No Damsels in Distress Detected
Petronella watches her brothers ride off into the world to seek their fortunes and basically says…cute. My turn.
This week, we’ve got Petronella, written by Jay Williams and illustrated by Friso Henstra, published in New York by Parents' Magazine Press in 1974. The premise? A princess sets out to find a prince, not to marry, not to admire, but to rescue. What follows is a playful twist on familiar fairytale patterns, where expectations are turned on their head and the “hero’s journey” looks a little different than usual. Which, frankly, feels like the upgrade fairytales have been waiting for.
Jay Williams (1914-1978) had a long and varied writing career, moving between historical fiction, fantasy, and children’s literature. He co-created the Danny Dunn science fiction series, but in his fairy tales, you see a more mischievous side, playful, slightly subversive, and clearly interested in what happens when you nudge traditional story roles just slightly out of place.
Friso Henstra (1928-2013) was a Dutch-born illustrator who worked internationally, bringing a distinctive, expressive style to children’s books in the mid-20th century. His characters stretch, stride, and gesture like they’ve got places to be, Petronella especially, who looks far more interested in getting things done than posing prettily in a tower somewhere. There’s also something delightfully offbeat about the style; it has that slightly surreal, exaggerated quality that feels a bit like Yellow Submarine or even a touch of Monty Python's Flying Circus, a little absurd, and completely unconcerned with behaving properly.
Honestly? We love a girl who doesn’t wait for the plot to happen to her.
--Melissa (forever rooting for the girls who grab the story by the reins and keep going), Distinctive Collections Library Assistant
-View previous Fairytale Friday posts
--View more from our Historical Curriculum Collection
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