Zaczarowane baletki

text: Noel Streatfeild

illustrations: Ruth Gervis

A classic novel about sisterhood, ballet, and finding one's own path – the first Polish edition with original illustrations!

London, 1930s. One day, Professor Brown, an eccentric fossil collector, brings home from a trip a baby miraculously saved from a shipwreck and entrusts her to the care of his granddaughter. A year later, he returns home with another girl – the daughter of Russians who fled the country from revolutionaries and died shortly thereafter. He sends a third, Pusia, orphaned by her father, by messenger – and then sets off on another long journey.

Years pass, the children grow up, and the professor doesn't return. It soon becomes clear that the girls will have to help support the household. A ballet school offers a chance to learn a profession.

But it quickly becomes clear that the world of dance isn't fair, and some girls prefer cars and planes to ballet. How will the stepsisters cope with the challenges of school, the stage, and life?

"The Enchanted Ballet Shoes" has been reprinted and translated numerous times, as well as adapted for the screen (with Emma Watson playing one of the main roles).

Paulinka straightened up and folded her arms.

“We, the three Fosyl sisters here,” she began with a church chant, “swear and vow to do everything to make our name go down in history, because it is only our name and no one will say that we owe it to some grandparents.”

She signaled to Petrovna, who quickly grabbed Pusia's hand and lifted it up.

"We vow," she said in a voice so low it sounded very solemn. Then she whispered to Pusia, "You say 'we vow' too."

"We vow." Pusia tried to say the word in the same tone, but it didn't work; it sounded like a cat meowing.