If you have a kid on your Christmas list, consider this classic. There are a lot of different printings, make sure you get the original printing with illustrations by William Nicholson. Information here. This is a vintage copy I found and I am as enamored with the illustrations{ the endpapers! at right}- the restrained color palette and technique - as I am the story.
The Velveteen Rabbit was one of my favorite books as a kid. I am a real sap - I can cry at just about anything. Including the end of this movie, back in the day. {I was young, okay!} Even though I have read this book so many times, I still have a little catch in my throat when the Skin Horse explains what it means to be real.
"Real isn't how you are made," said the Skin Horse. "It's a thing that happens to you. When a child loves you for a long, long time, not just to play with, but REALLY loves you, then you become Real."
"It doesn't happen all at once," said the Skin Horse. "You become. It takes a long time. That's why it doesn't happen often to people who break easily, or have sharp edges, or who have to be carefully kept. Generally, by the time you are Real, most of your hair has been loved off, and your eyes drop out and you get loose in your joints and very shabby. But these things don't matter at all, because once you are Real you can't be ugly, except to people who don't understand."
Now I'm all verklempt.
Talk amongst yourselves, I'll give you a topic: the Thighmaster is neither a thigh nor a master - discuss.
