Beatrix

This book is an interesting one to share with young people. It's neither biography nor autobiography, per se... Beatrix Potter's own words (taken from her letters and journals) are combined with text and illustrations by Jeanette Winter. Potter's words are in italics. I give this four stars only because I wish more of Potter's writing had been included. However, when Winter is writing as Potter (such as "One upon a time there was a little girl with wavy hair and serious eyes, and her name was Helen Beatrix Potter. I am that little girl.") she maintains the first person perspective so the text is not choppy. But you get an eerie feeling reading Potter's own description of her childhood days. It really helps children and adults alike realize that she was a real person. In addition to the format, the text itself is very interesting. Potter lead a very secluded childhood. Her parents felt that the neighborhood children carried disease and were a bad influence so she turned to the world of animals for friendship and had quite a few pets. She was an avid sketcher (a good way to remind children that artists only got that way through a lot of practice) and loved to make up stories about her animal companions. The book ends with her "happily ever after" days at Hill Top Farm, which she was finally able to afford due to the success of her books. She was thrilled to "finally leave the sad gray city behind" and Winter describes: "I live here with eighty ewes, forty young sheep, three horses, fourteen cows, lots of calves, twenty-five hens, some pigs, five ducks, a dog, a pony, turkeys, a cat, rabbits, and my dear husband, Mr. Heelis." For further reading, a bibliography is included in the back.