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The Witch Family

Di Eleanor Estes

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Valutazione: 4.5 stelle su 54.5/5 (8 recensioni)

Lunghezza: 185 pagine3 ore

Editore:: Open Road Integrated Media
Pubblicato:: Apr 1, 2018
ISBN:: 9780547546773
Formato:: Libro

Descrizione

This story of two girls trying to banish a witch is “full of wonderful fun, excitement, and humor” (Library Journal).

Old Witch likes nothing better than to fly around on her broomstick, crying “Heh-heh!” and casting abracadabras. But now she has been sent away . . . by two young girls.

Amy and Clarissa have decided that Old Witch is just too mean and wicked. So, drawing a rickety old house upon a barren glass hill, they exile Old Witch there with a warning: She better be good, or else no Halloween! But to give Old Witch some company, they draw her a Little Witch Girl and a Weeny Witch Baby . . .

Old Witch tries to be good, but anyone would get up to no good in a place as lonely as the glass hill. And Amy and Clarissa are about to find that out, when Old Witch magics them into her world of make-believe-made-real, in “a very special book that is certain to give boundless pleasure—at any time of the year” (The Horn Book).

“A classic for Halloween.” —Library Journal

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Informazioni sul libro

The Witch Family

Di Eleanor Estes

Valutazioni:

Valutazione: 4.5 stelle su 54.5/5 (8 recensioni)

Lunghezza: 185 pagine3 ore

Descrizione

Leggi altro

Editore:: Open Road Integrated Media
Pubblicato:: Apr 1, 2018
ISBN:: 9780547546773
Formato:: Libro

Informazioni sull'autore

Eleanor Estes

Eleanor Estes (1906-1988) grew up in West Haven, Connecticut, which she renamed Cranbury for her classic stories about the Moffat and Pye families. A children’s librarian for many years, she launched her writing career with the publication of The Moffats in 1941. Two of her outstanding books about the Moffats—Rufus M. and The Middle Moffat—were awarded Newbery Honors, as was her short novel The Hundred Dresses. She won the Newbery Medal for Ginger Pye.

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Anteprima del libro

The Witch Family - Eleanor Estes

Author

For information about permission to reproduce selections from this book, write to trade.permissions@hmhco.com or to Permissions, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company, 3 Park Avenue, 19th Floor, New York, New York 10016.

www.hmhco.com

First Harcourt Young Classics edition 2000

First Odyssey Classics edition 1990

First published 1960

The Library of Congress has cataloged the print edition as follows:

Estes, Eleanor, 1906–1988.

The witch family/Eleanor Estes; illustrated by Edward Ardizzone.

p. cm.

An Odyssey/Harcourt Young Classic.

Summary: Two little girls who love to draw witches build an elaborate world around the imaginary Old Witch and her family.

[1. Witches—Fiction. 2. Imagination—Fiction.] I. Ardizzone, Edward, 1900–, ill. II. Title.

PZ7.E749Wi 2000

[Fic]—dc21 99-89152

ISBN 978-0-15-202604-2 hardcover

ISBN 978-0-15-202610-3 paperback

eISBN 978-0-547-54677-3

v2.1215

For

and

M.S.

and

1

Old Witch, Banished

One day, Old Witch, the head witch of all the witches, was banished. Amy, just an ordinary real girl, not a witch, said Old Witch would have to go away. So, Old Witch had to go. Instead of living in the briers and the brambles, the caves and the heaths, instead of flying around on her broomstick wherever she wanted, chanting runes, doing abracadabras, casting spells and hurly-burlies, this great-great (multiply the great by about one hundred and you have some idea of how old she was) old grandmother Old Witch had to go and live on the top of an awful, high, lonely, bare, bleak, and barren glass hill! And at first, she had to live in the witch house up on that hill all alone because at first there was no witch family—there was just herself.

