The Light Princess (Sunburst Book) [Paperback]

George Macdonald (Author), Maurice Sendak (Illustrator)

Book Description

Age Level: 8 and up | Grade Level: 3 and up | Series: Sunburst Book

The Light Princess--the princess who "lost her gravity"--has been essential fiction for several generations of children. This new edition is a companion volume (same page size, similar design) to our edition of The Golden Key, of which Publishers' Weekly said: "Maurice Sendak lights the way through MacDonald's Kingdom with the most mystical, the most poetic pictures of his distinguished career." Now Sendak has made the pictures The Light Princess always deserved to have.
This is the only separate edition available that preserves the authentic text; it is neither cut nor edited nor "improved" in any way.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

The fact that George MacDonald--a scholar as well as a preacher and writer--once read this fairy tale to his students instead of giving them a lecture says volumes about the man and his beliefs. It also says much about his faith in the power of stories. The Light Princess is a simple enough tale, clearly written for children--a princess at her christening is cursed by a wicked witch with lightness (she floats blissfully about the castle all day long, and gets into all sorts of adventures, as one can easily imagine)--yet it holds a powerful spiritual truth. Gravity, weight, sorrow, suffering--all of this the princess misses, but with all of these she misses love, for what is love without weight, without body? What is love without falling? She discovers this truth, of course, only at the last minute when a faithful prince loves her enough to die for her.

Sometimes it's not a ponderous lecture--or sermon--that we need in order to experience what incarnation is about. --Doug Thorpe.

From Publishers Weekly

McKinley's deft adaptation trims the story without sacrificing the witty vitality of MacDonald's 19th century original. The story of a bewitched princess (gravity does not affect her) and the prince who will sacrifice his life for her is presented in a lavishly illustrated package. Treherne's intensely decorative drawings add a striking visual dimension: her use of rich colors and elegantly stylized figures creates a romantic, mysterious mood. Each picture is bordered by a motif that emphasizes an element of the story, which effectively enhances both text and pictures. All ages.
Copyright 1988 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Product Details

• Reading level: Ages 8 and up
  
• Paperback: 120 pages
• Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux (BYR) (August 1, 1984)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0374444587
• ISBN-13: 978-0374444587
• Product Dimensions: 7.2 x 4.8 x 0.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (15 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #254,724 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #17 in Books > 4-for-3 Books > Children's Books > Authors & Illustrators, A-Z > ( S ) > Sendak, Maurice

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

32 of 33 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars My most beloved MacDonald book!, December 17, 2002

By 

Jill Barrett (Independence, VA United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Light Princess (Sunburst Book) (Paperback)

When I received this as a gift, I had already read and thoroughly delighted in "At the Back of the North Wind," "The Princess and the Goblin," "The Princess and Curdie," and "The Golden Key." When you read MacDonald, if your heart is right, you feel sheltered--the world he creates for you is as trustworthy and pure as C. S. Lewis's Narnia or Rivendell of Tolkien's Middle Earth. At the same time, you feel challenged to transform your own world and make it more like MacDonald's.

I was expecting another dose of the same awe-inspiring goodness without false piety or preachiness that is MacDonald's literary legacy. In "The Light Princess," however, there was an unexpected ingredient--a sharp wit that pervades the whole book and made me laugh out loud more than once. In a modern world where wit and vulgarity are viewed as conjoined twins, how satisfying a book this is! MacDonald infused delicious humor into his characters without losing the innocence. I fell in love with this book by page three, and it has surpassed "The Princess and the Goblin" as my favorite work of George MacDonald.

The fact that my favorite illustrator of all time, Maurice Sendak, added his talents to this book is icing on the cake. Sendak always grabs the heart and soul of the written work and renders it into drawings too evocative to be believed. The drawing of the prince with only his head above the water took my breath away, and in one fabulous illustration, the hilarious expression on the face of the gravity-deprived infant princess as she floats away reflects the hilarity of the story itself.

If some of MacDonald's other stories have turned you off because they are too long, too "deep" or whatever, don't miss this treasure as a result. It is MacDonald-Light, and by that I mean not only easy to read, but typically illumined with beauty and truth. Plus, it's a love story that pokes fun of its own sentimentality. Anyone not brain-dead and heart-numb ought to adore it.

26 of 26 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Five Stars are to few, March 5, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: The Light Princess (Sunburst Book) (Paperback)

This is one of the most beautiful stories I have ever read! My friends tire of me recomending it to them -- but those who take my advise fall equally in love with its charm. The princess reminds me of Pearl in _The Scarlet Letter_, she cannot be truly human until she cries. What an idea! We cannot truly expereance real joy in life until we have felt the sting of pain. MacDonald never wrote fluff, his words have meaning even when born on the wings of fairies. Be encouraged and delighted by this beautiful fairy story. They say it's just for children, but the theme of love and the importance of gravity of character are as precious to the adult reader as the pool of water to the princess.

28 of 30 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Delightfully Whimsical Fairy Tale, March 27, 2001

By 

Richard R. Horton (Webster Groves, MO United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Light Princess (Sunburst Book) (Paperback)

George MacDonald was a Scottish clergyman of the mid-to-late 19th century, now known best for a variety of children`s fantasies, such as The Princess and the Goblin (recently made into a moderately successful animated feature), The Princess and Curdie, and the remarkable At the Back of the North Wind, as well as such adult novels as Lilith. Those are novels, but he also wrote some shorter pieces, perhaps aimed at a slightly younger audience (though very enjoyable for all ages). The Light Princess is one of these. (Another is The Golden Key: both books are available in very attractive Sunburst paperback editions, with illustrations by Maurice Sendak).

It is the tale of a princess who is cursed by a mean, jealous, witch so that she has no gravity. The book is full of puns, so MacDonald makes much both of her weightlessness, and the lack of gravity in her character. Naturally her parents are upset and try to have her cured, but to no avail (although the efforts of a couple of Chinese philosophers to provide a cure are rendered amusingly). However the Princess is quite happy with her "light" state (of course it is in her nature to be always happy). In the way of things, a Prince appears, and falls in love with the Princess. Then the witch realizes that her curse has failed to make the Princess unhappy, so she takes further steps, which are thwarted by the selfless behavior of the Prince, and which result in the Princess recovering her gravity: not an unmixed blessing, but one which her new maturity allows her to realize is best in the long run.

This is a delightful story, told with just the right mixture of whimsy and mildly serious moral comment. The characters are lightly and accurately drawn (the Princess` parents and the Chinese philosophers in particular, are delightful), and the story is predictable but still quite imaginative, with a number of nice touches to do with the Princess` weightlessness. Maurice Sendak`s illustrations are wonderful as usual.