Author: Eleanor Estes
Introduction
"The Hundred Dresses" is a story about bullying, social exclusion, and the silent guilt of a bystander. It is divided into two parts in the textbook. Part I introduces the main characters and establishes the central conflict: the teasing of a Polish immigrant girl named Wanda Petronski by her classmates.
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Key Characters
Wanda Petronski: A quiet, Polish immigrant girl who lives in the poor Boggins Heights area. She always comes to school in the same faded blue dress. She claims to have a hundred dresses at home — all lined up in her closet. The other children mock her for this.
Maddie: The protagonist and narrator through whom we see events. She is a kind girl but lacks the courage to speak up against Peggy's teasing. Her guilt and internal conflict are central to the story.
Peggy: Maddie's popular, confident friend who leads the teasing of Wanda. She is not portrayed as entirely cruel — she genuinely does not believe she is being mean, which is an important nuance.
The other students: They laugh along with Peggy, contributing to a culture of mockery.
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Key Concepts
Bullying and Social Exclusion: Wanda is excluded not just by active mockery but by the subtle cruelty of being different — her name, her clothes, her background set her apart.
The Bystander: Maddie knows the teasing is wrong but does not intervene. Her silence makes her complicit. This is the moral heart of the story.
Dignity and Pride: Despite being teased, Wanda maintains a quiet dignity. She never argues, never cries visibly, just repeats her claim about the hundred dresses.
Immigration and Otherness: Wanda's Polish surname, her strange-sounding name, and her poverty make her an outsider in her American school — a reflection of the experience of immigrants.
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Plot with Examples
Example 1: Wanda's Routine
Wanda always sits in the last row of the classroom, near the window. She is rarely noticed unless students are making fun of her. She is always alone.
Example 2: The Game of the Hundred Dresses
Peggy starts the "game" of asking Wanda about her dresses. Every time, Wanda answers: "I have a hundred dresses at home. All lined up in my closet." The girls laugh. Peggy insists she is just having fun and not being cruel.
Example 3: Maddie's Discomfort
Maddie feels uncomfortable with the game. She is herself from a poor family and wears hand-me-down clothes. She worries that if she speaks up for Wanda, Peggy might start teasing her. Her silence is born of self-preservation and fear.
Example 4: Wanda's Absence
One Monday, Wanda is absent. She is absent several days in a row. The class barely notices.
Example 5: The Drawing Contest
The school holds a drawing contest. Boys draw motorboats; girls draw dresses. Wanda submits a hundred drawings of different, beautiful dresses — each one a wearable work of art. The teacher is astonished. Wanda wins the contest easily. The hundred dresses she claimed to have were the ones in her mind and on paper — her artistic creations.
Example 6: The Realisation Begins
When Wanda's drawings are displayed in the classroom, Maddie and Peggy are astonished. Wanda has actually designed the hundred dresses she always talked about. The mockery they directed at her was directed at her talent. The girls begin to feel the first stirring of guilt.
Example 7: Wanda Leaves School
It emerges that Wanda has not returned to school because her father has moved the family away. He wrote a letter to the teacher explaining that the family is moving to a city where no one will make fun of Wanda's name. This letter is both heartbreaking and powerful — a father protecting his child from cruelty.
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Key Themes
- Cruelty of indifference: The most damaging cruelty is often not outright hostility but casual mockery and the silence of bystanders.
- Art as self-expression: Wanda's hundred dress drawings show that her "hundred dresses" were always real — they lived in her imagination and creative skill.
- Moral courage vs. cowardice: Maddie's failure to speak up is the moral failing the story asks us to examine.
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Common mistakes
> Students often focus only on Peggy as the villain. The story is more nuanced — Peggy does not consider herself cruel, and Maddie's silent complicity is equally important. Also note: Wanda wins the drawing contest for designing the most beautiful dresses, connecting her "hundred dresses" claim to her artistic reality.
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Summary
Part I of "The Hundred Dresses" establishes the heartbreaking story of a talented, lonely immigrant girl subjected to daily humiliation by her classmates. Through Maddie's perspective, the reader experiences the discomfort of knowing something is wrong and doing nothing. The revelation of Wanda's drawings transforms the reader's understanding of the "hundred dresses" — and begins the characters' journey toward guilt and, eventually, moral reckoning.