She had to go and live on the bare glass hill because Amy, appalled at the wickedness of the old witch, had said she must. Amy was almost seven, and she had a friend, Clarissa, who was almost seven too. They both had blond hair that hung straight and long, and they both had blue eyes. Amy’s blond hair was the color of moonlight. Clarissa’s was the color of sunlight. They might have been sisters, they looked so much alike. But they were not sisters. They were best friends, and they were both in the same class in Jasper School.

They were both brave girls. Clarissa could go all the way to the library alone. And although Amy did not yet go to the library alone, she was a brave girl too, for she did not mind booster shots. Moreover, it was she who had the bravery to think it up and say, Go! to the mean old wicked old witch.

Amy and Clarissa lived three doors apart on a beautiful street named Garden Lane. Ginkgo trees, meeting high overhead, lined the street on both sides. This street was in the city of Washington, D.C. Clarissa’s house was a small brick one painted light pink. It had a square front porch, where she and Amy, on hot days, sometimes had lunch, usually long noodoos—a name that Clarissa had long ago, when she was quite small, given to spaghetti, a name that in Clarissa’s family, and in Amy’s too, had stuck through the years. Or sometimes Amy and Clarissa just sat there on the front porch and ate popsicles and talked and watched the passersby.

But usually they played in Amy’s house. Amy’s house was a high red brick one. In front of it there was a tall and graceful ginkgo tree whose roots made the worn red bricks of the sidewalk bulge and whose branches fanned the sky. The ginkgo tree has little leaves shaped like fans that Amy and Clarissa liked to press and give to their dolls. The fruit of this tree is orange, but it is not good for eating. It has an odd fragrance that grownups do not like but that children do not mind, for it makes them think of fall and Halloween.

Near Amy’s front stoop there was a small fir tree to which Amy had tied a fragile rope swing. It was a very little swing, but it was strong enough for Amy and Clarissa, each one of these girls weighing only thirty-eight pounds so far. Frequently, while Amy was at Jasper School, Bear or the doll, Patricia, was allowed to sit in this swing all morning. And swinging there on summer days, Amy or Clarissa could keep track of the bees that nested in the bare ground of the yard where the ivy did not grow.

But now it was wintertime. There were no bees in the front yard to watch, though there was one ancient hoary bee—it was hard to tell whether he was dead or alive—in a sunny corner of the backyard. This was a bumblebee.

Amy and Clarissa always had a great deal to do. They both loved to draw pictures, and, seated opposite each other at Amy’s little yellow table in her mother’s big front bedroom, high up behind the ginkgo tree, they were drawing pictures now, pictures of witches.

It was cold late February, not Halloween. But at lunchtime, while Amy was eating her lamb chop, and Clarissa was standing by watching her eat it bite by bite—she had already had her long noodoos—Amy’s mother had told a story about Old Witch. Summer, spring, winter, fall, Amy loved to hear stories about Old Witch. One day, Old Witch . . . Mama always began.

And that was the way she had begun today, and had then told an awful, though not too awful, story about Old Witch, with many interruptions and suggestions from Amy.

That is why now, after lunch, Amy and Clarissa, having Old Witch very much on their minds, happened to be drawing pictures of her.

Go, go, go! To the glass hill, go! Amy sang as she drew. She looked closely at her picture for a moment. You go! she repeated firmly. And never come back! she said with finality as she banished Old Witch.

Go, echoed Clarissa. To the glass hill, go!

Don’t put any flowers on it! said Amy. Nothing grows on this awful bare glass hill. It is all glass, just plain glass. Up there there are no trees, no flowers, no violets. There is plain nothing.

Nothing, said Clarissa, chewing the end of her crayon thoughtfully.

The only food that Old Witch can eat is what she can get by magic, declared Amy. And her magic will not work very well on this shiny place. You know, witch magic works best in dark and gloom. And she can’t have any little rabbits to eat at all. You know that rabbits are what she loves best to eat? Don’t you, Clarissa?

Oh, yes, said Clarissa.

She can have only herbs to eat, said Amy.

Yes, said Clarissa. Herb soup morning, noon, and night.

And the only thing that she can take with her is Old Tom, the awful old black cat, the real head witch cat, declared Amy, going on with the banishment orders. "Oh, yes, and her awful old broomstick. And that’s all!"

