Today I am pleased to introduce to you Ms. Ellen Handler Spitz.  Author of Inside Picture Books (Yale University Press, 1999), Ms. Spitz currently holds the Honors College Professorship of Visual Arts at University of Maryland.  She is, as you can see, a smart cookie.  She is also a Beatrix Potter fan.  Indeed, amongst her other accomplishments, she reviewed Alexander Grinstein’s The Remarkable Beatrix Potter for “The International Journal of Psychoanalysis”.

It is with great pleasure that we are hosting Ms. Spitz’s recent piece “Who Was Beatrix Potter?” (not to be confused with the Grosset & Dunlap title of the same name) in honor of the upcoming 2016 sesquicentennial of Beatrix Potter.  It is will be added to the Study Guide for teachers when Philadelphia’s Enchantment Theatre presents its own production of “Peter Rabbit Tales.”

Due to the limitations of this blog, the font may strike some of you as small.  Those of you who have difficulty reading the piece may find the full PDF available for viewing at a larger scale here.

Enjoy.