Christensen, Madonna Dries. DOLLS REMEMBERED. Bloomington, IN: i Universe, 2009. 172 pages, trade paperback. $16.95.As touchstones to the past, dolls validate childhood, a span of years that often seem like a fragmented moment in time. With their life-like faces, blemished complexions, and snarled hair, childhood dolls hold sway with a magical power that rarely wanes, and often grows.
This charming anthology, DOLLS REMEMBERED, features more than 60 reminiscences and readers will learn that dolls can make or break friendships. Dolls are enjoyed alone or with a friend; they fuel creativity and imagination. Dolls teach sharing, nurturing, and loyalty; they assuage loneliness and hurt feelings; they calm fears and keep secrets. Dolls teach values and lessons--to adults as well as children. Dolls share adventure with their owners, and without them. When one girl outgrew her favorite doll but kept it under her bed, her friends "dollnapped" it. For years, the doll showed up at unlikely events.
Separately, two girls brought a treasured doll with them to America when they fled Nazi Europe with their family. Another girl lost her doll to that war. One girl disowned the doll she received for Christmas, while the same type doll was yearned for by others. More than one doll met an untimely fate. A childhood doll softened a poignnant reunion between two sisters after a rift had kept them apart for several years.
In the vignettes revealed in this anthology, not all dolls are pretty--except in the eyes of the beholder. Not all dolls were wanted; some were disappointing; not all became favorites, but each is memorable.
This book is available online through www.iUniverse.com and www.amazon.com. All royalities go to Down Syndrome Association of Northern Virginia.
Book reviewed by: Madonna Dries Christensen.
Brenda Kay Ledford's story, "Finding Dottie," appears in the anthology, DOLLS REMEMBERED. Brenda became reunited with her childhood doll through a serendipitous circumstance. Brenda is a member of North Carolina Writers' Network-West.
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Some of my dearest dolls were the homely ones, children that only a mother can love sort of thing. My best friends who knew all my secrets and always gave me comfort and reassurance when times were tough. A number of grown men I know feel the same about their teddy bears.
ReplyDeleteBrenda I will have to read your poem. I hope you put it on your blog.
As a child I received a doll each Christmas. I played with it until it was in a bad state by the time the next Christmas rolled around. Once my cousin who was a bit older gave away a box of her old dolls and my mother brought them home for my sister and me. She had a wide variety of dolls, bride dolls and large baby dolls, pretty dresses on some and some naked. Some of them were in worse shape than our own, but Gay and I had many hours of fun playing with all those dolls. We felt quite rich to have so many at one time.
ReplyDeleteThanks for posting this Brenda Kay. It sounds like an interesting anthology. Congratulations on being included.
I can see (not for the first time)I had queer childhood. I don't remember a single doll. What I do remember is what would today have been worth a fortune if they were still around: my stuffed animals, mostly Steiff. Especially a zebra, a pink pig, and a koala whose fur was actually kangaroo (not a Steiff, of course). That last one was lost when I was in the hospital once, and all efforts to replace it were futile.
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