Like
many children of the 1960s, I was subjected to a viewing of Walt's
shiny adaption of P.L. Travers fantastical story about a nanny with
magical and mischievous powers. I do remember Dick Van Dyke singing
and dancing and Julie Andrews chortling through a number of tunes,
but what I mostly remember was the truly amazing combination of
animation and real life. This had a massive impact on me as a young
boy. Up to that point of my brief existence I had understood
animation (it wasn't real) and I had understood real (it was real)
and then Mary Poppins comes along and stuffs the whole thing up
leaving a very young me to deal with this existential crisis.
This
book was published many years after Disney's eye popping, philosophical romp
through bourgeois, penguin dancing, Edwardian London. I wasn't aware
that Travers had continued writing and publishing as late as this
title which was the penultimate one in the series. It was only when
finding this book and doing a bit of interwebs research that I
learned the truth. Unlike Harry Potter and a lot like The Wizard of
Oz, Disney only made the one film despite there being material for
many more. I'm looking at this as being a good thing. One childhood
existential crisis is enough. Eight would have been a catastrophe.
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