《夏洛的网》这部作品初版于1952年，至2009年已有20多种译文，发行近千万册。虽然作者书写的是一个童话故事，但他给人以无限温情、感动和憧憬，是一部给大人阅读的童话。作者怀特用柔韧无比的蜘蛛丝编织了一张理想的、温暖的、美丽的、爱的大网，感动着世界无数的读者。这是一个善良的弱者之间相互扶持的故事，除了爱、友谊之外，这篇极抒情的童话里，还有一分对生命本身的赞美与眷恋。
中文书名：《夏洛的网》
作 者: E・B・怀特（美）
译 者: 任溶溶
I S B N: 9787532733415
页 数: 181
装 帧: 平装
出 版 年: 2004-05
所属类型：少儿/儿童文学/童话/
适合阅读年龄：6岁以上
出版社: 上海译文出版社
一只名叫威尔伯的小猪和一只叫夏洛的蜘蛛成为朋友。小猪未来的命运是成为圣诞节时的盘中大餐，这个悲凉的结果让威尔伯心惊胆寒。它也曾尝试过逃跑，但它毕竟是一只猪。看似渺小的夏洛却说：“让我来帮你。”于是夏洛用它的网在猪棚中织出“王牌猪”、“朱克曼的名猪”等字样，那些被人类视为奇迹的字让威尔伯的命运整个逆转，终于得到了比赛的特别奖和一个安享天命的未来。但就在这时，蜘蛛夏洛的生命却走到了尽头……
这是一个善良的弱者之间相互扶持的故事，除了爱、友谊之外，这篇极抒情的童话里，还有一分对生命本身的赞美与眷恋。
《夏洛的网》-主要目录
目录：
1）早饭前 2）小猪威尔伯 3）逃走 4)孤独 5)夏洛 6)夏日 7)坏消息 8)家里的谈话 9)威尔伯说大话 10)臭蛋爆炸 11)奇迹 12)会议 13）进展顺利 14）多里安医生 15）蟋蟀
关系表：
约翰·阿拉布尔先生，阿拉布尔太太，多里安医生
艾弗里——阿拉布尔夫妇的儿子，十岁 弗恩——阿拉布尔夫妇的女儿，八岁 霍默·L·朱克曼先生——弗恩的舅舅 伊迪丝·朱克曼太太——弗恩的舅妈 勒维——朱克曼夫妇的雇工 威尔伯——小猪 夏洛·阿·卡瓦蒂卡——蜘蛛 坦普尔顿——老鼠
《夏洛的网》-书籍作者
E.B.怀特(1899-1985) 生于纽约蒙特弗农，毕业于康奈尔大学。多年来他为《纽约人》杂志担任专职撰稿人。怀特是一位颇有造诣的散文家、幽默作家、诗人和讽刺作家。对于几代美国儿童来说，他之所以出名是因为写第一流的儿童读物《小斯图亚特》(1945年) 和《夏洛特的网》(1952年)。一代又一代学生和作者熟悉他，因为他是 《风格的要素》这本书的合著者 (兼修订者)。该书是关于作文和惯用法的很有价值的小册子，最初由在康奈尔大学教过怀特英语的小威廉．斯特朗克教授撰写。散文《自由》于1940年7月首先由《哈泼斯》杂志发表。当时美国尚未加入反对纳粹的战争，世界正处于纳粹──苏联条约的时期，无论左派或右派都忽略了极权主义对民主的威胁。这篇散文收入怀特的文集《一个人的肉食》(1942年)。
《夏洛的网》-出版花絮
美国作家E.B.怀特1952年的作品《夏洛的网》1979年曾出版过，但现在已经很难见到了。“这些年来总是找不到活着的感觉，看了《夏洛的网》，才知道生活是什么。”网络译本的翻译者肖毛就为了这样的感受，自己翻译并在网络上发布了这个经典童话，也带动起了一大批的“夏洛迷”。现在，这本被誉为“宝书 ”的《夏洛的网》经过长达五年的版权谈判，由著名儿童文学作家任溶溶、终于上海译文出版社出版。
《夏洛的网》-成绩
《夏洛的网》，一首关于生命，友情，爱与忠诚的赞歌。一部傲居“美国最伟大的十部儿童文学名著”首位的童话。风行世界五十年，发行千万册。
《夏洛的网》-相关评价
一）经过漫长的等待，世界经典童话《夏洛的网》终于在2004年5月由上海译文出版社引进出版，新版的译者是德高望重的儿童文学翻译家任溶溶先生。作为一本儿童文学名著，任溶溶先生的译本显然比旧译更加贴近儿童，但新译本能否完全取代旧译在读者心中的地位，还需要读者来作出判断。
不过无论如何，终于能够读到《夏洛的网》，对读者来说确实是一件幸运的事情。 “这实在是一本宝书。我觉得在一个理想的世界里，应该只有两种人存在，一种是读过《夏洛的网》的人，另一种是将要读《夏洛的网》的人。有时候，半夜里醒过来，摸摸胸口还在跳，就会很高兴，因为活着就意味着还能再把《夏洛的网》读一遍，而读《夏洛的网》就意味着还活着。……从我第一次读《夏洛的网》到现在，几乎已经有20年过去了，我一直都没能搞明白，这部‘儿童文学’何以能够如此长久地令我着迷。” ——复旦大学中文系副教授 严锋
二）这是一部非常优秀的童话，它的主题就是动物之间的友谊。怀特一生写过3部童话，这3部童话我都翻译过，相比而言，《夏洛的网》是其中最容易懂的，他的另外两部童话含义要更深一些。特别是《小老鼠斯图尔特》，当故事最后小老鼠上路去寻找的时候，那种气氛是非常忧伤的，怀特最终也没有告诉读者斯图尔特最后的寻找是不是有什么结果，这是一种很典型的“在路上”的感觉，而《夏洛的网》就要明亮得多，它的结尾是美好的，整个故事也非常清晰。——国内著名的儿童文翻译家之一任溶溶
The novel tells the story of a pig named Wilbur and his friendship with a barn spider named Charlotte. When Wilbur is in danger of being slaughtered by the farmer, Charlotte writes messages praising Wilbur (such as "Some Pig") in her web in order to persuade the farmer to let him live.