At first Amy and Clarissa felt pleased over the banishment of the mean old witch. I banquished her, said Amy proudly. Sometimes Amy joined two words together, creating one new word. Here, banish and vanquish had become banquish. I banquished her, she said. Then she became thoughtful. Doubt swept over her. It is all right not to have wicked Old Witch most of the year, she thought. But what about Halloween?

Clarissa, she said, what use is Halloween without the real, right, regular old witch?

Clarissa clasped her head between her hands, rolled her eyes, and said, No good!

It would be like Christmas without Santa Claus, said Amy.

And Easter without the Bunny, said Clarissa.

Same thing, said Amy. I have to change the order, she said. Change it to be that Old Witch must stay on top of the glass hill always except for Halloween. She can come down for Halloween. No other time.

Yes, said Clarissa.

On Halloween she can ride her broomstick down the glass hill instead of just around the top of it. But only on that one night, can’t she, Clarissa?

OK, said Clarissa.

If, said Amy, in an ominous voice, she can learn to be good, that is.

Yes, of course, said Clarissa.

Not eat any little rabbits.

No, said Clarissa.

"Not try to come down off the glass hill at any other time at all," said Amy.

No, said Clarissa.

You mean, ‘yes,’ said Amy.

Yes, said Clarissa, drawing.

After this change of rule had been decided upon, Amy and Clarissa put away their drawings of witches and went outdoors to the square little backyard. Though the backyard was tiny, still it was big enough to hold Amy’s jungle gym with its two swings and glider.

Today was a crisp and sunny day. In summer and in winter the backyard was shaded by a high and lovely linden tree in the corner of the backyard of the house next door, belonging to Polly and Christopher Knapp. Polly Knapp was eight, and she was Amy’s and Clarissa’s next best friend. Polly let Amy and Clarissa climb her high linden tree in her yard whenever they liked. And Polly, in turn, could swing on Amy’s swings and glide on her glider whenever she liked. But she must not go too high and she must never swing on the fragile rope swing in the little fir tree in the front yard because she weighed forty-seven pounds. Neither could Christopher, who was nine, because he weighted sixty-five pounds.

Clarissa got into one of the swings now and started to swing. Amy stood aside for a moment, thinking. In the sunny corner of the yard where Amy was standing dwelled the huge, old, hoary, weather-beaten bumblebee. Amy had discovered him just a few days ago. She had told her father about him. What is a good name for a bumblebee? she’d asked.

Malachi, her father had answered without a second thought. So Amy called the bumblebee Malachi.

There he was now, basking in the sunshine. Some might have thought that he was dead, for he never moved and summer was gone. But Amy knew that Malachi was just sleeping. Bumblebees do sleep with their eyes open, she told Clarissa.

Hello, said Amy to Malachi gently. He did not stir or wink an eye. So Amy swung herself onto the green board fence and up into Polly Knapp’s linden tree.

Suddenly, dark clouds swept over the sun. It must be Old Witch going, thought Amy. She looked down at Clarissa. Did you hear a little thunder? she asked.

No, said Clarissa.

I did. Just a little in the distance. You do not have to be afraid. Probably Old Witch is on her way. Tell her the change in the banquishment order, said Amy. Tell her she can come down for Halloween! That’s all.

Clarissa laughed gaily. She was not afraid of Old Witch. The wind was in her face and her hair whipped against her cheeks. All right, she said. And, Hey, wait a minute, Old Witch, she yelled bravely. Amy says you can come down for Halloween. That’s all!

Yes, yes! Just Halloween! repeated Amy. Amy also felt quite brave, having heard herself spoken of as the one in charge. And besides, though there were no leaves at this time of year on the linden tree, she thought she might be invisible to the old witch.

Suddenly, from the dark clouds, a few drops of rain fell. Amy shivered. She thought she heard the rustling of Old Witch’s black robes. She thought they brushed against her hair as Old Witch, enraged but truly invisible, steered her broomstick upward toward the glass hill, going where she had to go—up, up, and up the awful, bare, and faraway hill. Amy thought, too, that she heard the buzzing, foreboding sound of a bumblebee.

