Alma Flor Ada

The Three Golden Oranges

BOOK DESCRIPTION

Far on the other side of the moun­tains, next to an enchanted cas­tle, grows a tree with three golden oranges. It is there that the three brothers–Santiago, Tomás, and Matías–must jour­ney if they wish to find a wife. Once they reach their des­ti­na­tion, the broth­ers must care­fully pick the oranges and bring them back to the old woman who lives in a cave on the cliffs over­look­ing the sea. But, “In order to find your wives, you will need to work together,” the old woman has said. “Woe to you if you do not fol­low my advice!”

Each of the broth­ers wants some­thing dif­fer­ent. San­ti­ago wants a wife who is beau­ti­ful. Tomás wants one who is both rich and beau­ti­ful. But Matías, the youngest brother, longs for a woman who is kind, joy­ful, and loving…someone he could love very much in return. Will the broth­ers be able to avert mis­for­tune by work­ing together? Will they be strong enough to break the spell that a wicked sor­cerer has placed on the castle?

Mas­ter sto­ry­teller Alma Flor Ada offers a poetic and mag­i­cal retelling of a well-loved tra­di­tional story about Blan­caflor, a myth­i­cal young woman who appears in var­i­ous sto­ries through­out the His­panic world. This tra­di­tional Span­ish folk­tale cel­e­brates a spirit of coop­er­a­tion and broth­erly love. Reg Cartwright’s boldly col­or­ful and exquis­itely styl­ized art is a per­fect accompaniment.

AUTHOR’S NOTE

The Span­ish folk­lore is abun­dant in won­der­ful tales, as diverse as the coun­try from which they orig­i­nate. Many of them were brought to Spain by the Arabs, who inhab­ited large areas of the Iber­ian Penin­sula from 711 to 1492. The magic char­ac­ter­is­tic of the sto­ries of One and a Thou­sand Nights, is some­what present in this tale of enchantment.

Retelling this story was an excit­ing expe­ri­ence which I was happy to repli­cate in the retelling of the tales included in Tales Our Abueli­tas Told, com­piled in col­lab­o­ra­tion with Isabel Cam­poy who has retold many of the tra­di­tional folk­tales of Spanish-speaking coun­tries con­tained in that book, also pub­lished by Atheneum.

BOOK REVIEWS

Pub­lish­ers Weekly

Ada adds fem­i­nist panache to her retelling of the clas­sic Span­ish folk­tale. Matías and his two older broth­ers wish to wed, but there is not a sin­gle unmar­ried girl in all their lush val­ley. The old woman who lives on the cliff by the sea has the answer: if they travel to a dis­tant cas­tle, pick three golden oranges and bring them to her, each brother will have the wife he desires. But they must work together or, she cau­tions, “Woe to you if you do not fol­low my advice.” Matías, the only one to com­ply, wins his des­tined bride, the kind Blan­caflor, and she helps him to save both his broth­ers and her bewitched sis­ters. Ada’s author’s note cites no spe­cific source for her retelling, but does con­trast her Blan­caflor tale with some of the more pop­u­lar ver­sions. As in her orig­i­nal fairy tale, The Mala­chite Palace, she adopts a straight­for­ward, some­times bland nar­ra­tive voice (“When Matías… saw that there was only one orange left, he felt very sad for his broth­ers”). But the art­work will sus­tain read­ers’ inter­est. Cartwright’s (The Band Over the Hill) vivid and var­ied vignettes and spot illus­tra­tions ren­dered in flat, round shapes and bold col­ors evoke folk art while dis­play­ing a sense of life and move­ment. The pic­tures here are as suc­cu­lent as the oranges them­selves. Ages 5–8. (May) © 1999 Reed Busi­ness Infor­ma­tion, Inc.