Written in White's dry, low-key manner, Charlotte's Web is considered a classic of children's literature, enjoyable to adults as well as children. The description of the experience of swinging on a rope swing at the farm is an often cited example of rhythm in writing, as the pace of the sentences reflects the motion of the swing. Publishers Weekly listed the book as the best-selling children's paperback of all time as of 2000.
Charlotte's Web was made into an animated feature by Hanna-Barbera Productions and Paramount Pictures in 1973. Paramount released a direct-to-video sequel, Charlotte's Web 2: Wilbur's Great Adventure, in the US in 2003 (Universal released the film internationally). A live-action film version of E. B. White's original story was released on December 15, 2006. A video game based on this adaption was also released on December 12.
Plot summary
The book begins when John Arable's sow gives birth to a litter of piglets, and Mr. Arable discovers one of them is a runt and decides to kill it. However, his eight year old daughter Fern begs him to let it live. Therefore her father gives it to Fern as a pet, and she names the piglet Wilbur. Wilbur is hyperactive and always exploring new things. He lives with Fern for a few weeks and then is sold to her uncle, Homer Zuckerman. Although Fern visits him at the Zuckermans' farm as often as she can, Wilbur gets lonelier day after day. Eventually, a warm and soothing voice tells him that she is going to be his friend. The next day, he wakes up and meets his new friend: Charlotte, the grey spider.
Wilbur soon becomes a member of the community of animals who live in the cellar of Zuckerman's barn. When the old sheep in the barn cellar tells Wilbur that he is going to be killed and eaten at Christmas, he turns to Charlotte for help. Charlotte has the idea of writing words in her web extolling Wilbur's excellence ("some pig", "terrific", "radiant", and eventually "humble"), reasoning that if she can make Wilbur sufficiently famous, he will not be killed. Thanks to Charlotte's efforts, and with the assistance of the gluttonous rat Templeton, Wilbur not only lives, but goes to the county fair with Charlotte and wins a prize. Having reached the end of her natural lifespan, Charlotte dies at the fair. Wilbur repays Charlotte by bringing home with him the sac of eggs (her "magnum opus") she had laid at the fair before dying. When Charlotte's eggs hatch at Zuckerman's farm, most of them leave to make their own lives elsewhere, except for three: Joy, Aranea, and Nellie, who remain there as friends to Wilbur.