Did you hear a bumblebee? she asked Clarissa.

No, I heard no bumblebee, said Clarissa.

The sun came out again, which proved that Old Witch had really gone. Wind and rain had stopped. Amy came back from the other side of the huge trunk of the linden tree where she had hidden herself in case Old Witch, out of revenge, should try to cast a spell on her. Clarissa. Do you know what I am going to do? she said. "I am going to write Old Witch a letter so she will understand not to come back at any

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This was one of my favorite books when I was a child. It's a delightful story about Little Witch and her family living on the Glass Mountain.

One of my all-time favorite kids' books.

Enough is enough! Old Witch is banished or "banquished" as seven year old Amy pronounces it. Amy and Clarissa are two little girls who are best friends and they are fascinated with all things magical, especially witches. They love to draw and they spend a lot of their time making drawing after drawing of witches. They first hear of Old Witch, who is the head of all the witches in the world, in stories that Amy's mother loves to tell them. Old Witch eats rabbits whole and dances hurly-burlies and casts wicked abracadabras and reads from a thick old book filled with magical runes. There's really no telling what evil thing she will do next so Amy banishes Old Witch to a remote and barren glass hill and forbids her to leave it. At first Amy allows Old Witch nothing but the few things she can create by magic in such a barren and bleak place like a rickety old house with a front porch, a rocking chair and a few herbs for dinner. Of course she has her broom and pointy black hat and her black cat, Old Tom. After all she is a witch. If she can learn to be good she can come down from the hill of glass on Halloween night and behave like a proper Old Witch and do lots of delightfully wicked things. If she does not mend her ways and follow the rules and stay on the glass hill then she will not be allowed to celebrate Halloween. It's that simple and because Amy is seven and because she says so, that is exactly what happens to Old Witch. Amy knows that she can't expect total goodness. What fun would Halloween be without Old Witch up to her usual tricks? The Witch Family is a delightful mixture of the real world where Amy and Clarissa live and the fantasy world of the witches. Everything that Amy and Clarissa put into their drawings becomes "real" in the witch world. They can even send letters back and forth between the two worlds and they know a red cardinal bird who is happy to carry the messages in his beak. They are not unkind though and they quickly realize that it must be very lonely for Old Witch up on that slippery glass hill so they allow her to abracadabra herself a companion. They draw a picture of Hannah, Little Witch Girl and she soon shows up atop the glass hill much to the delight of Old Witch. She is a good little witch and becomes friends with Amy and Clarissa. Old Witch is Hannah's gammer or grandmother. Eventually, a Weeny Witch baby named BeeBee joins them on the glass hill. They each have a black cat in the corresponding size. A Little Mermaid and a Baby Mermaid live in a grotto inside the glass hill and become their friends but they don't tell Old Witch about the mermaids because they know she would immediately start thinking about fishing poles. Of course Little Witch Girl has to fly her broom to Witch School every day so Amy and Clarissa also draw the other six witch students and the witch teacher and the classroom and all their school adventures. Now it is very hard to control a disobedient and crafty hag like Old Witch because her appetite for wickedness is so strong and luckily Amy is able to enlist the help of a sleepy, old bumblebee that she finds hibernating in her yard. This is no ordinary bumblebee. It is a spelling bee named Malachi. He speaks aloud by spelling out the words. Malachi protects Little Witch Girl and keeps his three bee eyes on Old Witch and keeps her in check...most of the time. Written in 1960, which at age 8 is when I originally read it, The Witch Family was and is one of my favorite books. The author, Eleanor Estes, has written many, many wonderful books for children including a popular (at least in my day) series about the Moffat Family that includes the delightful Rufus M. She received the Newbery Medal for Ginger Pye. This book is filled with creativity and fun on every single page. The illustrations by Edward Ardizzone, executed with pen and ink, are sprinkled liberally throughout the text and add greatly to the atmosphere and characterizations since they are so in sync with the vision of the author. When I was a little girl I loved this book because it fulfilled my number one requirement for a good fantasy...the kids in the book really experience the magic. Witches and mermaids are real. Flying on a broomstick is real. Magical spells work! Bees can talk and