am in the process of typing out the longhand notes I took whilst doing a very close read of BETSY WAS A JUNIOR last winter and it is a slog. First of all, what kind of human being can't read her own handwriting?? The Ohio Public Schools failed me with regard to penmanship. Thank goodness that the computer revolution has killed handwriting. I would hate to have to take the rap for that crime alone, but a case could be made. Secondly, I get into some weird shit. I am not sure if I am doing the world a favor of a disservice in opening up the workings of my brain.
So I am going to consider this a test run. I will look at the way that sand runs through the book - like, well, sand through the hourglass! Ha! If this were a drinking game, take a shot when I reference the title of the blog post. Hey, it can only help...
So...sand...
One of the the things I love about BT is that is shows how self-entertaining these girls are. They make their own fun. The storytelling, the piano box, the dressing up and going calling - all these things show a kind of imagination that has been, for many kids, squelched by the constant stream of available entertainment.
As a kid, I could see my mother's internal struggle - does she tell me to put down the book and go play or just bask in the glow that she gave me a hunger for reading that precluded physical activity and just allow me to turn into a novel eating larvae that rarely got off the couch? (Spoiler - she chose door number two!) How much harder is if to fight against 4,000 channels of TV, YouTube and video games?
But I digress. (Get used to it.)
After Easter egg dying, Betsy saved the dye because possibly she was a tiny hoarder but you never know when you are going to need it. And since there was sand available due to a new building project (more on that later) she and Tacy decided to color it and sell it.
Part of Maud's gift is showing how these girls mature. When they dye the eggs, Katie and Julia are in charge. They "put on big aprons and acted important, but not too important. They let Betsy and Tacy help, coloring the eggs." (p.57) Oh, you just know that B & T LOVED being "let" to help. They were having fun, but their eternal resentment of their sisters' bossiness was still a tiny flame burning in their hearts, I am sure.
Payback is a bitch, as we all know and later on when Julie and Katie come down from their big business on the Big Hill to see the magnificence of the sand they say, "Well, for goodness' sake!" which is practically admitting that Betsy and Tacy are the coolest kids in Deep Valley. They had it coming... Julie and Katie offer to help put it into bottles after dinner. Who are the boss-ladies now, big sisters?
[Yes, I have an older sister. Yes, she was perfect. Yes, Maud perfectly hit the tone of love/resentment/idealization that is ever so familiar to all of us who are middle children - over and over again!]
SO now they are going to sell their art. But who is their demographic? Well, from the illustration on page 71 it is clear that Mrs. Benson is clearly their market. Her house is as busy as a Oriental Trading Company catalog. This woman is LONGING for more crap to buy. And also, she is the best.
Mrs. Benson doesn't appear to have kids. Or if she does, they are grown and gone. But she knows just how to interact with little girls. Later on, when Betsy and Tacy dress up and go calling she is just brilliant in the way that she never breaks character. She treats them like the grown women that they are pretending to be and it is just perfect.
They make a butt-ton of money selling some of the sand to Mrs. B. It is at least 9 or 10 cents. These riches lead to their near-purchase of the chocolate colored house and the eventual friendship with Tib.
The sand is available because of the new build on the house - for Robert Ray Junior - aka Margaret.This is foreshadowing which I can't believe I never noticed before. Good grief... So many new relationships. And the end of others. (RIP Baby Bee, I can't even with the bird flying to heaven.)
The most important new person is Tib. When B&T call on Mrs. Benson, they also drop off TWO of Mrs. Ray's calling cards at the chocolate colored house. Because they have no idea that they are making Mamma look like a stalker. But on the bright side, Mrs. Mueller "returns" the call and that is how they meet Tib. They are nervous about this kid. Julia and Katie love her when they meet her, but she sounds like kind of a prig. They go to see her, though. And she can stand on her head. Nailed it, Tib!
One final thing, in the chapter where they take a magic milk cart for a ride, I was trying to think of the way that "Deep Valley" is laid out and I was thinking - "Wait - this isn't how the town is laid out! I can't believe that she is describing a turn from Front Street to Broad Street - they run parallel!!" And then I remembered - when you are a kid, you don't know how streets are laid out, unless they are right in your neighborhood. Betsy has no idea how streets downtown are laid out at this point in her life. Nailed it, Maud!
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