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I haven't read the book, but I wonder if it contains a racist depiction of the Roma? The stereotype of "gypsies steal children" is mentioned in the blurb. Could someone enlighten me please? Thanks!

J. Wallis Mary covers the answer well, below, but I'd like to chip in a thought, from a historical/cultural point of view. We used both this and the Singing Tre…moreMary covers the answer well, below, but I'd like to chip in a thought, from a historical/cultural point of view. We used both this and the Singing Tree as learning supplements, during my years of home-schooling.

Depending on the age of the children you're reading this to, the book could be a good jump off point for talking about diasporatic peoples: from violently displaced cultures (like the Jews and Roma), to enslaved peoples (many African Tribes as well as New World Natives), to oppressed peoples who have had their cultures stripped away over a longer period of time. (Native Americans, many of the Slavic peoples, and even the Irish and Scottish, who often get overlooked (no, kilts aren't traditional, nor are bagpipes,. the're stereotypes)).

If you're reading to a 12-14 year-old audience, I would even use this as a chance to talk about "Presentism", which is one of the sneakiest forms of prejudice.

The Roma were a people group who had undergone centuries of hate and oppression, wherever they went. At one time, they truly did have a system of ethics where stealing from non-Roma, especially in a guileful or tricky way, was considered a great virtue. This was a perfectly logical adaptation to their life experience.

It is wrong to ascribe traits to an entire group of people, especially when those supposed traits are based on prejudice, instead of experience. However, it is equally wrong to deny an entire group of people their cultural history, simply because we find it offensive, by the standards and hindsight of two-hundred years later.

P.S. The grand majority of the tales of Roma "kidnapping" children turned out to be incidents of young people running off with the travelling people to escape their brutal, miserable lives, subject to the absolute authority of often abusive parents. The concept of children as individuals, possessed of human rights, is less than a hundred years old, but the desire of the human spirit to be free is as old as humanity.(less)

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