the children don't wake up the next day and find that it is all a dream. The children in the story interact with the fantasy characters in their own world and in the fantasy world which to them is also real. What is so splendid about the way Estes wrote this story is that she does elude to the fact that Amy and Clarissa are imagining the witches and their glass hill and all the adventures but Estes realizes that for some lucky children the line between fantasy and reality really does vanish. So the child readers can say to themselves, "This is pretend but it's as real as I want it to be," which is, of course, very real indeed. The reader senses that Eleanor Estes knows all about "real" magic...as of course this dear book proves she does. Estes uses a writing style that never talks down to its young readers (recommended age group is 9-12). Many challenging words will help build young vocabularies. She throws in real information about bumblebees that also helps to blur the lines of fantasy and reality. Traditional mythical witch and mermaid lore embellishes the plot and adds color and excitement. This might be one small area that Pagan parents will object to in that she does reference Bacchanalia and Saturnalia several times in the story but does not do so in a realistic way but rather in the stereotypical and make-believe Halloween Witch way. At the time this book was written I am quite sure that the author had no idea that these rites were still very much alive and in practice. In thinking of them as obsolete she therefore felt it was fine to treat them as entirely make-believe. Pagan children may be confused by this but their parents can overcome this by reminding them that it is intended to be pretend in every way while helping them with lessons about the historical and actual celebrations. The book culminates on Halloween and children will enjoy reading about a good old-fashioned 1950s-early 1960s style night of trick-or-treating, the way it was before our culture lost its innocence and we came to fear for our children's safety even in our own neighborhoods. Estes captures the thrill in the air and the spooky excitement in which children gloried in those bygone days and shares it with us. They run from door to door, going inside and visiting each of their neighbors who try to guess each child hidden behind a false face. They fill their bags to bulging with pop-corn balls, homemade brownies and cookies, apples, pennies and Tootsie Rolls. Parents hide in the shadows, keeping an eye on the very smallest while the other children run wild and free, fully expecting to see witches and ghouls and goblins. Estes conjures this magical night and spares no element of its joy. Nighttime came. Wind began to howl. Hobgoblins filled the air. The moon rose, and like a true Halloween moon, now it disappeared behind the swift swirling clouds, and now it came out again. Vapors came and vapors vanished....... Old Witch mounted her broomstick, true witch sideways style, and muttered the appropriate incantation. Old Tom leaped on. His back was arched and his hair was bristling in the true Halloween style. Away and up and off they flew, on their way to the saturnalia, which is a place for witch wickedness. There is plenty of humor in the story and Old Witch is actually quite a funny, cantankerous old thing with a big soft spot in her wizened heart for her Witch family. This is a great story, filled to the brim with fun and exciting adventures. The ending is clever and satisfying and does not let young readers down. While the story reaches a conclusion the reader is left with their vision of magical fantasy intact. I was surprised when I re-read this book for the purpose of writing this review to see by contrast how dumbed-down so much of current children's literature has become. I found that sadly, the vocabulary in this book and the subtleties of thought and story construction were as much a source of nostalgia for me as the setting and story itself. It is a gem of juvenile literature that I hope never goes out of print. Treat your children to The Witch Family this Halloween. Getting them to enjoy it will require no trick.

Simply one of the best.

The kids enjoyed this one but it was not my favorite Eleanor Estes book. It was difficult to read aloud with the spelling bee and some of the babyish language the characters used. And the story was a little silly... a departure from the Moffats or Ginger Pye for sure.

I think the author was trying to really put me into the book.(Which she did) But like each chapter, she described something that made me want to read more!

Lingua

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The Witch Family

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Azioni libro

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The Witch Family

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The Witch Family - Eleanor Estes

1

Old Witch, Banished

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