The Tale of Jemima Puddle-Duck

Jemima Puddle-Duck wants only one thing: to sit on her own eggs and raise her own ducklings. The farmer's wife won't allow it, so Jemima flies off to the woods to find the perfect nesting spot. There she meets a charming gentleman with sandy whiskers who offers her his woodshed, completely free of charge. He is, of course, a fox with dinner on his mind. What follows is a picture book thriller, as the fox patiently waits for his roast duck while Jemima builds her nest with great determination. Only the intervention of Kep, Beatrix Potter's real-life sheepdog, saves her from a sticky end. Her eggs, tragically, do not survive the adventure. The tale is darker than its pastoral watercolors suggest, a story about maternal longing, gullibility, and the gap between desire and judgment. It endures because it trusts children with real danger, wrapped in the gentle package of a duck who just wants to be a mother.