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A response from Sharon Karpinski:

1. The information about Elsie as recommended literature for Christian
Homeschoolers came straight off the Net at various Elsie Dinsmore sites
supported by Christian Homeschoolers.  I added the words "fundamentalist"
which I believe does describe the form of evangelical Christianity embraced
by many Christian oriented Homeschoolers. To take it further---if one
must---I believe they are either Calvinists or Anabaptists but I have not
researched this.

2.  Obviously, I don't contend that all Christians are embracing Elsie as
suitable child reading matter. I've no idea where the "all" came from. I'd
never write it that way because I are one.  I am a practicing Christian who
does not believe the Elsie books are a good idea 130 years after the fact.

3.  All info about Elsie book plots comes from my personal reading
experience. I have read Elsie, Elsie's Holidays at Roseland, Elsie's
Girlhood, Elsie's Children, Elsie's Widowhood,  Elsie's New Relations and
Elsie's Young Folks. I'm about halfway through Elsie's Womanhood, which I
just acquired. And if anybody has any of the Dodd Mead edition Elsie books,
lemme know. I want them.

4.  I know a number of homeschoolers whose orientation is not primarily
religious. I lived in northern Calif.  for many years during the height of
"alternative lifestyle", e.g. I'm an old hippie.  When my son was a child,
several of his friends were homeschooled for various reasons (their parents
believed they could do it better than the local public school, they lived
in a yurt ten miles up a dirt road impassable much of the year and---my
personal favorite---the local junior high's main problem wasn't even drugs,
it was prostitution and that girl's parents couldn't afford private
school). I don't think I am innately prejudiced against homeschoolers
though, obviously, I could be wrong about that. 

5. Mr. Travilla (Elsie's husband) forgot to have "obey" removed from the
marriage vow which is just as well since when Elsie finds out what he
intended to do, she informs him that she actively wants to obey him, that
her obedience passes from her father to her husband. Travilla, poor man,
has been fighting the "obey" thing for twenty years because he thinks his
friend Horace demands too much of his daughter. Travilla is killled off as
soon as possible (in book 6).

On the whole, I'm pleased with the responses that you've sent (and do send
more, even the condemnatory ones---the loyal opposition always reveals much
about themselves when on the attack) because I thought what I'd found was a
little scary. I'm glad I'm not alone. Sharon

[I'm forwarding her the responses, as you figured out by now. --Sandra]






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