Harriet the Spy
Harriet the Spy
Written and illustrated by Louise Fitzhugh
New York, Harper & Row, 1964
5.6" x 8.25"
Kerlan Collection, Children's Literature Research Collections
University of Minnesota Libraries
If Max, the wee hero of Where the Wild Things Are, had an older sister, she might well look and act like rambunctious, 11-year-old Harriet M. Welsch. Louise Fitzhugh's protagonist, who lives with her parents and nanny in a fashionable Yorkville townhouse, dresses like a tomboy, sulks, swears, grouses, and commits minor acts of breaking and entering in the service of her dream of becoming a writer. Critics were unsure at first what to make of Harriet's uncompromising manner, but young readers were quick to identify with the funny, feisty rebel who wears her heart on her sweatshirt sleeve.
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