Characters
* Wilbur is a rambunctious pig, the runt of his litter, who loves life, even that of Zuckerman’s barn. He sometimes feels lonely or fearful.
* Charlotte A. Cavatica , or simply Charlotte, is a spider who befriends Wilbur, who at first seems bloodthirsty due to her method of catching food.
* Fern Arable, daughter of John Arable and Mrs. Arable, is the courageous eight-year-old girl who saves Wilbur in the beginning of the novel.
* Templeton is a gluttonous rat who helps Charlotte and Wilbur only when offered food. He serves as a somewhat caustic, self-serving comic relief to the plot.
* Avery Arable is the brother of Fern. He appears briefly throughout the novel.
* Homer Zuckerman is Fern’s uncle who keeps Wilbur in his barn. He has a wife, Edith, and a hired man named Lurvy who helps out around the barn.
* Other animals living in Zuckerman’s barn with whom Wilbur converses are a disdainful lamb, a goose who is constantly sitting on her eggs, and an old sheep.
* Henry Fussy is a boy Fern’s age whom Fern becomes very fond of.
* Uncle is Wilbur’s rival at the fair, a large pig whom Charlotte doesn’t consider to be particularly refined.
History
White's editor Ursula Nordstrom said that one day, in 1952, E.B. White handed her a new manuscript out of the blue, the only version of Charlotte's Web then in existence, which she read soon after and was hugely impressed with. Charlotte's Web was published three years after White began writing it.
Since E. B. White published Death of a Pig in 1948, an account of how he failed to save a sick pig (which had been bought in order to be fattened up and butchered), Charlotte’s Web can be seen as White attempting "to save his pig in retrospect."
When White met the spider who originally inspired Charlotte, he called her Charlotte Epeira (after Epeira sclopetaria, the Grey Cross spider, now known as Aranea sericata), later discovering that the more modern name for that genus was Aranea. In the novel, Charlotte gives her full name as "Charlotte A. Cavatica", revealing her as a barn spider, an orb-weaver with the scientific name Araneus cavaticus.
The anatomical terms (such as those mentioned in the beginning of chapter nine) and other information that White used came mostly from American Spiders by Willis J. Gertsch and The Spider Book by John Henry Comstock, both of which combine a sense of poetry with scientific fact. White incorporated details from Comstock's accounts of baby spiders, most notably the "flight" of the young spiders and also the way one of them climbs to the top of a fence before launching itself into the air. White sent Gertsch’s book to Illustrator Garth Williams. Williams’ initial drawings depicted a spider with a woman’s face, and White suggested that he simply draw a realistic spider instead.
White originally opened the novel with an introduction of Wilbur and the barnyard (which later became the third chapter), but then decided to begin the novel from a human perspective by introducing Fern and her family on the very first page. White’s publishers were at one point concerned with the book’s ending and tried to get White to change it.
The author’s granddaughter, Martha White, thinks many children don’t necessarily see the book as set in Maine. Charlotte's Web has become White's most famous book. However, White treasured his privacy and the integrity of the farmyard and barn that helped inspire the novel, which have been kept off limits to the public according to his wishes.
Reception
Charlotte's Web was generally well-reviewed when it was released. In The New York Times, Eudora Welty wrote, "As a piece of work it is just about perfect, and just about magical in the way it is done." Aside from its paperback sales, Charlotte's Web is 78th on the all-time bestselling hardback book list. According to publicity for the 2006 film adaptation (see below), the book has sold more than 45 million copies and been translated into 23 languages. It was a Newbery Honors book for 1953, losing to Secret of the Andes by Ann Nolan Clark for the medal. In 1970, White won the Laura Ingalls Wilder Medal, a major prize in the field of children's literature, for Charlotte's Web, along with his first children's book, Stuart Little, published in 1945.
Maria Nikolajeva (in her book The Rhetoric of Character in Children's Literature) calls the opening of the novel a failure because of White's begun and then abandoned human dimension involving Fern, which, she says, obscures any allegory to humanity, if one were to view the animals' story as such. Seth Lerer, in his book Children’s Literature, finds that Charlotte represents female authorship and creativity, and compares her to other female characters in children’s literature such as Jo March in Little Women and Mary Lennox in The Secret Garden. Nancy Larrick brings to attention the "startling note of realism" in the opening line, "Where's Papa going with that Ax?"
