Mrs. Piggle Wiggle

Mrs. Piggle Wiggle #1

by Betty MacDonald, Hilary Knight (Illustrator)

Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle lives in an upside-down house and smells like cookies. She was even married to a pirate once. Most of all, she knows everything about children. She can cure them of any ailment. Patsy hates baths. Hubert never puts anything away. Allen eats v-e-r-y slowly. Mrs Piggle-Wiggle has a treatment for all of them. The incomparable Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle loves children good or bad and never scolds but has positive cures for Answer-Backers, Never-Want-to-Go-to-Bedders, and other boys and girls with strange habits.

Genres: Childrens, Fiction, Fantasy, Middle Grade, Classics, Humor, Chapter Books

119 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1947

About the author

MacDonald was born Anne Elizabeth Campbell Bard in Boulder, Colorado. Her official birth date is given as March 26, 1908, although federal census returns seem to indicate 1907.

Her family moved to the north slope of Seattle's Capitol Hill neighborhood in 1918, moving to the Laurelhurst neighborhood a year later and finally settling in the Roosevelt neighborhood in 1922, where she graduated from Roosevelt High School in 1924.

MacDonald married Robert Eugene Heskett (1895–1951) at age 20 in July 1927; they lived on a chicken farm in the Olympic Peninsula's Chimacum Valley, near Center and a few miles south of Port Townsend. She left Heskett in 1931 and returned to Seattle, where she worked at a variety of jobs to support their daughters Anne and Joan; after the divorce the ex-spouses had virtually no contact.

She spent nine months at Firland Sanatorium near Seattle in 1937–1938 for treatment of tuberculosis. On April 24, 1942 she married Donald C. MacDonald (1910–1975) and moved to Vashon Island, where she wrote most of her books. The MacDonalds moved to California's Carmel Valley in 1956.

MacDonald rose to fame when her first book, The Egg and I, was published in 1945. It was a bestseller and was translated into 20 languages. Based on her life on the Chimacum Valley chicken farm, the books introduced the characters Ma and Pa Kettle, who also were featured in the movie version of The Egg and I. The characters become so popular a series of nine more films were made featuring them. In the film of The Egg and I, made in 1947, MacDonald was played by Claudette Colbert. Her husband (simply called "Bob" in the book) was called "Bob MacDonald" in the film, as studio executives were keen not to raise the matter of MacDonald's divorce in the public consciousness. He was played by Fred MacMurray.
Although the book was a critical and popular success at publication, in the 1970s it was criticized for its stereotypical treatment of Native Americans. It had also been claimed that it "spawned a perception of Washington as a land of eccentric country bumpkins like Ma and Pa Kettle."

MacDonald's defenders point out that in the context of the 1940s such stereotyping was far more acceptable. MacDonald faced two lawsuits: by members of a family who claimed she had based the Kettles on them, and by a man who claimed he was the model for the Indian character Crowbar. One lawsuit was settled out of court, while the second went to trial in February 1951. The plaintiffs did not prevail, although the judge indicated he felt they had shown that some of the claims of defamation had merit.

MacDonald also published three other semi-autobiographical books: Anybody Can Do Anything, recounting her life in the Depression trying to find work; The Plague and I, describing her nine-month stay at the Firlands tuberculosis sanitarium; and Onions in the Stew, about her life on Vashon Island with her second husband and daughters during the war years. She also wrote the Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle series of children's books and another children's book, entitled Nancy and Plum. A posthumous collection of her writings, entitled Who Me?, was later released.[citation needed]
MacDonald died in Seattle of uterine cancer on February 7, 1958

Reviews

[Janet · Rating 3 out of 5]

Banned books:

Are you there God, its me, Margaret
Huckleberry Finn
Heather has two Mommies

Why are people wasting their time on those well meaning books when Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle is still out there on shelves, unchallenged, messing with people's heads?! I read this odd little book when I was about eight and STILL have recurring nightmares about The Radish Cure. I just reread it today, trying to vanquish my fears, and now I'm afraid to go to sleep.

I will not go into details about The Radish Cure except to say that to this day the sight of mud on my skin freaks me out and I have a deep distrust of roots.

Bring on The Satanic Verses, but keep that Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle away from me!

