{"product_id":"2940148841630","title":"The Story of Opal (Illustrated)","description":"For those whom Nature loves, the Story of Opal is an open book. They need no introduction to the journal of this Understanding Heart. But the world, which veils the spirit and callouses the instincts, makes curiosity for most people the criterion of interest. They demand facts and backgrounds, theories and explanations, and for them it seems worth while to set forth something of the child’s story undisclosed by the diary, and to attempt to weave together some impressions of the author.\u003cbr\u003eLast September, late one afternoon, Opal Whiteley came into the Atlantic’s office, with a book which she had had printed in Los Angeles. It was not a promising errand, though it had brought her all the way from the Western coast, hoping to have published in regular fashion this volume, half fact, half fancy, of The Fairyland Around Us, the fairyland of beasts and blossoms, butterflies and birds. The book was quaintly embellished with colored pictures, pasted in by hand, and bore a hundred marks of special loving care. Yet about it there seemed little at first sight to tempt a publisher. Indeed, she had offered her wares in vain to more than one publishing house; and as her dollars were growing very few, the disappointment was severe. But about Opal Whiteley herself there was something to attract the attention even of a man of business—something very young and eager and fluttering, like a bird in a thicket.\u003cbr\u003eThe talk went as follows:—\u003cbr\u003e“I am afraid we can’t do anything with the book. But you must have had an interesting life. You have lived much in the woods?”\u003cbr\u003e[vi]\u003cbr\u003e“Yes, in lots of lumber-camps.”\u003cbr\u003e“How many?”\u003cbr\u003e“Nineteen. At least, we moved nineteen times.”\u003cbr\u003eIt was hard not to be interested now. One close question followed another regarding the surroundings of her girlhood. The answers were so detailed, so sharply remembered, that the next question was natural.\u003cbr\u003e“If you remember like that, you must have kept a diary.”\u003cbr\u003eHer eyes opened wide. “Yes, always. I do still.”\u003cbr\u003e“Then it is not the book I want, but the diary.”\u003cbr\u003eShe caught her breath. “It’s destroyed. It’s all torn up.” Tears were in her eyes.\u003cbr\u003e“You loved it?”\u003cbr\u003e“Yes; I told it everything.”\u003cbr\u003e“Then you kept the pieces.”\u003cbr\u003eThe guess was easy (what child whose doll is rent asunder throws away the sawdust?), but she looked amazed.\u003cbr\u003e“Yes, I have kept everything. The pieces are all stored in Los Angeles.”\u003cbr\u003eWe telegraphed for them, and they came, hundreds, thousands, one might almost say millions of them. Some few were large as a half-sheet of notepaper; more, scarce big enough to hold a letter of the alphabet. The paper was of all shades, sorts, and sizes: butchers’ bags pressed and sliced in two, wrapping-paper, the backs of envelopes—anything and everything that could hold writing. The early years of the diary are printed in letters so close that, when the sheets are fitted, not another letter can be squeezed in. In later passages the characters are written with childish clumsiness, and later still one sees the gradually forming adult hand.\u003cbr\u003eThe labor of piecing the diary together may fairly be described as enormous. For nine months almost continuously the diarist has labored, piecing it together sheet by sheet, each page a kind of picture-puzzle, lettered, for frugality (the store was precious), on both sides of the paper.\u003cbr\u003e[vii]\u003cbr\u003eThe entire diary, of which this volume covers but the two opening years, must comprise a total of a quarter of a million words. Upwards of seventy thousand—all that is contained in this volume—can be ascribed with more than reasonable definiteness to the end of Opal’s sixth and to her seventh year. During all these months Opal Whiteley has been a frequent visitor in the Atlantic’s office. With friendliness came confidence, and little by little, very gradually, an incident here, another there, her story came to be told. She was at first eager only for the future and for the opportunity to write and teach children of the world which she loved best. But as the thread of the diary was unraveled, she felt a growing interest in what her past had been, and in what lay behind her earliest recollections and the opening chapters of her printed record.\u003cbr\u003eHer methods were nothing if not methodical. First, the framework of a sheet would be fitted and the outer edges squared. Here the adornment of borders in childish patterns, and the fortunate fact that the writer had employed a variety of colored crayons, using each color until it was exhausted, lent an unhoped-for aid. Then, odd sheets were fitted together; later, fragments of episodes.","brand":"Lost Leaf Publications","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":47067932983536,"sku":"2940148841630","price":0.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0737\/7593\/9824\/files\/2940148841630_p0.jpg?v=1763708696","url":"https:\/\/shop-qa.barnesandnoble.com\/products\/2940148841630","provider":"Barnes \u0026 Noble (DEV)","version":"1.0","type":"link"}