Figure 1.--Many editions have been greatly enhanced by the illustrations. Quite a number of different illustrators have worked on illustrating the various editions. The evocative illustration here was done by Lilian Obligado for a 1964 edition.. I'm not sure who did the illustrations for the original edition. |
Lassie was written by an American, but is not about America. It is about a boy and dog in Yorkshire, England. The movie was based on a classic children's book by Eric Mowbray Knight. Knight first published a short story which appeared in The Saturday Evening Post (December 17, 1938). It proved so popular that the John C. Winston Publishing Company secured the publication rights for an exapnded book version. The book was published in 1940 and became a popular best seller. The story has had instant appeal and has been published in over 25 languages. It has never gone out of print and is now considered a classic. This is a wonderful book, in part because of the wonderful illustrations, which are breathtaking in their beauty and their ability to capture the essence of a boy and a dog. But make sure you also buy the original Eric Knight Lassie Come-Home novel. For the heart and soul of the novel are absent from the text of this version, and the loss is
grievous indeed. The novel shows real, cranky people struggling hard with moral choices, and hurting when they are bound to make the right one. The novel also guides the reader into concluding on her own that living things cannot rightfully be sold, unlike this version, which just blats it out. Moral lessons that children reach on their own are the ones that become deeply rooted, so it is a shame to deny
them this process of moral discovery. The realism of the novel is absent from this version, which presents stick figures spouting politically correct platitudes that would be unthinkable in the communities that Knight described. The novel presents decidedly politically incorrect people who struggle to do the right thing. A child learns best from books that present life in its bewildering complexity. Without such guides, how will she deal with a real world that is not populated with politically correct stick figures? MGM
purchased the movie rights in 1942 Lassie Come Home was released in 1943, the year Knight died.
It is a little difficulty to classify the nationality of this book, much like Little Lord Fauntleroy. Lassie and Joe were certainly English from Yorkshire. The book was written by a Yorkshire-born author who grew up in America. He came to think of himself aboth American and English. The story was frst published in tghe very American Saturday Evening Post and later published as a book in America. The book wwas then made into a Hollywood film classic.
The movie was based on a classic children's book by Eric Mowbray Knight. Eric Mowbray Knight was born in Yorkshire but grew up in Pennsylvania. He wrote many other books, but it is Lassie Come Home for which he is remembered. He wrote the book in 1938. Knight lived quite an event-filled, but short life. He was born during 1897 explaining how he could describe Yorkshire so beautifully in the book. His father was a diamond merchant. His mother was a governess to the Russian Royal family. They were a well off family until Eric's father absconded to South Africa. His father ran off when Eric was quite young. His mother remarried to an American and moved to America. Eric joined her as a teenager 15 years old. He came to see himself as both American and English. He attended the Cambridge School of Latin in Massachusetts and also pursued art at the New York National Academy of design. After World War I (1914-18) he returned to England for a while. He then left for America. Knight taught at the University of Iowa. His primary interest was journalism and he worked for different newspapers. He also liked movies and was a noted movie critic for the Philadelphia Public Ledger. He worked in Hollywood writing films and was a favorite of Frank Capra. Knight's main goal in life, however, was to write the great American novel. He wrote a lot of his stories about England and in particular a Yorkshire character called Sam Small. Knight died on his way back to England during World War II. His plane came down in mysterious circumstances. It had already been searched for a bomb but none was found. That same year another English writer, actor and screen writer Lesley Howard was in a plane that was shot down my a German fighter. Also a couple of famous electrical engineers were in planes which also crashed. In these cases, some have speculated that the cause was the experimental equipment being tested.
Knight first published a short story which appeared in The Saturday Evening Post (December 17, 1938). The saturday Evening Post was at the time one of the most popular magazines in America. It was an illustrated magazine. It featured the work of Norman Rockwell and other leading illustrators.
Knight's story proved so popular that the John C. Winston Publishing Company secured the publication rights for an exapnded book version. The book was published in 1940 and became a popular best seller. The story has had instant appeal and has been published in over 25 languages. It has never gone out of print and is now considered a classic.
Many editions have been greatly enhanced by the illustrations. Quite a number of different illustrators in various countries have worked on illustrating the various editions. There is a great variety in how Lassie and Joe are depicted in these various editions and is interesting to see these different interpretations. We do not know much about the different illustrators at this time. The evocative illustration here was done by Lilian Obligado for a 1964 edition (figure 1). I'm not sure who did the illustrations for the original edition. A reader had provided illustrations done by Cyrus Leroy Baldridge for a People's Book Club in 1943.
There have been many editions of the book published. Some have deleted imprtant text from the original Eric Knight Lassie Come Home edition. Some of these editorial deletions horribly crop the original novel.
The novel shows real, cranky people struggling hard with moral choices, and hurting when they are bound to make the right one. The novel also guides the reader into concluding on her own that living things cannot rightfully be sold, unlike this version, which just blats it out. Moral lessons that children reach on their own are the ones that become deeply rooted, so it is a shame to deny
them this process of moral discovery. The realism of the novel is absent from this version, which presents stick figures spouting politically correct platitudes that would be unthinkable in the communities that Knight described. The novel presents decidedly politically incorrect people who struggle to do the right thing. A child learns best from books that present life in its bewildering complexity. Without such guides, how will she deal with a real world that is not populated with politically correct stick figures?
MGMpurchased the movie rights in 1942 and immediately shot the film. The film had quite a cast. In additon to Lassie there was Roddie McDowell who played Joe and none other than Elizabeth Tsylor to play Patricia as well as a very strong supporting cast. "Lassie Come Home" was released in 1943, the year Knight died. "Lassie Come Home"is one of the classic films of the 1940s. It
starred of course Lassie and a young Roddy McDowell. While
an American movie it dealt will as poor Yorkshire (English) boy
and his beloved dog. It was one of a series of sentimental films
shot in America and England which were thought to help support
morale during the war. The film was set during the World War I
era, but Roddy's costume seems more in keeping with what
English boys were wearing during World War II. Roddy
continued wearing short pants suits even after coming to America.
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