Originally published in 1871 by Strahan & Co., London.
Historically, At the Back of the North Wind ranks as George MacDonald’s most well-known and enduring book, the haunting tale of little Diamond, a simple London cabman’s son and his dreamy encounters with the mysterious, wise, powerful, comforting, and occasionally frightening lady known as North Wind. Their eerie nighttime adventures have captivated readers old and young ever since the book’s publication in 1871.
It has been published in more editions than any of MacDonald’s works, and ranks as one of the few (perhaps only) title of MacDonald’s that has likely never been out of print. Its skillfully woven intermingling of realism and fantasy set MacDonald apart as a writer of uniqueness and distinction in the early 1870s as his reputation widened.
(Source: The Cullen Collection)
““Though I cannot promise to take you home,” said North Wind, as she sank nearer and nearer to the tops of the houses, “I can promise you it will be all right in the end. You will get home somehow.”
Recommended Editions and Adaptions
WRITTEN WORKS
Johannesen Printing & Publishing (hardcover)
The Cullen Collection edition, published by Michael Phillips (paperback)
Edition edited by McGillis and Pennington, with essays on childhood by contemporaries such as John Ruskin and Charles Dickens, as well as contextualizing selections from Victorian fantasy and fairy tales (paperback)
Edited Version from Michael Phillips: At the Back of the North Wind, Young Reader’s Edition
Vintage edition from 1927, illustrated by Frances Brundage
OTHER MEDIA
Diamond and the North Wind: An Illustrated Excerpt by Juliette Watts
Vintage editions from 1904 and 1919: Contrasting Illustrations by Jessica Wilcox Smith and Maria L. Kirk
Making A New Audiobook Edition of At The back of the North Wind: A Personal Journey, by Donna K. Triggs
Audiobook on YouTube
Radio Theatre Audio Drama Adaption
At the Back of the North Wind in Stained Glass, by Karen Scheffler
Articles about At the Back of the North Wind
VARIOUS SOURCES
A Read of At the Back of the North Wind, by Colin Manlove
Fight the Miserable Things: Reflections on Joy in At the Back of the North Wind, by Jason Monroe
Good Enough to Believe In: George MacDonald and Knowledge of the Ineffable, by George Scondras
“Behind the Back of the North Wind: 16 essays on At the Back of the North Wind”, edited by Pennington & McGillis
“Behind the Back of the North Wind: Critical Essays on George MacDonald’s Classic Children’s Book. Ed. John Pennington and Roderick McGillis”, by Bonnie Gaarden
“MacDonald, George. At the Back of the North Wind, Ed. Roderick McGillis and John Pennington. Peterborough, Ontario: Broadview, 2011. 406 pp.”, by Fernando Soto
George MacDonald’s Personal Theology in At the Back of the North Wind, by Martin Simonson
Article by Robert Trexler about Behind the Back of the North Wind, with pictures from a vintage edition
Thoughts from Michael Phillips on At the Back of the North Wind
"The Odour of Music,” a brief essay by Sharon Edel
A mother’s perspective, by Tiffini Oporto
Death and Fairyland: At the Back of the North Wind, by Mari Ness
NORTH WIND ARCHIVE
The home page of the North Wind Archive can be accessed here.
“And All About the Courtly Stable Bright-Harnessed Angels Sit: Eschatological Elements in At the Back of the North Wind”, by Catherine Persyn
“Travelling Beastward: An Ecocritical Reading of George MacDonald’s Fairy Tales”, by Björn Sundmark
“A Person’s Name and a Person’s Self, or: Just Who is North Wind”, by Catherine Persyn
“A Reading of At the Back of the North Wind”, by Colin Manlove
“Cosmos and Diamonds: Naming and Connoting in MacDonald’s Works”, by Fernando Soto
“Death and Nonsense in the Poetry of George MacDonald’s At the Back of the North Wind and Lewis Carroll’s Alice Books”, by Melody Green
“Dombey and Grandson: Parallels Between At the Back of the North Wind and Dombey and Son”, by Robert Trexler
“Good Words: At the Back of the North Wind and the Periodical Press”, by Tania Scott
“Language, Ideology, and Fairy Tales: George MacDonald’s Fairy Tales as a Social Critique of Victorian Norms”, by Osama Jarrar
“MacDonald’s Fairy Tales and Fantasy Novels as a Critique of Victorian Middle-Class Ideology”, by Osama Jarrar
“Outworn Liberal Humanism: MacDonald and ‘The Right Relation to the Whole’”, by Roderick McGillis
“The Ultimate Rite of Passage: Death and Beyond in ‘The Golden Key’ and At the Back of the North Wind”, by Marilyn Pemberton
“This is (Not) a Horse: MacDonald’s Theodicy in At the Back of the North Wind”, by G. St. John Scott
WINGFOLD
Wingfold is a quarterly magazine that restores material by and about George MacDonald, in print since 1993. To subscribe, click here. To request any of the following articles that appear in back issues of Wingfold, contact Barbara Amell at b_amell@q.com.
Spring 1998
“1871 Review”
Spring 2006
“Diamond and the Prince: Shakespearean Influence in At The Back of the North Wind”, by Barbara Amell
Summer 2010
“Shelley played upon him”, by Barbara Amell