★★★★★ Harriet is another of those brilliant, painful characters

Harriet the Spy

Louise Fitzhugh

** spoiler alert **

I read this many years ago after my New York City aunt, who always knew about the hot new books gave it to my sister. I LOVED it (So did my sister.) Harriet was brilliant, as was Ole Golly.

As is usual for a book I read so long ago, I mainly remember certain specific scenes. For instance, I remember Harriet, who saw herself as a future writer, spying on a writer who lived nearby. This writer lived alone and had a large number of cats. While Harriet was watching, he came home from grocery shopping, fed his cats, and ate some yogurt. This caused Harriet to question her career choices: She reckoned she could learn to eat yogurt, but wasn't sure she could endure all those cats. Although when I read it I was close to Harriet in age, I knew immediately that this was flawed logic Louise Fitzhugh had put in for comic effect.

The story is mainly about Harriet learning how unfair the world is. Harriet, to teach herself to write, carries a notebook in which she writes everything, even her most private thoughts. Her notebook is clearly labeled "PRIVATE". Harriet has never really imagined how bad it would be if her private thoughts became public, nor does she realize how thin is the shield of the PRIVATE label on her notebooks. Of course, her notebook is stolen and all her classmates become furious at her. This includes even her best friends Sport and Janie.

By the end of the book Sport and Janie appear to have reconciled themselves to Harriet, so we end if not exactly happily, then at least with some relief.

I am not sure why I liked Harriet the Spy so much. I think it was probably the originality of Harriet's thoughts. As in the case of her writer neighbor, Harriet's thinking was not always linear or logical. But it was always her very own, often insightful.

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