What do you think?
Rate this book
Behind the Magic: 50 Years of Disneyland
Book by Karal Ann Marling
112 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2004
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 1 of 1 review
June 15, 2017
Some nice backstory tidbits and cool vintage photos.
Touching to see the photos of Walt in Disneyland, clearly he would have been so happy spending years of life he did not get, in that place.
The book helped me to see Disneyland as Walt saw it: It begins with the Main Street of the early 1900's as Walt remembered it from his childhood. A place of neighbors and shops and plodding horse drawn vehicles with the occasional motor car swerving around them. A place where the present day could be forgotten, as Henry Ford had done with Greenfield Village in Michigan.
Around the park circles the toy train, a popular toy of boys at the time.
Beyond Main Street are the 3-D embodiments of the young Walt's dream beginning with the fairytales that began almost every childhood of the time. Then there are the cowboy dreams (Frontierland) the adventures in exotic places (Adventureland) and the dreams of science fiction and the future (Tommorowland.) Even New Orleans Square fits here as an American place, like Frontierland, yet being exotic and French, allowing a transition to Adventureland.
But from looking a Walt's view I could also see how the Park is no longer a place Walt would probably want to visit--unless he could come on a day when attendance was severely restricted. Original Main Streets were places with space and quiet and leisure, allowing for dreams--not crowd saturated way-stations to hours long line standing.
Touching to see the photos of Walt in Disneyland, clearly he would have been so happy spending years of life he did not get, in that place.
The book helped me to see Disneyland as Walt saw it: It begins with the Main Street of the early 1900's as Walt remembered it from his childhood. A place of neighbors and shops and plodding horse drawn vehicles with the occasional motor car swerving around them. A place where the present day could be forgotten, as Henry Ford had done with Greenfield Village in Michigan.
Around the park circles the toy train, a popular toy of boys at the time.
Beyond Main Street are the 3-D embodiments of the young Walt's dream beginning with the fairytales that began almost every childhood of the time. Then there are the cowboy dreams (Frontierland) the adventures in exotic places (Adventureland) and the dreams of science fiction and the future (Tommorowland.) Even New Orleans Square fits here as an American place, like Frontierland, yet being exotic and French, allowing a transition to Adventureland.
But from looking a Walt's view I could also see how the Park is no longer a place Walt would probably want to visit--unless he could come on a day when attendance was severely restricted. Original Main Streets were places with space and quiet and leisure, allowing for dreams--not crowd saturated way-stations to hours long line standing.
Displaying 1 - 1 of 1 review