Illustrator Henry Cole expressed his deep childhood appreciation of the characters and story, and calls Garth Williams' illustrations full of “sensitivity, warmth, humor, and intelligence.” Illustrator Diana Cain Blutenthal states that Williams' illustrations inspired and influenced her.
There is an unabridged audio book read by White himself which reappeared decades after it had originally been recorded. Newsweek writes that White reads the story “without artifice and with a mellow charm,” and that “White also has a plangency that will make you weep, so don’t listen (at least, not to the sad parts) while driving.” Joe Berk, president of Pathway Sound, had recorded Charlotte’s Web with White in White’s neighbor's house in Maine (which Berk describes as an especially memorable experience) and released the book in LP. Bantam released Charlotte’s Web alongside Stuart Little on CD in 1991, digitally remastered, having acquired the two of them for rather a large amount.
In 2005, a school teacher in California conceived of a project for her class in which they would send out hundreds of drawings of spiders (each representing Charlotte’s child Aranea going out into the world so that she can return and tell Wilbur of what she has seen) with accompanying letters; they ended up visiting a large number of parks, monuments and museums, and were hosted by and/or prompted responses from celebrities and politicians such as John Travolta and then First Lady Laura Bush.
Maggie Kneen created full-color illustrations for a couple sections of the novel, which were published in picture book format as Wilbur's Adventure and Some Pig.
Awards and nominations
* Massachusetts Children's Book Award (1984)
* Newbery Honor Book (1953)
* Laura Ingalls Wilder Medal (1970)
* Horn Book Fanfare
Film adaptations
1973 version
Main article: Charlotte's Web (1973 film)
The book was adapted into an animated feature by Hanna-Barbera Productions and Sagittarius Productions in 1973 with a song score by the Sherman Brothers.
2003 sequel
This is the sequel to the 1973 film, released direct-to-video by Paramount Pictures.
2006 version
Paramount Pictures, with Walden Media, Kerner Entertainment Company, and Nickelodeon Movies, produced a live-action/animated film starring Dakota Fanning as Fern and the voice of Julia Roberts as Charlotte, released on December 15, 2006.
Video game
A video game of the 2006 film was developed by Backbone Entertainment and published by THQ and Sega, and released on December 12, 2006 for the Game Boy Advance, Nintendo DS, PlayStation 2 and PC.
中文书名：《夏洛的网》
