Carroll, Baum, Barrie. (Mito)biografie i (mikro)historie. [Carroll, Baum, Barrie. (Mytho)biographies and (micro)histories] by Maciej Skowera (review)

Reviewed by: Carroll, Baum, Barrie. (Mito)biografie i (mikro)historie. [Carroll, Baum, Barrie. (Mytho)biographies and (micro)histories] by Maciej Skowera Mateusz Świetlicki CARROLL, BAUM, BARRIE. (Mito)biografie i (mikro)historie. [CARROLL, BAUM, BARRIE. (Mytho)biographies and (micro)histories] By Maciej Skowera. Series: Projekty Komparatystyki. Universitas, 2022, 512 pages. ISBN: 978-83-242-3763-0 Lewis Carroll’s Alice (1865), L. Frank Baum’s Dorothy (1900), and J. M. Barrie’s Wendy (1904) are among children’s literature’s most widely recognized characters. While the novels in which they were first introduced were published in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, they have continued to captivate subsequent generations of readers worldwide. However, the popularity of Alice, Dorothy, and Wendy stems not only from their status as beloved children’s characters but also from their quality as symbols of mainstream popular culture. They have appeared in numerous film and book adaptations, have been featured on merchandise, and have been referenced in culture— for instance, most recently by musicians such as Lady Gaga (Alice), Nicki Minaj (Dorothy), and Taylor Swift (Wendy). Notably, often such references have little to do with the original characters—and children’s books—but with their palimpsestic images shaped throughout the years by readers, critics, film directors, animators, and, more generally, show business. Maciej Skowera’s recent book demonstrates the history of the entanglements of Lewis Carroll’s, L. Frank Baum’s, and J. M. Barrie’s female protagonists and the beyond-textual discourses that surround them. Carroll, Baum, Barrie. (Mito)biografie i (mikro) historie [Carroll, Baum, Barrie. (Mytho)biographies and (micro)histories] is a meticulously researched monograph consisting of impressive 512 pages. Notably, it features a long list of works cited, an index, and colorful illustrations demonstrating some of the most interesting reimagi-nations of Alice, Dorothy, and Wendy over the years. In the introduction, Skowera explains the aim of the study and the meaning of the eponymous terms microbiography and microhistory, which he uses to demonstrate “what the individual stories said and say about human fears and dreams; what childhood and adulthood, children’s and adult literature, reality and fantasy used to be and what they are today for the Western world; what we culturally remember about Carroll, Baum and Barrie and what we no longer remember” (30). The following theoretical chapter contains references to sources by international and Polish scholars of children’s literature and culture and not only demonstrates the author’s erudition but also establishes his own voice. The three thought-provoking analytical chapters are the heart of the monograph and are devoted to Carroll, Baum, and Barrie, respectively. Although a lot has been written about these authors— mostly in English—Skowera offers a new perspective using an interdisciplinary and transcultural approach. He not only combines close reading of a variety of primary texts with the study of their authors’ (mytho) biographies, but also demonstrates that Alice, Dorothy, and Wendy have crossed over into the mainstream of popular culture. Moreover, the analytical chapters feature a detailed investigation of how changing attitudes towards selected elements of the authors’ biographies have influenced the reception of their protagonists. Thus, [End Page 73] Skowera demonstrates that Carroll, Baum, and Barrie have become almost mythical authors, just like their best-known characters have become almost mythical—and universal—heroines who are still alive in the Western cultural imagination and can be adapted to different cultural, social, and political circumstances in various types of narratives. In the book’s conclusion, Skowera argues that Alice, Dorothy, and Wendy have become “imaginal structures,” that is, “product[s] of multiple narratives about a text/text of culture, a bundle of multiple views about a story” (431). Although Carroll, Baum, Barrie. (Mito)biografie i (mikro)historie discusses only three well-known authors and their female characters, the analytical approach Skowera applies goes beyond the microhistories and mythobiographies of Carroll, Baum, and Barrie and their protagonists. Thus, it may inspire other scholars to study the textual and beyond-textual lives of other authors and their literary children—for example, L. M. Montgomery and Anne Shirley, J. K. Rowling and Harry Potter, or Enid Blyton and Noddy. Mateusz Świetlicki University of Wrocław Copyright © 2024...

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