Faulkner's The Wishing Tree as Children's Literature

Faulkner's The Wishing Tree as Children's Literature Faulkner's only published children's story, The Wishing Tree, has fallen into an obscurity from which, in my opinion, it deserves to be rescued—not so much for scholars and Faulkner specialists as for the children for whom it was originally intended. Indeed, it can provide youngsters early in their lives with a memorable introduction to this major American author. Published in 1967, it is currently out of print and therefore largely unknown, even to many specialists in children's literature. I would like to argue for its return to the top ranks of children's literature for enjoyment by children on their own but more especially for use in the elementary school setting. The Wishing Tree is full of magical adventures, appealing, often humorous characters, and instructive themes; further, it can lead to a variety of activities both in and out of the classroom. However, before turning to a close examination of the book itself, I will review its somewhat murky origins and subsequent history as well as its fate at the hands of scholarship in order to provide a background which should prove helpful to those teachers who choose to use it. Its origins and its textual history are both complicated and fascinating. Faulkner apparently composed the story in late January or early February of 1927, although whether he originally intended it as a gift for the eighth birthday on February 5 of Victoria Franklin, who would become his stepdaughter when he married her mother Estelle in 1929, or for ten-year-old Margaret Brown, a friend's daughter who was dying of cancer, is somewhat unclear. Faulkner himself is largely responsible for the confusion, for he has claimed both. Victoria's copy, which he typed and bound himself, bears the date 5 February, 1927, and a dedication indicating that he wrote it specifically for her birthday: For his dear friend Victoria on her eighth birthday Bill he made this book. However, in defending his opposition to Mrs. Brown's desire to publish her daughter's copy in 1958-59, Faulkner claimed that he wrote it for Margaret; in a letter of February 4, 1959, to his agent Harold Ober, he stated, "I invented this story for Mrs. Brown's daughter, about ten at the time, who was dying of cancer. I put it on paper and gave it to her so her family could read it when she wanted to hear it. This I did as a gesture of pity and compassion for a doomed child. I was quite shocked when Mrs. Brown wrote me that she even considered getting money from it" (Selected Letters 421; see also his letter to Bennett Cerf, quoted in Brodsky 334) . Although Blotner quotes both the 132 dedication and this letter in his biography of Faulkner, he does not comment on the contradiction; indeed, his chronology clearly indicates that Faulkner wrote the story for Victoria's birthday in February of 1927 and then gave a copy of it to Margaret early in 1928 (565) . Brodsky, however, in an article in Studies in Bibliography argues that Margaret's version is the original and Victoria's the later one, citing Faulkner's 1959 statement in a letter to Bennett Cerf, the "dedication" to Margaret in her copy, and a reported entry of February 11, 1927, in her father's diary indicating that Faulkner had given her the story by that date. Further, he proposes that the simpler, shorter Victoria version is a refinement of the earlier Margaret version. Although we may never know for a certainty, it seems to me much more likely that Faulkner originally wrote the story as a birthday gift for Victoria and then gave a slightly different version to Margaret Brown, either a few days or approximately a year later. Not only the dedication to Victoria but also numerous details in the story itself support this contention: its subject is a little girl's birthday; it takes place on a winter day, reflecting Victoria's February birthdate; the birthday girl has a younger brother, as did Victoria; there is no mention of a father (the Franklins were divorced) ; and...