作 者: E・B・怀特（美）
译 者: 任溶溶
I S B N: 9787532733415
页 数: 181
装 帧: 平装
出 版 年: 2004-05
所属类型：少儿/儿童文学/童话/
适合阅读年龄：6岁以上
出版社: 上海译文出版社
一只名叫威尔伯的小猪和一只叫夏洛的蜘蛛成为朋友。小猪未来的命运是成为圣诞节时的盘中大餐，这个悲凉的结果让威尔伯心惊胆寒。它也曾尝试过逃跑，但它毕竟是一只猪。看似渺小的夏洛却说：“让我来帮你。”于是夏洛用它的网在猪棚中织出“王牌猪”、“朱克曼的名猪”等字样，那些被人类视为奇迹的字让威尔伯的命运整个逆转，终于得到了比赛的特别奖和一个安享天命的未来。但就在这时，蜘蛛夏洛的生命却走到了尽头……
这是一个善良的弱者之间相互扶持的故事，除了爱、友谊之外，这篇极抒情的童话里，还有一分对生命本身的赞美与眷恋。
《夏洛的网》-主要目录
目录：
1）早饭前 2）小猪威尔伯 3）逃走 4)孤独 5)夏洛 6)夏日 7)坏消息 8)家里的谈话 9)威尔伯说大话 10)臭蛋爆炸 11)奇迹 12)会议 13）进展顺利 14）多里安医生 15）蟋蟀
关系表：
约翰·阿拉布尔先生，阿拉布尔太太，多里安医生
艾弗里——阿拉布尔夫妇的儿子，十岁 弗恩——阿拉布尔夫妇的女儿，八岁 霍默·L·朱克曼先生——弗恩的舅舅 伊迪丝·朱克曼太太——弗恩的舅妈 勒维——朱克曼夫妇的雇工 威尔伯——小猪 夏洛·阿·卡瓦蒂卡——蜘蛛 坦普尔顿——老鼠
《夏洛的网》-书籍作者
E.B.怀特(1899-1985) 生于纽约蒙特弗农，毕业于康奈尔大学。多年来他为《纽约人》杂志担任专职撰稿人。怀特是一位颇有造诣的散文家、幽默作家、诗人和讽刺作家。对于几代美国儿童来说，他之所以出名是因为写第一流的儿童读物《小斯图亚特》(1945年) 和《夏洛特的网》(1952年)。一代又一代学生和作者熟悉他，因为他是 《风格的要素》这本书的合著者 (兼修订者)。该书是关于作文和惯用法的很有价值的小册子，最初由在康奈尔大学教过怀特英语的小威廉．斯特朗克教授撰写。散文《自由》于1940年7月首先由《哈泼斯》杂志发表。当时美国尚未加入反对纳粹的战争，世界正处于纳粹──苏联条约的时期，无论左派或右派都忽略了极权主义对民主的威胁。这篇散文收入怀特的文集《一个人的肉食》(1942年)。
《夏洛的网》-出版花絮
美国作家E.B.怀特1952年的作品《夏洛的网》1979年曾出版过，但现在已经很难见到了。“这些年来总是找不到活着的感觉，看了《夏洛的网》，才知道生活是什么。”网络译本的翻译者肖毛就为了这样的感受，自己翻译并在网络上发布了这个经典童话，也带动起了一大批的“夏洛迷”。现在，这本被誉为“宝书 ”的《夏洛的网》经过长达五年的版权谈判，由著名儿童文学作家任溶溶、终于上海译文出版社出版。
《夏洛的网》-成绩
《夏洛的网》，一首关于生命，友情，爱与忠诚的赞歌。一部傲居“美国最伟大的十部儿童文学名著”首位的童话。风行世界五十年，发行千万册。
《夏洛的网》-相关评价
一）经过漫长的等待，世界经典童话《夏洛的网》终于在2004年5月由上海译文出版社引进出版，新版的译者是德高望重的儿童文学翻译家任溶溶先生。作为一本儿童文学名著，任溶溶先生的译本显然比旧译更加贴近儿童，但新译本能否完全取代旧译在读者心中的地位，还需要读者来作出判断。
不过无论如何，终于能够读到《夏洛的网》，对读者来说确实是一件幸运的事情。 “这实在是一本宝书。我觉得在一个理想的世界里，应该只有两种人存在，一种是读过《夏洛的网》的人，另一种是将要读《夏洛的网》的人。有时候，半夜里醒过来，摸摸胸口还在跳，就会很高兴，因为活着就意味着还能再把《夏洛的网》读一遍，而读《夏洛的网》就意味着还活着。……从我第一次读《夏洛的网》到现在，几乎已经有20年过去了，我一直都没能搞明白，这部‘儿童文学’何以能够如此长久地令我着迷。” ——复旦大学中文系副教授 严锋
二）这是一部非常优秀的童话，它的主题就是动物之间的友谊。怀特一生写过3部童话，这3部童话我都翻译过，相比而言，《夏洛的网》是其中最容易懂的，他的另外两部童话含义要更深一些。特别是《小老鼠斯图尔特》，当故事最后小老鼠上路去寻找的时候，那种气氛是非常忧伤的，怀特最终也没有告诉读者斯图尔特最后的寻找是不是有什么结果，这是一种很典型的“在路上”的感觉，而《夏洛的网》就要明亮得多，它的结尾是美好的，整个故事也非常清晰。——国内著名的儿童文翻译家之一任溶溶
The novel tells the story of a pig named Wilbur and his friendship with a barn spider named Charlotte. When Wilbur is in danger of being slaughtered by the farmer, Charlotte writes messages praising Wilbur (such as "Some Pig") in her web in order to persuade the farmer to let him live.
Written in White's dry, low-key manner, Charlotte's Web is considered a classic of children's literature, enjoyable to adults as well as children. The description of the experience of swinging on a rope swing at the farm is an often cited example of rhythm in writing, as the pace of the sentences reflects the motion of the swing. Publishers Weekly listed the book as the best-selling children's paperback of all time as of 2000.
