Robin Hood and Little John and Friar Tuck

My next book of distinction would be "Robin Hood". The copy I read I still have, but it is rapidly returning to dust. The paper used for this edition has the thickest texture ever, the wood pulp used for must not have been ground down as finely as it could have been, it is chunky in your hands. As a result, this was not a good text to "dog ear" pages in, as the "ear" would snap off in your fingers. My book is riddled with missing upper page corners!

Robin Hood, Robin of Locksley, was a larger than life hero to me, especially since he was based on a real person! I clearly recall wanting to join Robin and his Merry Men, as they lived freely in Sherwood Forest , thumbing their noses at Prince John, and stealing from the rich to feed the poor. It always bothered me that there were no women romping in the woods with the boys, only Marion seemed to be granted that privilege...and I wanted to be her, badly.

Reading the book was only one aspect of enjoying this classic tale, acting it out became the next natural step in my Sherwood Forest devotion. Enter: Walt Disney and his magical animation studios. Disney produced a cartoon/animated version of Robin Hood in the middle '70's, and it is this film version that allowed my love affair to blossom. I was not alone in dramatic reinterpretation of Robin Hood, my best summer friend of all times, meg, was deep in the thick of our recreations too. It was her soundtrack vinyl record of Robin Hood, that came with read along stills from the film that became our "bible" for a summer.

We spent hours, at her house and at mine, reenacting key moments from the film. Never mind that Disney had "cutified" the entire story line, and made all of the characters into animals...we loved that film and recording. We mimicked every characters voice, tone, and cadence word for word, we didn't just say our lines, we became our lines. I have no idea how our mothers survived that summer, for Robin and Little John were alive and well in the woods of New Hampshire...constantly reminding the mothers hat we needed to steal that box of ring-ding snack cakes from the rich (them) for the poor (us). It didn't work very often, but we must have tried an awful lot, for Meg's mother, to this very day, still calls me "Jennifrair Tuck"...and I love it!

Post note: I lived on "Sherwood Drive" in NY, and Meg lived on "King Richards Drive"in NH and as a result, we felt that that it was in the cards to be Robin and Little John forever. Meg gave me the DVD version with Errol Flynn for Christmas one year, and I watch it at least once a year or so.