School Library Journal

Grade 1–5: In this well-known Span­ish folk­tale, three broth­ers are instructed by their mother to find wives. An old woman advises them that they must work together and tells them to travel to a cas­tle grove, pick three golden oranges, and together bring them back to her. The two older broth­ers, who are vain and shal­low, dis­re­gard her advice and are put into the castle’s prison, where they are res­cued by Matías, the com­pas­sion­ate youngest son who fol­lows the woman’s direc­tions and gets the fruit. On the way home, the older broth­ers open their oranges and once again find them­selves in the dun­geon. When Matías brings his fruit back to the old woman, she cuts it open and a dove flies out. Later, he removes a thorn from the bird’s neck and it turns into a young woman named Blan­caflor. They return to the cas­tle and free her fam­ily from a spell. Matías mar­ries Blan­caflor, but her sis­ters refuse to marry his broth­ers. Cartwright’s flat, folk-art style char­ac­ters wear tra­di­tional Span­ish cos­tumes. The yel­lows, greens, and oranges in the rounded patch­work coun­try­side con­trast with the black of the broth­ers’ cloth­ing and bright blue skies. Full-page illus­tra­tions alter­nate with smaller pic­tures to move the eye and relieve the long text. Ada keeps the story as sim­ple as its many twists and turns allow, but this is still a com­pli­cated tale. An author’s note dis­cusses vari­a­tions of the folk­tale and how oranges fit into Spain’s his­tory. –Sally Bates Goodroe, Har­ris County Pub­lic Library, Hous­ton, TX © 1999 Reed Busi­ness Infor­ma­tion, Inc.

Book­list

In this ver­sion of a pop­u­lar His­panic folk­tale, three broth­ers in search of brides are told by an old woman that they will each find the wives they want–if they work together. She sends them on a quest to bring her three golden oranges. Of course, the two old­est try on their own and fail, and the youngest pulls them together. In a nice twist, he is finally rewarded by a strong bride who chooses him. The text is long, some­times too long, espe­cially with the rep­e­ti­tion of the pat­tern of three; but the telling is lively, the mes­sage is light, and the styl­ized oil paint­ings in bright col­ors com­bine magic and per­son­al­ity, rhythm and char­ac­ter, with a strong sense of drama. –Hazel Rochman

Latin Baby

LBBC’s rec­om­men­da­tion for the August Libro del Mes, is Alma Flor Ada’s The Three Golden Oranges. Ada’s adap­ta­tion of the clas­sic Span­ish fairy­tale is spec­tac­u­lar with changes to the orig­i­nal story line that cre­ate a tale that flows sim­ply and beau­ti­fully… Unlike most fairy­tale end­ings in which the hand­some prince is res­cu­ing the princess with his extra­or­di­nary strength, agility and dash­ing good looks, Three Golden Oranges empha­sizes the value of hon­esty, self­less­ness, honor, and ded­i­ca­tion. When asked what type of wife he wants, Matías asks for one who is “kind, joy­ful and some­one I could love very much” as opposed to his broth­ers who desire wealth and beauty. And in a novel turn of events, it is the sweet Blan­caflor who chooses Matías to be her hus­band, rather than the other way around! Yay! Alto­gether what a great message…and one that I hope to impart to my own son and daugh­ter… More »

Kirkus Reviews

Ada (Under the Royal Palms, 1998, etc.) reworks the tra­di­tional story of Blan­caflor, tak­ing swipes at greed, van­ity, and the prac­tice of arranged mar­riages in the process. Some well-traveled types help make the points: older broth­ers full of them­selves and not above treach­ery; the inno­cent, well-intentioned youngest brother; a wise older woman; and a young woman in dire cir­cum­stances, with the moral fiber to endure. Here the story revolves around three broth­ers wish­ing to wed, and how they seek the advice of an elderly woman and then ignore all her warn­ings. The two bad-of-heart broth­ers wind up in a cas­tle jail, and then mar­riage­less; Matías, the pure one, lib­er­ates a fam­ily under a sorcerer’s spell, gains love and mar­riage, and ful­fills his mother’s wishes. Ada invests her lengthy retelling with a quiet musi­cal­ity that soft­ens the pre­dictabil­ity of the nar­ra­tive. Mean­while, the Span­ish coun­try­side comes blaz­ingly alive under the bold illus­tra­tions of Cartwright’s styl­ized, utterly trans­port­ing art­work. (Pic­ture book/folklore. 5–8) — © 1999, Kirkus Asso­ciates, LP. All rights reserved.

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