The Rabbits’ Wedding
Written and illustrated by Garth Williams
It all began one day fifty years ago when I was lying on the floor at kindergarten, pretending to be asleep. Peeking through my fingers, I watched as a fellow student, dressed in a Santa constume, stumbled around the various napping children, delivering presents to us all.
When I “woke up” I discovered beside me a thin little book with 2 rabbits drawn on the cover. I felt slightly disappointed that the book sported only four colours - black, white, green and a spot of yellow. I wanted a toy that was more colourful and stimulating. Instead I had received a book. I already had hundreds of books at home!
Little did I know that this one, “The Rabbits’ Wedding”, would quickly become one of the most treasured in my collection. The kindergarten teacher eventually became tired of my repeated request for it to be read, telling me to choose a different book whenever it was my turn to nominate a story for the day’s reading session.
The illustrations are what first endeared me to the book. I was entranced by their intricate detail. I fell into the tranquility of the rabbits’ meadow. I could almost believe that I was a fellow forest creature in the final wedding scene.
For me, the story remains one of idyllic innocence. It portrays a foundational simplicity of life: Two little rabbits playing together in harmony day by day, one of them often becoming melancholy until the other pursues an awkward conversation, which then leads to the happy ending.
However, that was not how Alabama state senator Edward Oswell Eddins saw it a year after the book’s publication in 1958. He stated that it was “propaganda for integration and intermarriage.” He and various other similar minded people sought to have the book banned.
It’s a difficult thing to do, to understand and sympathise with societal thought of times gone by. It is said that we should not judge the decisions of the past with the knowledge of today. To a large extent I agree. In the case of “The Rabbits’ Wedding” however, I fail to meet this standard, despite knowing that the book’s publication occurred at the height of the civil rights movement of the American south, and nine years before the legalisation of interracial marriage throughout all of the United States.
The book was banned from all of the libraries in Alabama. Thankfully though, the director of the Alabama Public Library Service Division, Emily Wheelock Reed, found a work-around. She placed it on reserve, thereby keeping it available for the librarians. I wish that Emily was still with us to defend the children’s books that have been targeted for banning in recent years. Hopefully she would also be making a stand to ban the numerous inappropriate books that line the children’s shelves today. However, I digress.
To my delight, my research for this post uncovered a combination of two of my favourite artistic mediums. Having been surrounded by books and theatre throughout my childhood I was excited to find that in 2015 Kenneth Jones penned a play, “Alabama Story”. It portrays the story of the controversy surrounding “The Rabbits’ Wedding”. Ironically it premiered in the very state that the controversy began and received favourable reviews.
Garth Williams illustrated more books than he wrote. Overall his illustrations are found in more than seventy books, many of them becoming favourites in my Little Golden Book collection. He also illustrated, “Charlotte’s Web” and “Stuart Little” by Elwyn Brooks White, and eight of the “Little House on the Prairie” books by Laura Ingalls Wilder. I had no idea of the illustrative connection between such delightful adolescent reads.
Who would have thought that exploring the history of this gentle book would lead me to discover so many of its connections to my childhood? It has certainly been a journey through - a rabbit’s warren!
Nikki