8. Works and images cited

Works cited:

Acton, Eliza. Modern Cookery for Private Families. London: Elek, 1860. Google Archives. Harvard University. Web. 22 Feb. 2017. <https://archive.org/details/moderncookeryfo00actogoog>.

Myers, David, and Simon King. "BBC Food - Recipes - Jam Roly-poly (The Hairy Bikers)."BBC Food. BBC, n.d. Web. 26 Mar. 2017. <http://www.bbc.co.uk/food/recipes/jam_roly_poly_36901>.

Potter, Beatrix. The Beatrix Potter Collection. Vol. One. Ware: Wordsworth Editions, 2014. Print.

Potter, Beatrix. The Beatrix Potter Collection. Vol. Two. Ware: Wordsworth Editions, 2014. Print.

Images cited:

Introduction to the blog

(1) Potter, Beatrix. "Peter Rabbit" Digital Image. Victoria and Albert Museum. Web 2016.  13th Feb 2017

(2) Foord, Korie. "Beatrix Potter edition 3" 2017 JPEG file

(3) Foord, Korie. "Beatrix Potter edition 1" 2017 JPEG file

(4) Foord, Korie. "Beatrix Potter edition 2" 2017 JPEG file

The Roly-Poly pudding and other potty ideas

(1) Potter, Beatrix. "Kitten roly-poly pudding" Digital image Chessalee WordPress blog 2008. 22 Feb 2017
https://chessaleeinlondon.wordpress.com/2008/09/10/beatrix-potters-hill-top-farm/
(2) Foord, Korie. "Potter 73 quote" 2017 JPEG image
(3) Foord, Korie. "Eliza Acton" 2017 JPEG image
(4) Foord, Korie. "Mrs Beeton" 2017 JPEG image

Making a Roly-Poly Pudding

All images are my own

 Animals as food:

(1) Potter, Beatrix, "Flopsy, Mopsy and Cottontail picking were good little bunnies" 1902 Digital Image. Web  https://archive.org/details/thetaleofpeterra14838gut

(2) Foord, Korie "Tom Kitten" 2017 JPEG file 

(3) Jackson, Lee. "Victorian London - Publications - Social Investigation/Journalism - London Labour and London Poor, 1861-62; Henry Mayhew - Street Characters (selected Illustrations)." Victorian London - Publications - Social Investigation/Journalism - London Labour and London Poor, 1861-62; Henry Mayhew - Street Characters (selected Illustrations). N.p., n.d. Web. 19 Mar. 2017. <http://www.victorianlondon.org/mayhew/mayhew-street-characters.htm>.

Mr Tod:

(1) Foord, Korie. "Tommy Brook" 2017 JPEG file

(2) Foord, Korie. "Potter 227 quote" 2017 JPEG file

(3) Blake, Quentin "The Magic Finger". Digital Image The World Gallery 2017. 19 March 2017 http://www.worldgallery.co.uk/art-print/quentin-blake-roald-dahl-the-magic-finger-432214

(4) Foord, Korie. "Potter 237 quote" 2017 JPEG file

Two bad Mice:

(1) Potter, Beatrix. "Tom Thumb unable to cut ham" 1904 Digital Image

(2) Foord, Korie. "Plaster Food" 2017 JPEG file

(3) Foord, Korie. "Destoying the food" 2017 JPEG file

(4) Foord, Korie. "Destruction" 2017 JPEG file

Conclusion
 (1) Warne, Frederick. "Beatrix aged 25 with rabbit, Benjamin Bouncer" Digital Image. Victoria and Albert Museum. Web 1891. 26 March 2017

7. Conclusion

Overall Beatrix Potter as an author has captured the very essence of food within her texts, to be food, need food and become food. I have explored a wide range of her texts from the start of her career as an author to the darker more sinister texts at the end. Throughout my research I have learnt that not all of her texts are innocent and some certainly have a darker undertone. The care Potter took within her texts is evident in the way she used human characteristics to explore the animalistic within her characters.

Beatrix aged 25 with rabbit, Benjamin Bouncer, 1891. © Frederick Warne & Co. 2006

   Image Cited

 (1) Warne, Frederick. "Beatrix aged 25 with rabbit, Benjamin Bouncer" Digital Image. Victoria and Albert Museum. Web 1891. 26 March 2017

6. The Tale of the Two Bad Mice

(1)Beatrix Potter 1904 Tom Thumb unable to
cut ham

In this post, I would like to focus on the human, civilised way of eating compared to the animalistic. The best way to explore this theme is through Beatrix Potter's text, The Tale of the Two Bad Mice (1904). Within this text, it is very apparent that it is one of her earlier texts as it does not have the darkness that some of her other later texts portray. Instead, this text is quite a light text due to what happens in the story and also the illustrations.

