The Rescuers (book)
 First UK edition | |
| Author | Margery Sharp |
|---|---|
| Illustrator |
Garth Williams (US) Judith Brook (UK) |
| Country | England |
| Language | English |
| Series | The Rescuers |
| Genre | Children's literature |
| Publisher |
Little, Brown (US) Collins (UK) |
Publication date | 1959 |
| Media type | Print (Hardback & Paperback) |
| Pages | 160 |
| Followed by | 'Miss Bianca' |
The Rescuers is a British children's novel written by Margery Sharp and illustrated by Garth Williams; its first edition was published in 1959 by Collins in the UK and Little, Brown in the US. The novel is the first in a series of stories about Miss Bianca, a coffee socialite who volunteered to lend assistance to people and animals in danger.
Plot
The story begins during a meeting of the society to help the prisoners, an international organization dedicated to mice that accompany and brighten the lives of prisoners held in cells. When the old clerk informs delegates about the case of a Norwegian poet imprisoned in the Black Castle, the moderator lady suggests changing the traditional rules of the organization and try to rescue him. Despite the clerk's doubts, the company decides to try to carry out her proposal. To achieve this, know they will need a Norwegian mouse who knows the language of the captive. They know that Miss Bianca, a privileged white mouse, will travel to Norway by plane accompanying her owner, 'the Boy,' an ambassador's son. The moderator asks Bernard, a resident of the pantry, to locate Miss Bianca in her magnificent porcelain pagoda and convince her to undertake the mission to find the bravest mouse in Norway.
Reception
Kirkus Reviews described the book as "an absurd and beguiling fantasy" that was "made to order for Walt Disney—but a strange departure for Margery Sharp",[1] and shortly after its publication, Walt Disney Productions began developing an adaptation of the novel. The result was the animated film The Rescuers, released in 1977 and based primarily on the second novel in the series, Miss Bianca.
In his 1997 collection of essays on children's literature, A Child's Delight, Noel Perrin noted that the book is very different from (and in his opinion far superior to) the movie, commending the book for its inventive plot and for the "ease and freedom", "elegance", and "irony" of Sharp's writing.[2]
In 2011, a decade after going out of print, the book was reissued in a new edition by The New York Review of Books. Reviewer Meghan Cox Gurdon of The Wall Street Journal noted that the book "is much funnier and more interestingly textured than the high-fructose movie version."[3]
References
- ↑ The Rescuers (review), Kirkus Reviews, Oct. 29th, 1959.
- ↑ Noel Perrin, A Child's Delight (UPNE, 2003), ISBN 978-1584653523, pp. 48-54. Excerpts available at Google Books.
- ↑ Meghan Cox Gurdon, "Rescuing a Classic", The Wall Street Journal, July 9, 2011.