This is my eighth and final post about 2015’s books for The Classics Club.  I’ll be reading one classic book a month through 2018.  Track what I’m reading for the Classics Club here.  I’ll try not to include too many spoilers in my review but I may need to discuss some in order to fully review the book. I’ll warn you if I’m going to mention one.  

Little Lord Fauntleroy by Frances Hodgson Burnett

Sitting on the kitchen counter…don’t you read in the kitchen? Ha!

• Year Published: 1886
  
• Reread? Or new to me?:  new to me
• Number of Pages: 229
  
• Date Finished: in the car on Christmas Day (12/25) on the way to our relatives’ house for Christmas dinner
• Number of Days it took me to read it: about a week
• Page/Day ratio: approx. 30:1
• Will I reread this?: Most likely yes, as a read aloud to my kids

Review:

Nik and I saw The Secret Garden (as a musical) at Center Stage over Thanksgiving weekend.  It was fabulous! In preparation for that, I ended up requesting all three of Burnett’s books, to reread SG and Little Princess (both beloved classics of my childhood) and to read for the first time, Little Lord Fauntleroy. Perhaps my mother can tell me – why hadn’t I read this one? Or do I just have a horrible memory and in fact, we did read this one too, as kids?

Simple and quick to read, with an overwhelmingly moralistic tone, I was surprised to find myself dwelling on its lessons for quite some time.  In the end, the little boy’s incredibly inaccurate assumptions of his grandfather’s goodness and impossibly lofty expectations of his generosity turned out to be true because the grandfather couldn’t stand to disappoint his grandson. How often do I convey certain expectations to my children (positive or negative) only to find them come true – not perhaps because that’s what my children were going to do but because they were just responding to me?  A couple years ago, I wrote about the practice of assigning positive intent, and this comes to mind here too.  If I assume (until proven otherwise) that my children are going to do the right thing, how much more likely are they apt to do so?

How about you? Can you think of a time when you had expectations of someone that perhaps affected their behavior (for good or for evil)?

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And, I’m caught up with Classics Club posts!  I’ll do my best not to subject you to five CC posts in five days ever again.

In January, I’m reading A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court. So far, I’m finding it quite funny.  Want to join me in reading it?

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