The Princess and the Goblin

3.5-4 stars. This basically reads like a regular children's fantasy book and would be very nostalgic/familiar to any readers familiar with Enid Blyton.

Princess Irene is an 8 year old little girl who one day stumbles upon a long-lost ancestor, whom she calls her grandmother for simplicity's sake, just living in a corner of her castle. Later on, while out with her nurse Lootie, she meets the young son of a miner, Curdie Peterson, who teaches them that goblins are nothing to be afraid of. They later find save each other from goblins.

Make no mistake, this is thoroughly a standard-fare children's fantasy book. There're so many books that read like this nowadays that on first read, it doesn't immediately feel particularly fresh or amazing.

But I think the full impact of it is best appreciated when reading more on the context of the book's production. Macdonald was seen as the founding father of modern fantasy. he was a mentor of Lewis Caroll (and his children's positive reception of Alice in Wonderland encouraged Carroll to publish it) and apparently influenced even Tolkien in the depiction of goblins in the Legendarium. i don't even think there were fantasy books like this before Macdonald (although I am not an expert on the history of this genre so I can't say for sure).

Being a standard Victorian fairy tale, the book was full of moralistic “good values” for children, although it doesn't feel so grating somehow, probably because I lived and breathed Enid Blyton growing up. I thought the values that it tried to bring across weren't overly preachy - Princess Irene was never proud or encouraged to maintain a divide between herself and a “lower class” person like Curdie. In fact, she reprimands her nurse for trying to get Curdie to call her “Your Royal Highness”, which she thinks is “name-calling only for rude children”.

In the case of Irene's grandmother, there's a very complex situation there where Curdie is unable to see this lady-ancestor even when Irene brings him to her room. He's also unable to see the magic thread that the grandmother has spun for Irene to hold on to in times of trouble, which is the only reason why she manages to find Curdie when he is captured by the goblins, and lead him out to safety. Curdie is rude to Irene, who thinks that she is simply getting carried away by her fancies and “taking him in” - he is reprimanded by his mother who thinks that just because he can't see it doesn't mean that it doesn't exist. Irene is rude to Curdie as she's offended, but then she's also reprimanded by her grandmother who says that he can't help not being able to see what she is able to. This is an unexpectedly complex situation that I think would go over the heads of most children, but might still stick around in their subconsciousness for years to come.

If you're picking up this book expecting something that'll blow your mind, you will be disapopinted. Rather, I'd recommend it for anyone looking to (re)visit moralistic Victorian children's fairy tales, or if you're a fantasy buff and would like to experience this really simple children's story that started the domino effect and set the historical stage for works like Alice in Wonderland and Lord of the Rings in the century following its publication.