Amelia Bedelia by Peggy Parish

Amelia Bedelia by Peggy Parish. Illustrated by Fritz Siebel (Canada) - (US)
Amelia Bedelia, Book 1
I Can Read Book, Level 2


Pages: 64
Ages: 6+
Finished: Jan. 25, 2011
First Published: 1963 (1992 revised edition)
Publisher: Harper Trophy
Genre: children, easy reader, humour
Rating: 4/5


First sentence:

"Oh, Amelia Bedelia, your first day of work, and I can't be here.

Acquired: Purchase a new copy through an online retailer.

Reason for Reading: Ds read aloud to me as his reader.

Well, everybody knows the antics of Amelia Bedelia, the maid who takes everything literally. This is the first book written about the famous maid, that made her such a beloved literary character. My son loved the book, thought it was just absolutely hilarious and couldn't believe how "stupid" she was. "Stupid" is a word we are not allowed to say in our house so I asked for another word to describe Amelia and he came up with "very dumb". {sigh} We later agreed upon "very silly". I wasn't sure he'd like this so much since he's autistic and does take things literally himself, to a point. Truthfully, I never liked Amelia Bedelia as a kid because I just did not get it at all. I found it entirely confusing and I guess that was my Asperger's coming out. Being an extremely literal person, I did not see the joke. (I don't get many jokes) Besides I had no idea what "trim the fat" "dress the turkey" or "draw the drapes", for example, meant in the first place! (I do get it now.) Surprisingly, my son knew what they really meant for her to do in every situation, except "trim the fat"!

For some reason, I have no idea why, while reading this I did wonder if the illustrations were the originals and they are. Fritz Siebel is the original illustrator. However after examining the copyright page, I see that his estate allowed the illustrations to be "revised" in 1992. I'm wondering just exactly what was revised for as they stand now there are two things that stand out as having been left "as is" when one knows the illustrations have been tampered with. On the first page Mr. Rogers has pipe in mouth and in all the last pages Mrs. Rogers is wearing a real fox stole, complete with head! I'll be looking around to replace my copy with an earlier hardcover "I Can Read" book edition (as I collect those) to see for myself just how the illustrations have been "revised". I can't see it being much since they left those two very un-PC illustrations alone.