[emma · Rating 3 out of 5]

honestly, i think the mrs. piggle-wiggle books represent not only the peak of comedy, but the single most effective means of getting me to grow a conscience and to participate in what can be generally referred to as "good behavior" ever achieved in the history of the world.

never has didactic content been so entertaining. betty macdonald went off and i would reread this series in a heartbeat.

name a more iconic showdown than mrs. piggle-wiggle versus that gross kid who wouldn't take a bath.

you can't.

part of a series i'm doing in which i review books i read a long time ago

[Jessica · Rating 5 out of 5]

Dear Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle! So clever, so kind! And what a fascinating look these book give you at life in the "Donna Reed Era." All the mothers are at home making pot roasts and gingerbread for their children, and the fathers work in an office and smoke pipes and read the paper after supper. The girls wear dresses and white socks and the boys wear sweaters and ironed jeans! It's swell, just swell!

And YET. The problems that these frazzled mothers call Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle to help with? Still so current! Selfishness, not picking up toys, picky eating, constant bickering! Every time I read these books to my kids (and it looks like it's been about 6 years since the last time), I always have to keep stopping to stare meaningfully at my children. Because even though they're generally very good . . . well, we all need a reminder about how annoying quarreling is, or how important it is to take care of your own things!

[Ivonne Rovira · Rating 5 out of 5]

Having been disappointed by Betty MacDonald’s The Egg and I, I returned to the book I first read 50 years ago, the one that made me adore MacDonald: Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle. The tales involving the tiny, eccentric widow with her upside-down house, dog Wag, cat Lightfoot, pony Spotty, delightful games, and amazing insight.

Betty MacDonald’s slim book delighted me as much now in late middle age as it did when I was a young girl, laughing out loud at Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle’s “cures” for wayward children: the lazy, the slovenly, the lying, the selfish, the filthy, the insolent, the insomniac, the whiny. I still loved “The Answer-Backer Cure” and “The Radish Cure” best — my favorites from childhood. Of course, now I see Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle as a clever woman with an encyclopedic knowledge of child psychology, but, of course, in those days, I thought her magical and wise in the way that good witches are wise. And, really, aren’t those just two views of the same phenomenon?

Readers enjoying this children’s classic for the first time — whatever their age — are in for a treat; those revisiting after the passage of years will find the book as good as they remember.

[Janssen · Rating 4 out of 5]

Oh, this was so fun to read. I've always loved these books and it's so fun to see my little girl loving it too.

[Sarah Booth · Rating 4 out of 5]

My dad read these to me as a kid and did voices. He did one for Fetlock (not in this book) who lied all the time and said his father was a cat burglar. I want to find the one with fetlock in it and read it to my dad now.

[Emily · Rating 3 out of 5]

(review of April 2010)

I never encountered Mrs Piggle-Wiggle as a child, but I know that many people who did really adore this series. Coming to it as an adult, I feel like I've missed out on some kind of special magic that it must have, because while I liked it well enough, it's hard for me to see how it could inspire such fond devotion.

I read Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle to my six-year-old, having just recently resolved to make more of an effort to read aloud chapter books to him (we've been stuck in a loop, reading the same picture books over and over), and he was really enthusiastic about it, so perhaps when he's an adult Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle will have that magical glow of nostalgia that Winnie-the-Pooh has for me.

I quite liked the first chapter, in which we meet Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle and see her upside-down house, and watch her interacting with kids and showing them how washing the dishes can be a tremendously exciting game. So it was odd and disappointing that for the rest of the book she doesn't appear at all except as a disembodied voice on the telephone. Each subsequent chapter is about a different problem child, and the mother's desperation, and Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle's wacky cure. I found it got quite repetitive, and though my son was relishing each child's bad behavior, and was eagerly anticipating what form the cure would take, he still got a little impatient with the part of each chapter in which the mother (they are all indistinguishable from each other) calls all the other mothers that she knows for their (completely inadequate) advice, until one of them will say "Why not try calling Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle," and the mother says, "Oh yes, what a good idea!" By the end of the book, we were both yelling, "Just call Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle *first*, already!"

But, as I said already, my son liked it, and that's really what matters. I'm a little uneasy though. This morning he said "The never-go-to-bedders cure was so funny! I think I'm not going to go to bed tonight so you can try it on me!"

[rowanthorn ✨ · Rating 5 out of 5]

Literally everyone should read this book.

