Who hasn't had a fascination with Wednesday Addams in at least one point in their lives? The morbid and spooky little goth girl who's obsessed with all things dark and negative like: death, violence, torture, suffering, devastation, misery, gloom, hopelessness, fear and manipulation. And witchcraft. She's arguably more popular than the franchise she came from.
No wonder, since she represents the dark horse and weird social outcast we wish we could be. She is an (oc)cult icon.
'The Addams Family: Wednesday's Library' is a collection of classic gothic poetry and novel quotes, with Wednesday's insightful, sadistic and humourous commentary; on why she loves these literary woes. They include Edgar Allen Poe, Emily Dickinson, Shakespeare, 'Frankenstein', 'The Divine Comedy', 'The Scarlet Letter', 'The Legend of Sleepy Hollow', 'Les Miserables', 'The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde', 'Heart of Darkness', 'Dracula', 'The Picture of Dorian Gray', 'Paradise Lost', 'Jane Eyre', 'Wuthering Heights', and the original Grimm fairy tales.
The appeal is strangely fun and intoxicating, even for children. It reminds me of a creepy, ghostly spiritual successor to 'Belle's Library'. Although it is a quick collection read and not anything too special, and on page 57, where Wednesday comments on a quote from 'Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde', there is an illustration from 'Alice in Wonderland' for some reason. There are no other 'Alice in Wonderland' references in the book. Was that a mistake? Also, Wednesday mentions having a school teacher at the beginning, but then later on (page 153) she says she's homeschooled. A teacher for her home?
The accompanying illustrations are nice, simple and eerie, with purple watercolours splashed on to match the purple book cover. They feature scorpions, bats, skulls, ravens, trees, trinkets, snakes, brooms, roses, human organs, and big, staring eyeballs.
Ghosts, vampires, graves, witches, and instruments of torture, oh my!
'Wednesday's Library' - Recommended for the demented child in all of us.
'I never understood why Jane [Eyre] would want to look so... normal. Her looks are perfectly wretched.' - page 133
'Shame, despair, solitude! They are teachers to us all.' - page 125
'This same feeling is typical when you're an Addams. People's fear of the abnormal just makes us stronger.' - page 109
'If there is any goodness inside me, then I'm afraid it is broken. How thrilling.' - page 99
'My sentiments exactly. Why marry when you could satiate your curiosity with things like studying poisonous plants or becoming a country's first female dictator?' - page 87
'The best houses have ghosts living in them.' - page 81
'Witches. Blood. Impending devastation. It's as if William Shakespeare were writing about my life.' - page 45
'I would also follow the directives of insane people. They tend to be the most levelheaded people in the room.' - page 39
Final Score: 3.5/5
No comments:
Post a Comment