(2) Page 153 Plaster food

At the beginning of the narrative, the reader is introduced to the fact the dolls house is beautiful, and that the two dolls who live there own the house "at least it belonged to Lucinda, but she never ordered meals. Jane was the cook; but she never did any cooking' (Potter 152) this quote was fascinating to me as it is meant to be humorous because dolls cannot cook. But underneath it is saying that even in a fantasy world for children Lucinda is the owner and Jane is the servant/cook. There is a social hierarchy even within children's playthings. 
Throughout my research into the text, it is interesting to find the cultural and contextual hints from the Victorian era in Potters work. For example in the pages following the last quote, it is interesting to note that the mice are civilised, trying to eat the plaster and paint ham with a knife and fork. But then they have animalistic tendencies with their actions following the disappointing dinner.  They break apart the food and then tear apart the house this is all in need of finding food. The illustrations depict them as animals without clothes (as I have discussed in a previous post). Although at the end of the text Hunca Munca is humanised by wearing the dolls dress and cleaning the dollhouse. 

(3)Page 160/161 Destroying the food

The plaster food is interesting as a concept because it relates to childhood and the plastic food that is now in the modern day. But these are represented as highly valued food. The dining table includes ' two red lobsters and a ham, a fish, a pudding and some pears and oranges' (Potter 153) all of these pieces are expensive items for a dinner party. They are beautiful but fake and these little pieces for the dolls house are still used in dolls houses today. 

(4) Page 162 Destruction

'There were tin spoons, and lead knives and forks, and two dolly chairs' (Potter 158) the detail on what kinds of metal and material the utensils are added to the intricacy of simple language. They are soft and cheap materials instead of hard silver. The good housewife if represented too "it is not boiled enough; it is hard. You have a try, Hunca Munca."(Potter 159) by letting Tom Thumb carve the meat they are taking on the male and female roles within the house. Potter cleverly intertwines the civilised with the animalistic, boiling the ham is not what an animal would do but they know to do that anyway. It also represents the fact that Jane the cook who does not cook (because she is a doll) would not know how to prepare a ham. Also in the next line "It's as hard as the hams at the cheesemonger's"(Potter 160), this is important because it suggests a human motive which is that Hunca Munca is a good shopper (part of the Victorian ideal of a housewife) she would know not to get her Ham from a certain place.   

Works and Images cited

Potter, Beatrix. The Beatrix Potter Collection. Vol. One. Ware: Wordsworth Editions, 2014. Print.

(1) Potter, Beatrix. "Tom Thumb unable to cut ham" 1904 Digital Image

(2) Foord, Korie. "Plaster Food" 2017 JPEG file

(3) Foord, Korie. "Destroying the food" 2017 JPEG file

(4) Foord, Korie. "Destruction" 2017 JPEG file

5. The Tale of Mr Tod. Predator vs Prey

(1) Tommy Brook

Another of Beatrix Potter's stories is the story of Mr Tod. This tale is about a fox named Mr Tod and a badger named Tommy Brook, Tommy Brook steals Benjamin bunnies children and then breaks into Mr Tod's house intending to eat the children later in the day. Complications arise and the story unfolds from there. It is A very dark tale if looked at in a certain light. From a previous post I wanted to carry on the trend of animals being food and how Beatrix Potter uses this to her advantage. The Tale of Mr Tod is one of the darkest stories that ever came from Beatrix Potter and in some cases parents wanted it removed from editions of the text. This is to do with the dark undertone of the narrative. Nearly all of the images are dark and bold showing both the badger and the fox. What is again unusual about this text is how civilised Potter has made the characters. From reassuring her readers 'Now Tommy Brock did occasionally eat rabbit pie; but it was only very little young ones occasionally when other food was really scarce' (Potter 208) this language is used to make the reader sympathise with Tommy Brook. But children will be looking at the characters as people and not animals. By saying this about Tommy Brook it makes him seem more of a gentleman.

(2) Potter 227 quote

Further, into the text there is civilised human actions an example is the description of how the dinner table in Mr Tod's home is set out (figure 2) This meal is for Tommy Brook and the thing that is most disturbing about it is the knowledge that the baby rabbits are inside the oven waiting to be cooked. The scene is set out to be very human and civilised but behind the facade, there is a darkness. This is something Beatrix Potter does very well. Behind the innocence there is darkness, it makes the reader more aware of predator vs prey.

(3) Roald Dahl's The Magic Finger

The Predator vs prey theme is a moral issue within these texts, this tale is more aware of it than many others. But Beatrix Potter isn't the only children's writer to put this as a theme within their texts. Within Roald Dahl's The Magic Finger, the whole text is focused on the rules of being a predator vs being prey. The magic is that the humans have duck features and have to act like ducks when they have killed and hunted ducks previously in the story. This is also swapped when the ducks start to have human characteristics and start hunting the people. The reader gets pulled into a world in which they realise that it is not okay to assume you are the predator. This is what Beatrix Potter plays on within her texts, by making her characters more human there is an instant reaction and care for their well-being.