IT IS SO CUTE AND HILARIOUS. My mom read this to me countless times growing up and each time I reread I fall in love with the whimsical magic and hilarity all over again.

[Marvin · Rating 3 out of 5]

Wow. I forgot all about these books. Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle was an eccentric lady that parents turned to when they became frustrated with their children's misbehavior. Her techniques were pretty predictable. Let the child do what they want until their behavior back-fired, then she would tell the parents to do some nasty little trick that sent the kids running to the sanctity of good behavior. For instance, when the children wouldn't wash, she would let them get really dirty, then plant radish seeds under the dirt while they slept. When the radishes sprouted, the kids couldn't clean up fast enough! Perhaps she was the precursor to the idea of natural and logical consequences, the most used form of discipline these days. I always wondered what Dr. Benjamin Spock thought of Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle.

P.S. My wife reminded me to state that I am pretty much reviewing the series of Mrs. Piggle wiggle books. I can't vouch for the specific example I used being in this specific book. My wife catches things like that. I think she has a little Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle in her.

[Jessica · Rating 5 out of 5]

Delightful as ever! Read it aloud to the kids (8 and 4), they both loved it. As a kid I thought this book was hilarious, as an adult I found that I kept pausing and looking meaningfully at my children, to see if they were paying attention to what happens to little boys and girls who quarrel or don't pick up their toys! I love how full of details about life back in the 1950's these books are: the mothers are home all day, cleaning and cooking. Children eat snacks like thick slices of gingerbread and drink glasses of milk before running outside to play baseball - not on an organized team, mind you, but just in the street or in someone's yard! Wonderful!

[Samuel · Rating 1 out of 5]

There was a trend in children's literature in the early and mid-20th century for books about quasi-magical people who were courageous and clever and seemed to know everything about everything. It's the model that gave us Doctor Doolittle, Pippi Longstocking, and Mary Poppins, and when it works, it can produce the framework for memorable, enchanting stories.

When it doesn't work, it gives us Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle.

Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle lives in an upside-down house, and is a great friend of children. Each of the chapters in the book are about the parents of a child with a particular problem behavior. The parents call Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle for help, and she prescribes some type of "cure" for it.

That sounds sort of preachy and tiresome, but it's actually worse than that, because each of the "cures" is pretty awful. They range from the frustrating ("The Answer-Backer Cure," with its loathsome parrot) to the cruel ("The Selfishness Cure" is basically an incitement for bullying) to the OMG THAT'S ACTUAL CHILD ABUSE ("The Slow-Eater-Tiny-Bite-Taker Cure" literally features Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle trying to stifle laughter at the sight of an emaciated child, who's been given progressively smaller and smaller meals for days, struggling to stay on the back of a horse). I recognize the book is trying to be whimsical, but it comes across as Goofus and Gallant Go To Hell, crossed with the meaner episodes of Punk'd.

I'm not sure why this one has found an audience -- it's still in print, and here on this page, its average rating is well north of four stars. But to me, it was deeply unpleasant, the kind of thing I only finished because a) it was short, and b) I wanted to see just how much of a train wreck it would become. Not Recommended.

[tropie · Rating 3 out of 5]

the rare book that dares to ask what if instead of having magic mary poppins was a consulting lawyer dedicated to enacting malicious compliance schemes to children. mostly funny but the radish cure will haunt me until the end of my days.

[Luisa Knight · Rating 4 out of 5]

I recently read several stories with magical nannies coming to the rescue of families in need. I thought it would be fun to compare each of their pros and cons and see how they lined up ...

Before I share that though, I thought I would mention that in this particular book, chapter favorites were The Won't-Pick-Up-Toys Cure and The Slow-Eater-Tiny-Bite-Taker Cure. So funny!

Now... the comparison:

Mrs. Piggle Wiggle:
-Likable “nanny.”
-The children have some common bad habits and learn their lessons nicely (actually, these stories are pretty practical and applicable, so if you have kids who are slow eaters, don’t pick up their toys, etc. there’s some good, fun lessons here).
-The book is pretty funny.
-I loved the writing style and the illustrations were great!
-I was satisfied with the ending.


