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Hansel and Gretel

By The Brothers Grimm; Pictures by Eloise Wilkin

A Little Golden Book

I venture to guess most, if not all, of the Baby Boomers that are now grandparents, grew up reading these books.

Starting in 1942, they originally sold at the ginormous price of 25 cents! Yes, for one quarter of a dollar, your child could read the likes of “The Pokey Little Puppy”, “Tootle the Train”, “Scuffy the Tugboat”, “The Saggy Baggy Elephant”, “The Shy Little Kitten”, “The Tawney Scrawny Lion”, “The Little Red Caboose”, “Mother Goose”, “Prayers for Children”, “Three Little Children” and a slew of other initially published titles.These small books soon found their way into households, hands and eventually the hearts of young readers everywhere. And they have stood the test of time, with the authors and illustrators whose artistry created them. That is my definition of a classic picture book read and Little Golden Books are classics.

Their lure was not merely their attractive price, but their writers and illustrators were the likes of Garth Williams, illustrator of “The Little House on the Prairie” series, “Charlotte’s Web” and “Stuart Little”, Margaret Wise Brown of “Goodnight Moon” fame, Richard Scarry, Trina Schart Hyman, James Marshall, and Alice and Martin Provensen to name but a very few.

These people made artistry and great narrative available to every child that had a quarter. That, in and of itself, is a wonderful thing.

Guess the reason I keep bringing these classic books forward in the Way Back Wednesday segment of The Snuggery is that I firmly believe their artistic value needs to be brought forward again and again so a new generation can see them and hopefully love them as we Boomers did.

I had a first hand experience of the impact they had on one child now grown to be an artist that did covers for Penguin paperback books. Bill had, as a child, a well loved copy of “Scuffy the Tugboat.” It somehow was lost in the passage of time. When he spoke of this book, and its story and art, you could tell it had affected his life, AND maybe even his future profession as artist.

So I made up my mind to find an original of this Little Golden Book. It took a while, but I did it. Wish you could’ve been there when I put the book in his hands. It was really something to see him gently thumb the pages of a book he had treasured as a child and could practically recite as a adult.

Books DO affect young readers for a lifetime.

So, why not perhaps revisit YOUR journey with these wonderful Little Golden Books and launch a new discovery, via your own grandchildren, children or a young reader you know?

Please go and rediscover a Little Golden Book with your little ones. It’s way past time!

You start it with . . . EXCITEMENT!

A show of hands.  Who, right now, is weeping a little over the fact that we will never have Mr. Colby Sharp as the 4th grade teacher of our youth?  That is, perhaps, the first video I would show to my students if I were teaching a graduate course in children’s librarianship.  And everyone should watch it just before the school year starts to get pumped up.  Thanks to Gretchen Hardaway for the link.

Book trailer time!  So I have some good news, and I have some bad news.  Literally.

Fact of the matter is, thanks to Flash animation, book trailer technology just grows more and more accomplished every year.  We’re getting to the point where they may as well be little movies in and of themselves.  Case in point, The Insomniacs.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vAbeV_gPUNA&feature=player_embedded

And as for this next one, a Grimm story retold as a graphic novel by James Odone . . . WANTWANTWANNAWANNAWANT!

Trouble is, this one’s in the works so we’ve no info on it yet.  James, for the record, is the fellow behind the fantastic picture book Honey Badgers (it came out before the YouTube video so no snorts, people) as well as this year’s Mole Had Everything (a natural companion to I.C. Springman’s More, illustrated by Brian Lies.

And for our off-topic video of the day, let’s just think of this one as Make Way for Ducklings 2.0.

Last week I talked at great length about my visit to The Eric Carle Museum of Picture Book Art. One of the highlights of my visit was a showcase of original art by Lisbeth Zwerger (love her). Read more after the jump. Little Red Cap is no Disney version of “Little Red Riding Hood”. This classic [...]

We are living through a strange era.  Fairy tales, long a source of folktelling splendor, are currently being pillaged for their movie rights like never before.  There are, for example, THREE different Snow White retellings in the works as we speak, as well as that Red Riding Hood coming out in theaters and many many more.  Meanwhile in the book world we’re seeing things like Sleeping Beauty, Vampire Slayer and Cinderella, Ninja Warrior.

Yet it was last year’s A Tale Dark and Grimm that proved to be the most interesting fairy tale adaptation.  Adam Gidwitz saw these stories for what they really were: awesome.  And he cleverly plumbed the depths of the stranger ones for his tales.

He’s hardly the first person to do so, of course.  Books like Grimm’s Grimmest have been coming out for years.  Still, one can’t help but think how much more interesting the fairy tale adaptation movement would be if someone were to turn The Juniper Tree or The Robber Bridegroom into a film.

All this has been on the tippy top part of my brain today since my husband brought home 1999’s The Big Book of Grimm.  There are distinct advantages to dwelling with a mate who knows a classic comic source when he sees it. Part of the “Big Book” comic series, over 50 comic artists were nabbed to adapt some of the Grimm Brothers’ stranger tales.  Some of the folks here may be familiar to you.  The Girl With No Hands has been adapted by none other than Randy DuBurke (best known to our community now for his work on G. Neri’s Yummy).  You may have loved the work of Charles Vess on Neil Gaiman’s Blueberry Girl, but you should also check out his take on old Snow White (red hot dancing shoes and all).  And while the name James Kochalka is probably lodged in your frontal lobe as the creator of the adorable Johnny Boo, you ain’t lived till you’ve see what he does with that old chestnut Dog and Sparrow.

It’s an utterly faithful arrangement of some of the creepiest stories imaginable.  Naturally, I love it. Jonathan Vankin is the man behind the collection, and actually offers some fairly incisive, albeit brief, commentary.  For example, at one point he wonders if the use of the stepmother rather than mother in these tales was an act of self-censorship on the part of the Grimms.  Personally, I was fascinated by some of the stories dealing with class.  I hadn’t read The Poor Man and the Rich Man or Godfather Death before but both stories take an interesting view of how God regards the rich.

Something to keep an eye out for, then.  Classic tales, lots of body parts being flung about, and some of the best comic artists working (Dean Haspiel, Sergio Aragones, etc.).  Eat up!