 

(4) Potter 237 quote

The Tale of Mr Tod is also interesting because the worry and care for innocence is represented in another way throughout the passage on the left there is the same sense of being civil and human rather than having an animistic side. It shows the direct comparison between something nice and human (the plate) and then the hunting for food like an animal. The Plate in this description adds context and feeling to the character of Mr Tod right before he essentially kills and eats eggs (babies). As readers we don't have the same reaction to this as we would do if they were living creatures, the baby rabbits are a different matter as they are living and breathing.  But again the illustrations throughout the book are depicted as very dark scenes. The image of Mr Tod is interesting because even though he is a predator, he is worried about Tommy Brook's teeth. This shows that even a predator is fearful and can become food if the situation arises.

Images and Works Cited

Potter, Beatrix. The Beatrix Potter Collection. Vol. Two. Ware: Wordsworth Editions, 2014. Print.

(1) Foord, Korie. "Tommy Brook" 2017 JPEG file

(2) Foord, Korie. "Potter 227 quote" 2017 JPEG file

(3) Blake, Quentin "The Magic Finger". Digital Image The World Gallery 2017. 19 March 2017 http://www.worldgallery.co.uk/art-print/quentin-blake-roald-dahl-the-magic-finger-432214

(4) Foord, Korie. "Potter 237 quote" 2017 JPEG file

4. Animals as food and Illustration

(1) Beatrix Potter Illustration

 Beatrix Potters has a wonderful way of adding darkness into a narrative. At the beginning she has a very light and innocent way of presenting characters within her stories, mainly because they are children's books. But throughout her series of stories her narratives get darker the more you read into them. The main contrast between her stories, later on, are the illustrations. Beatrix Potter gets bolder within her work and takes on a Gothic style.  Using a type of crosshatching or black and white drawings she creates bold and deceptive images. Normally she uses these illustrations to represent the coming danger but it makes her later narratives seem a lot darker.

It all started with Peter Rabbit and the casual mention of the fact his father was put into a pie. Within the imagery that is presented the first illustration it shows the rabbit family as normal wild creatures. But the second illustration is presented with human characteristics, the rabbits are wearing clothes and acting like people. This makes it difficult to show how they become food later on.  This relation to animals becoming food is a recurring theme throughout Potters texts. Within Peter Rabbit the relation to food is brushed off as a warning for children not to be bad. But the deeper meaning is that they are 'people' becoming food. Throughout her other novels, it becomes clear that her intentions are slightly darker than that of a moral compass for children. 

(2) Tom Kitten

As I have previously shown in a blog post about The Tale of Samuel Whiskers it relates heavily to the idea in which animals become food and are food. The prey/predator complex plays a huge part within the text. First with Mrs Tabitha Twitchit saying she had eaten the rat's children 'I caught seven young ones out of one hole in the back kitchen, and we had them for dinner last Saturday.' (Potter 54) this sets up the story and determines Tom Kitten's fate. Later in the story, the contrast between the civil human way of eating and the animalistic way of eating is put into play. The rats proceed to steal ingredients to make Tom Kitten into a pudding, this, in turn, causes more complications. The reader is also presented with the idea that the animals are civil creatures and they have to make and cook things before they eat them, When this is read to a child they are being asked to identify with the animals. Which in turn makes the children worry when other animals or humans threaten the existence of their chosen protagonist/hero. 

(3) The London Sweep

Most of the characters in danger are children or young animals, which makes them more innocent and relatable to the reader. Tom Kitten is presented in dark imagery when going up the chimney and this relates to images of chimney sweeps in the Victorian era. It also shows Potters gothic style within her later texts. The image of the left is one created by Henry Mayhew.It was dangerous and dirty going up the chimney in Victorian  England and this is evident in Beatrix Potters illustration. 

Works and Images Cited

Potter, Beatrix. The Beatrix Potter Collection. Vol. Two. Ware: Wordsworth Editions, 2014. Print.
(1) Potter, Beatrix, "Flopsy, Mopsy and Cottontail picking were good little bunnies" 1902 Digital Image. Web  https://archive.org/details/thetaleofpeterra14838gut
(2) Foord, Korie "Tom Kitten" 2017 JPEG file 
(3) Jackson, Lee. "Victorian London - Publications - Social Investigation/Journalism - London Labour and London Poor, 1861-62; Henry Mayhew - Street Characters (selected Illustrations)." Victorian London - Publications - Social Investigation/Journalism - London Labour and London Poor, 1861-62; Henry Mayhew - Street Characters (selected Illustrations). N.p., n.d. Web. 19 Mar. 2017. <http://www.victorianlondon.org/mayhew/mayhew-street-characters.htm>.