The name for Little Princess Frocks™ comes from the book A Little Princess, by Frances Hodgson Burnett. Nearly 100 years ago Mrs. Burnett spelled out the magic of dolls in A Little Princess. Here's a little excerpt of young Sara Crewe's wonderful introduction to her beloved doll, Emily. Once upon a time... “Said Sara, ‘… Dolls ought to be intimate friends. Emily is going to be my intimate friend.’ … ‘She is a doll I haven't got yet, … I have called her Emily.’  “‘I want her to look as if she wasn't a doll really,’ Sara said. ‘I want her to look as if she listens when I talk to her…. If, when I find her, she has no frocks, we can take her to a dressmaker and have her things made to fit. They will fit better if they are tried on.’ “When … they were approaching a shop which was really not a very large one, Sara suddenly … cried, ‘There is Emily! … She is actually waiting there for us!’ she said. ‘Let us go in to her…. You must introduce me and I will introduce you,’ said Sara. ‘But I knew her the minute I saw her — so perhaps she knew me, too.’ “Perhaps she had known her. She had certainly a very intelligent expression in her eyes when Sara took her in her arms…. ‘Of course,’ said Sara, looking into her face as she held her on her knee, ‘of course papa, this is Emily.’ “So Emily was bought and actually taken to a children's outfitter's shop and measured for a wardrobe as grand as Sara's own. She had lace frocks, too, and velvet and muslin ones, and hats and coats and beautiful lace-trimmed underclothes, and gloves and handkerchiefs and furs. ‘I should like her always to look as if she was a child with a good mother,’ said Sara.” "What I believe about dolls," she said, "is that they can do things they will not let us know about. Perhaps, really, Emily can read and talk and walk, but she will only do it when people are out of the room. That is her secret. You see, if people knew that dolls could do things, they would make them work. So, perhaps, they have promised each other to keep it a secret. If you stay in the room, Emily will just sit there and stare; but if you go out, she will begin to read, perhaps, or go and look out of the window. Then if she heard either of us coming, she would just run back and jump into her chair and pretend she had been there all the time." .....thank you, Mrs. Burnett, for fueling our imaginations! We who love dolls feel much the same way about them as Sara did her Emily! From time to time I will recommend a book or two in the Library. For this inaugural visit, I highly recommend A Little Princess by Frances Hodgson Burnett. Happy reading! <<Back to Library