HARRIET THE SPY 1/8

Chapter 1-4 Reading Guide

Hello Readers!

I am overjoyed to spend the next few weeks delving into the world of Harriet the Spy written and illustrated by Louise Fitzhugh. As always I’ll provide weekly chapter breakdowns and questions as well as creative writing prompts based on what we’re reading. This book was first published in 1964 and became known as one of the best children’s books ever. Even as recent as 2012 it was named 17th out of 100 best books for kids by the School Library Journal and holds a special place in the hearts of many.

To loosley summarize, Harriet the Spy follows Harriet M. Welsh, a stubborn and curious 11 year old “spy”. Harriet lives in upper Manhattan where the neighbors she spies on provide the material and observations she furiously documents in her notebooks. Her friends Janie and Sport have different personalities and circumstances, but like Harriet occupy their own internal worlds. Harriet is raised primarily by her nanny Ole Golly who is a bit strange, but very encouraging of Harriet’s desire to record her experiences. But when Harriet finally gets caught she has to learn certain truths about herself or risk the people that matter to her most.

Before we go any further, I should probably come clean about something. When I saw the movie version of this book I would have said I loved the movie more. I saw the movie on TV a few years after its release in 1995 and happened to be close to Harriet’s age at the time. And without being too gushy, it was pretty inspiring to see another girl who wanted to be a writer no matter what.

And even now it is wonderful to see a young person be so passionate and stand so firm to what they love even when the grown ups or people in their life don’t understand. But Harriet is a very flawed character. She is far from perfect and is self aware enough to know that, however that awareness does not stretch very far. In all her observations she seems to lack a lot of understanding. Now as I mentioned, this book was published in the 1960’s and the ideas adults had about how children, especially how young girls should act and behave are very different from what they are now. An eleven year old girl from a wealthy family was expected to be ladylike and agreeable. The fact that Harriet is running around in back allies in ripped clothes was waaaaay more scandalous back then.

For all of Harriet’s ambition and drive for knowledge, she is not totally enviable. And what we’ll see over the these 16 chapters, besides a lot of mischief and peeking into the lives of her neighbors, is how Harriet’s blind passion can also be her downfall.

In the following posts we’ll get to why this book was banned in the 1980. Yes, I know, ANOTHER banned book. And we’ll learn a little bit more about the author and perhaps how her life and Harriet’s are in common. But for now, here are some guiding questions on the first 4 chapters to get you to think about the book a little deeper and hopefully notice something you might have missed. And if you have any answers to these questions I encourage you to share them in the comments so we can continue the conversation.