Charlotte's Web was made into an animated feature by Hanna-Barbera Productions and Paramount Pictures in 1973. Paramount released a direct-to-video sequel, Charlotte's Web 2: Wilbur's Great Adventure, in the US in 2003 (Universal released the film internationally). A live-action film version of E. B. White's original story was released on December 15, 2006. A video game based on this adaption was also released on December 12.
Plot summary
The book begins when John Arable's sow gives birth to a litter of piglets, and Mr. Arable discovers one of them is a runt and decides to kill it. However, his eight year old daughter Fern begs him to let it live. Therefore her father gives it to Fern as a pet, and she names the piglet Wilbur. Wilbur is hyperactive and always exploring new things. He lives with Fern for a few weeks and then is sold to her uncle, Homer Zuckerman. Although Fern visits him at the Zuckermans' farm as often as she can, Wilbur gets lonelier day after day. Eventually, a warm and soothing voice tells him that she is going to be his friend. The next day, he wakes up and meets his new friend: Charlotte, the grey spider.
Wilbur soon becomes a member of the community of animals who live in the cellar of Zuckerman's barn. When the old sheep in the barn cellar tells Wilbur that he is going to be killed and eaten at Christmas, he turns to Charlotte for help. Charlotte has the idea of writing words in her web extolling Wilbur's excellence ("some pig", "terrific", "radiant", and eventually "humble"), reasoning that if she can make Wilbur sufficiently famous, he will not be killed. Thanks to Charlotte's efforts, and with the assistance of the gluttonous rat Templeton, Wilbur not only lives, but goes to the county fair with Charlotte and wins a prize. Having reached the end of her natural lifespan, Charlotte dies at the fair. Wilbur repays Charlotte by bringing home with him the sac of eggs (her "magnum opus") she had laid at the fair before dying. When Charlotte's eggs hatch at Zuckerman's farm, most of them leave to make their own lives elsewhere, except for three: Joy, Aranea, and Nellie, who remain there as friends to Wilbur.
Characters
* Wilbur is a rambunctious pig, the runt of his litter, who loves life, even that of Zuckerman’s barn. He sometimes feels lonely or fearful.
* Charlotte A. Cavatica , or simply Charlotte, is a spider who befriends Wilbur, who at first seems bloodthirsty due to her method of catching food.
* Fern Arable, daughter of John Arable and Mrs. Arable, is the courageous eight-year-old girl who saves Wilbur in the beginning of the novel.
* Templeton is a gluttonous rat who helps Charlotte and Wilbur only when offered food. He serves as a somewhat caustic, self-serving comic relief to the plot.
* Avery Arable is the brother of Fern. He appears briefly throughout the novel.
* Homer Zuckerman is Fern’s uncle who keeps Wilbur in his barn. He has a wife, Edith, and a hired man named Lurvy who helps out around the barn.
* Other animals living in Zuckerman’s barn with whom Wilbur converses are a disdainful lamb, a goose who is constantly sitting on her eggs, and an old sheep.
* Henry Fussy is a boy Fern’s age whom Fern becomes very fond of.
* Uncle is Wilbur’s rival at the fair, a large pig whom Charlotte doesn’t consider to be particularly refined.
History
White's editor Ursula Nordstrom said that one day, in 1952, E.B. White handed her a new manuscript out of the blue, the only version of Charlotte's Web then in existence, which she read soon after and was hugely impressed with. Charlotte's Web was published three years after White began writing it.
Since E. B. White published Death of a Pig in 1948, an account of how he failed to save a sick pig (which had been bought in order to be fattened up and butchered), Charlotte’s Web can be seen as White attempting "to save his pig in retrospect."
When White met the spider who originally inspired Charlotte, he called her Charlotte Epeira (after Epeira sclopetaria, the Grey Cross spider, now known as Aranea sericata), later discovering that the more modern name for that genus was Aranea. In the novel, Charlotte gives her full name as "Charlotte A. Cavatica", revealing her as a barn spider, an orb-weaver with the scientific name Araneus cavaticus.
The anatomical terms (such as those mentioned in the beginning of chapter nine) and other information that White used came mostly from American Spiders by Willis J. Gertsch and The Spider Book by John Henry Comstock, both of which combine a sense of poetry with scientific fact. White incorporated details from Comstock's accounts of baby spiders, most notably the "flight" of the young spiders and also the way one of them climbs to the top of a fence before launching itself into the air. White sent Gertsch’s book to Illustrator Garth Williams. Williams’ initial drawings depicted a spider with a woman’s face, and White suggested that he simply draw a realistic spider instead.