Nurse Matilda:
-Likable nanny.
-The children are naughtier in this book; doing things sometimes just for naughtiness’ sake (like throwing their porridge on the walls) but they always end up regretting their decisions and learning their lesson (I think the author was trying to be a little tongue-in-cheek with the kid’s actions).
-The book is really funny.
-I loved the writing style and the illustrations were great!
-The first book has a satisfying ending (books #2 and #3 are essentially repeats, but with different circumstances, so I would have rather liked to see the author use a different family to show that the children really had changed and weren’t back to their old antics again – still fun reads though).


Mary Poppins:
-I did not like the nanny (watch the movie instead, if you want to like Mary Poppins; Julie Andrews did a great job enhancing and making the character likable).
-There’s actually FOUR children and they all need some help with their behaviors and perspectives, but in the end, they learn too. (There’s one chapter in the book, Bad Tuesday, they I don’t recommend reading to your kids).
-I don’t remember thinking it was all that funny.
-I loved the writing style and the illustrations were great!
-I was not satisfied with the ending (Mary Poppins leaves, and rather than the family coming together (like in the movie), the mother calls for the cook to put the children to bed so she can be off to her dinner party).

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[Aubree · Rating 1 out of 5]

I listened to this on audio with my 5-year-old daughter and I thought it was terrible. I remember liking the Mrs. Piggle Wiggle books as a child but as an adult I thought it was awful- though my daughter really liked it.

It’s not really a novel, more a collection of short stories which were so repetitive and often dull. In each one, a child is misbehaving, the mother calls Mrs. Piggle Wiggle who provides a cure, and within days the child is a perfect angel. Repeat. Repeat. Sometimes the cures were super realistic and seems like they might actually work, and other times they were just plain weird- like growing radishes on the skin of a child who wouldn’t bathe. Like the dirt could actually get that thick on a person. 🙄

This book was really outdated and old-fashioned. Not just in a there are no cell phones in it kind of way, but in the values. For instance- it’s a book of 1950s style housewives who bake chocolate cakes in the middle of the day (no doubt wearing heels and pearls!) and not once does a single father ever call Mrs. P-W. Another example- there were several instances of fat-shaming amongst the stories.

It just rubbed me the wrong way and I think these books are better left in a bygone era. I was so relieved when it was over!

[Nora-Kate · Rating 5 out of 5]

*updated review 2021* Read this aloud to my 2 daughters now, ages 6&7. It was well loved once more. But lost a little of the magic I remember from the read aloud with my boys in the first read.


One of the best read alouds of 2017. I love the ones capable of sending my olders into laughter so hard they need me to 'hold' them. This was special to us.

[Kellyn Roth · Rating 3 out of 5]

I remember reading this when I was little. A little cliche and silly ... but it was kind of amusing.

[Stephanie · Rating 4 out of 5]

Practically perfect in every way.

[Terris · Rating 4 out of 5]

I just read this book for the second time -- the last time was in 3rd grade!! I re-read it for a challenge that had a "book from your childhood" category. And now I remember why I enjoyed Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle so much! She doesn't have any children of her own, but the neighborhood children love her and come to visit every day. And all their mothers call her for cures for such childhood ailments as: "won't-pick-up-toys-itis"; "answer-backers disease"; and "never-want-to-go-to-bedders' syndrome." Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle has a cure for them all! Just an adorable book, I'm so glad I read it again! :)

[Joel · Rating 4 out of 5]

Even better than I remember them. I love all the kids' utterly ridiculous names. The kid digs them too. Hopefully we can correct her with the Won't-Pick-Up-Her-Toys Cure.

[Lauren · Rating 4 out of 5]

Highly recommend giving Mrs Piggle-Wiggle a Scottish accent ☺️

[Torrie · Rating 4 out of 5]

My second read-aloud with my preschooler. I'm not sure if I read this as a kid or not, but I thought it was not only fun to read (not to mention hilarious), but it also had some pretty valid points in it! Basically, Mrs. Piggle Wiggle is the neighborhood's resident expert in how to "cure" children of various bad behaviors, and each chapter focuses on a different "cure." It gave Raven and I lots of opportunities to discuss certain desirable/undesirable behaviors and habits, and it helped me to get her to stop doing a few of the bad behaviors it mentioned (at least some of the time)! I know there are several in this series, so it will be fun to check out some more of those later.

