A review by sassmistress
Twenty and Ten by Claire Huchet Bishop, William Pène du Bois

hopeful tense medium-paced

4.0

Twenty displaced children live in a refuge in occupied France. Ten Jewish children arrive, on the run, and they all agree to hide them from the Nazis.

This book is great! Such a gentle way to introduce young children to WWII. The children know that if the Nazis find them, the Jewish children and probably their nun caretaker will be killed. It's a tale of courage, leadership in a crisis, and children learning to be a little kinder than they were before. If course, there's nothing graphic, nothing scarier than some intimidating soldiers and vague threats and a close call when the toddler starts talking, and there's a happy ending. 

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Content Warnings

Here are a few bits of content I noticed that folks may care about. Being written in 1952, you'll notice the primary theme here is "written in a different time". - The book starts with the children acting out Mary and Joseph's flight to Egypt. They squabble over who can play Mary, and one boy says "Sometimes Mary is dark and sometimes she is fair. Mary can be French, Spanish, Russian, Negro, Indian, Chinese, anything, anything at all." - Their play is not biblically accurate, with one boy pretending that the fleeing Jews are actually rich but hiding their ration cards to "double-cross us" (the Egyptians) and take their jobs. A fistfight breaks out because of all the bickering about how to play pretend. - One boy like another girl much better because she is "dark" instead of "fair". It sounds like they are talking about hair color but it's hard for a modern reader to decipher. - A child makes sense of the Jewish refugees by relating them to the Holy Family fleeing to Egypt. "That boy is right. It is the same story - always - throughout the centuries. This time Herod's soldiers are the Nazis. That's all." "... Now, once more, Jesus' family is hunted and will be killed if we do not hide them. Will you, boys and girls, help? Will you take with you, here, and hide, ten Jewish boys and girls whose fathers and mothers are dead already?" - Some children hide a chocolate bar to keep for themselves. Another girl finds it and takes it to eat some herself. - One boy gets annoyed with a girl and shouts "Helpless! Always helpless one way or another! I cannot stand a girl who--" and is interrupted. One girl takes a risky trip to help the ones in hiding and a boy says "Why didn't Henry come? Why did he let a girl get into this jam?" When it's time to eat with no adult to help, "we girls cooked rutabagas and we all had that and a small piece of bread each". - A soldier smokes a pipe. - An adult says to the nun, "you know you can be shot for this?" A soldier fires a gun into the air. At another time, one shouts at a child, "Stop or I shoot!" - The main character pretends to be "stupid", which looks a liiiiittle too much like a stereotypical nonverbal autistic child.

- At the end, they all (including the Jewish children) play pretend again, this time the story of Jesus multiplying the fish and loaves. There is a blessing found, described as a "sweet miracle".