White originally opened the novel with an introduction of Wilbur and the barnyard (which later became the third chapter), but then decided to begin the novel from a human perspective by introducing Fern and her family on the very first page. White’s publishers were at one point concerned with the book’s ending and tried to get White to change it.
The author’s granddaughter, Martha White, thinks many children don’t necessarily see the book as set in Maine. Charlotte's Web has become White's most famous book. However, White treasured his privacy and the integrity of the farmyard and barn that helped inspire the novel, which have been kept off limits to the public according to his wishes.
Reception
Charlotte's Web was generally well-reviewed when it was released. In The New York Times, Eudora Welty wrote, "As a piece of work it is just about perfect, and just about magical in the way it is done." Aside from its paperback sales, Charlotte's Web is 78th on the all-time bestselling hardback book list. According to publicity for the 2006 film adaptation (see below), the book has sold more than 45 million copies and been translated into 23 languages. It was a Newbery Honors book for 1953, losing to Secret of the Andes by Ann Nolan Clark for the medal. In 1970, White won the Laura Ingalls Wilder Medal, a major prize in the field of children's literature, for Charlotte's Web, along with his first children's book, Stuart Little, published in 1945.
Maria Nikolajeva (in her book The Rhetoric of Character in Children's Literature) calls the opening of the novel a failure because of White's begun and then abandoned human dimension involving Fern, which, she says, obscures any allegory to humanity, if one were to view the animals' story as such. Seth Lerer, in his book Children’s Literature, finds that Charlotte represents female authorship and creativity, and compares her to other female characters in children’s literature such as Jo March in Little Women and Mary Lennox in The Secret Garden. Nancy Larrick brings to attention the "startling note of realism" in the opening line, "Where's Papa going with that Ax?"
Illustrator Henry Cole expressed his deep childhood appreciation of the characters and story, and calls Garth Williams' illustrations full of “sensitivity, warmth, humor, and intelligence.” Illustrator Diana Cain Blutenthal states that Williams' illustrations inspired and influenced her.
There is an unabridged audio book read by White himself which reappeared decades after it had originally been recorded. Newsweek writes that White reads the story “without artifice and with a mellow charm,” and that “White also has a plangency that will make you weep, so don’t listen (at least, not to the sad parts) while driving.” Joe Berk, president of Pathway Sound, had recorded Charlotte’s Web with White in White’s neighbor's house in Maine (which Berk describes as an especially memorable experience) and released the book in LP. Bantam released Charlotte’s Web alongside Stuart Little on CD in 1991, digitally remastered, having acquired the two of them for rather a large amount.
In 2005, a school teacher in California conceived of a project for her class in which they would send out hundreds of drawings of spiders (each representing Charlotte’s child Aranea going out into the world so that she can return and tell Wilbur of what she has seen) with accompanying letters; they ended up visiting a large number of parks, monuments and museums, and were hosted by and/or prompted responses from celebrities and politicians such as John Travolta and then First Lady Laura Bush.
Maggie Kneen created full-color illustrations for a couple sections of the novel, which were published in picture book format as Wilbur's Adventure and Some Pig.
Awards and nominations
* Massachusetts Children's Book Award (1984)
* Newbery Honor Book (1953)
* Laura Ingalls Wilder Medal (1970)
* Horn Book Fanfare
Film adaptations
1973 version
Main article: Charlotte's Web (1973 film)
The book was adapted into an animated feature by Hanna-Barbera Productions and Sagittarius Productions in 1973 with a song score by the Sherman Brothers.
2003 sequel
This is the sequel to the 1973 film, released direct-to-video by Paramount Pictures.
2006 version
Paramount Pictures, with Walden Media, Kerner Entertainment Company, and Nickelodeon Movies, produced a live-action/animated film starring Dakota Fanning as Fern and the voice of Julia Roberts as Charlotte, released on December 15, 2006.
Video game
A video game of the 2006 film was developed by Backbone Entertainment and published by THQ and Sega, and released on December 12, 2006 for the Game Boy Advance, Nintendo DS, PlayStation 2 and PC.