[Erin Hendrian]

A very silly book, but a memorable one. 😂 When my mom read it to me for school, I was particularly fascinated with Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle’s house, because I, like most children, spent a lot of time lying on the floor pretending to walk on the ceiling and wondering what it would be like, and the fictional protagonist earned my admiration and respect for actually making this dream a reality. 😂 My own 2nd and 3rd graders were likewise enchanted with Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle and her house, and they thought her ridiculous cures were hilarious and begged for another chapter every night.

[Katy Harms · Rating 3 out of 5]

Ingrid enjoyed listening to this book during quiet time very much and wanted to listen to it over and over. Now she calls me “mother,” and I’m not sure how I feel about that.

[Megan Dunlap · Rating 5 out of 5]

Such a great read aloud. My kids just giggled and giggled.

[laskavka · Rating 4 out of 5]

Doposloucháno za dvě procházky s kočárkem. Oddychové, zábavné, jenom už ke konci trochu moc se opakující, ale vzhledem k tomu, že je to bráno jako pohádka, tak to tam vlastně i patří.

[Ann · Rating 4 out of 5]

I remember adoring the Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle books when I was little, except for Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle's Farm because it didn't have any magical cures in it. I was surprised to find that this first book in the series didn't include them either. I didn't love it as much as I think I will love re-reading the next couple of books, but I still think the little stories are really fun. I love the old-fashioned feeling of these books. However, the radish cure story is the grossest thing ever and I had to cringe my way through it.

[Kris · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read all of the Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle books approximately 922 times each when I was a kid, and you know what? They still cracked me up. I always thought it was weird that some of her cures were magical, and some weren't, but they are funny and ridiculous. Sure, this is dated in a lot of ways. The kids are always being spanked, the dads smoke pipes and work all day and expect to be served breakfast, and the moms are at home and cooking and caretaking. But when the parents bicker to show their kids how it sounds, or they plant radishes on the layer of dirt that forms on the kid who won't take a bath - c'mon - that's comedy gold.

[Jeremy Hurd-McKenney · Rating 3 out of 5]

When standard child abuse is no longer effective to rid your little ones of their bad habits, it's Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle to the rescue! In stark contrast to the aggressive vitriol and lies employed by Mary Poppins, Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle has a friendly, unpolished exterior, which she uses to her advantage to get children to bend to her will through a variety of subtle tortures and passive-aggressive homespun remedies. The Radish Cure was particularly disturbing.

One of the children mentioned in the book is named Paraphernalia.

[Crystal · Rating 3 out of 5]

I loved these books as a kid and felt like re-reading something light this summer, so I checked this one out. These hold up and don't (gender roles!) at the same time. I really think some adult folks need to be sent to a Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle for a cure to their ailments :)

[Carissa (Regency Woman) · Rating 4 out of 5]

My sister read a ton of children's fiction growing up. She had diverse tastes (still does), and so her books were a little bit of everything, including the Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle series. I was pretty much a Hardy Boys kinda girl, so our tastes almost never crossed, but now that we're both adults, I'm actually trying some of her favorite books when she was a kid. Hence my rather odd choice of Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle for this challenge.

I LOVED it. You have this dear older widow woman who befriends pretty much every child in her small town, invites them into her upside-down house (the chandeliers are on the floor, etc.) and just lets them play and be creative. Eventually, word gets out that Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle knows children, so whenever children in the town start to rebel, inevitably the parents seek out Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle for her "cures." Like the little boy who doesn't like to clean his room; she just advises them to let the mess get so big that he can't get out of his room and starts missing out on adventures with his friends. He'll have no choice but to clean his space. And the once sweet little girl who starts back-talking like crazy, so Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle loans the family her parrot who is the queen of back-talk and shows the child just how nasty the habit is. You've got the radish cure for the little girl who refuses to bathe and whose parents plant radishes in the accumulating dirt on her skin one night, and the children who don't want to go to bed on time so the parents let them stay up as late as they want without saying a word until the children are so exhausted and crabby they beg to go to bed on time.

The book is organized a little like the Mary Poppins books, but if I were to choose a favorite between the two, it would be Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle hands-down. She's a charming, delightful woman whose love of children and her neighbors is absolutely genuine. The lessons learned are all valuable since they address bad habits, and this first book in the series has "practical" cures instead of magic cures like in the later books. I'm not sure that I'll read any further in the series, but I highly recommend the first Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle as a delightful read for your little ones, especially read out-loud for story time once chapter at a time!