The Story of Little Kettle-Head



Helen Bannerman (1862–1946) wrote children's books, some of them now quite controversial. Among them was the 1904 work The Story of Little Kettle-Head. It's about a young pyromaniac who sets herself on fire and underwent a crude cybernetic conversion to replace her destroyed head. So it's sort of like The Six Million Dollar Man, except that it probably didn't cost more than five dollars. Also, there's misogynistic mutilation by boys, aided by a father figure. All in all, a freaky work of children's literature. Enjoy.

Link via The Presurfer

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I had nightmares about this story for years, and more than 50 years later it still gives me the shudders to think about it. The pictures were GHASTLY. Many of Helen Bannerman's illustrations were graphically grisly. In Little Black Quasha, for instance, there's a tiger melee that ends with a picture of a field awash with blood and tiger body parts.
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