I know that Marcia Brown won the Caldecott Medal for Cinderella, or the Little Glass Slipper and thus of course, specifically for these very illustrations, but I personally find them much too wishy-washy and even expressionless (and not nearly as evocative as some of Marica Brown's other Caldecott honours).Īnd yes, I also wish that Marcia Brown had included supplemental details, showing historical background, her own research and the like (maybe even a bibliography listing works consulted and cited).

Still, I would probably have given this adaptation a solid four star rating, had I enjoyed the accompanying illustrations a bit more.

I guess I am someone who has always as a rule liked the Grimms' version of the Cinderella tale rather more than Perrault's rendition (I might not like the violence at the end of the Brothers Grimm's Cinderella all that much, but I have always preferred the idea of Cinderella being helped by the spirit of her dead mother, how she actively enlists birds to help her with her chores to the Perrault version with its fairy godmother, magical mice and pumpkins, and a Cinderella who is actually annoyingly inactive, a matter of person choice, I guess). While I quite enjoyed the narrative of Marcia Brown's adaptation, I did not absolutely love it.

Cinderella and the little glass slipper