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Weidenfeld & Nicolson has acquired a collection of stories by Nathan Englander, one of the New Yorker's "20 Writers for the 21st Century", whose previous works have been published by Faber.
Editorial director Arzu Tahsin bought UK and Commonwealth rights from Arabella Stein at the Abner Stein Literary Agent on behalf of Nicole Aragi in an auction. What We Talk About When We Talk About Anne Frank will be published in February 2012, with Knopf to publish in the US.
My husband Matt pairs well with me for a number of reasons. Amongst them is our mutual inclination to collect things we love. As such, Matt has systematically been holding onto all his issues of The New Yorker ever since he got his subscription in college. Over the years these issues have piled up piled up piled up. I was a Serials Manager before I got my library degree and one of the perks of the job was getting lots of lovely magazine holders. For years these holders graced the tops of our bookshelves and even came along with us when we moved into our current apartment a year ago. Yet with the arrival of our puir wee bairn, we decided to do the unthinkable.
Yes. We ripped off all their covers.
Well, most anyway. We have the complete run of New Yorker text on CD-ROM anyway, and anything published after the CD-ROM’s release would be online anyway. Thus does the internet discourage hoarding.
In the meantime, we now are the proud owners of only three boxes worth of New Yorker covers. They’re very fun to look at. I once had the desire to wallpaper my bathroom in such covers, but that dream will have to wait (as much as I love New York apartments and all . . .). For now, it’s just fun to flip through the covers themselves and, in flipping, I discovered something. Sure, I knew that the overlap between illustrators of children’s books and illustrators of New Yorkers was frequent. I just didn’t know how frequent it was. Here then is a quickie encapsulation of some of the folks I discovered in the course of my cover removal.
Istan Banyai
Zoom and Re-Zoom continue to circulate heavily in my library, all thanks to Banyai. I had a patron the other day ask if we had anything else that was similar but aside from Barbara Lehman all I could think of was Wiesner’s Flotsam. Banyai is well known in a different way for New Yorker covers, including this controversial one. As I recall, a bit of a kerfuffle happened when it was published back in the day.
Harry Bliss
Author and illustrator of many many picture books, it’s little wonder that the Art Editor of The New Yorker, Ms. Francoise Mouly, managed to get the man to do a TOON Book (Luke on the Loose) as well. And when it comes to his covers, this is the one I always think of first.
12 Comments on Children’s Illustrators and The New Yorker, last added: 7/28/2011
Thank you so much for this retrospective! So lovely to see a Gary Larson cover in there, I had no idea! I’m going to have to check out more of Marcellus Hall, I love that cover.
I also love the covers by Richard McGuire, creator of books like The Orange Book and Night Becomes Day. Check out this old blog entry I wrote, http://handthumbcomics.com/?p=66 , for some of his covers!
janeyolen said, on 7/27/2011 10:39:00 PM
Fascinating. I knew of some of them, but. . .
Jane
Linda Urban said, on 7/28/2011 3:30:00 AM
I love this article Betsy.
For about a year or so, when my son was small, he thought the magazine was about an individual guy who was The New Yorker. My boy scanned every cover looking for glimpses of the guy in a “Where’s Waldo?” sort of way and a few of those covers became favorites of his. He still has a small stack of them in his room.
leda schubert said, on 7/28/2011 5:10:00 AM
Great list. Also Charles Martin, Ludwig Bemelmans, Joseph Low, James Thurber (did he illustrate a children’s book? I don’t think so. But he wrote several of my favorites), Roger Duvoisin, James Stevenson, John O’Brien, Roxie Munro, Gretchen Dow Simpson (she did an alphabet book years ago) and probably more.
Fact: our basement is completely filled with New Yorkers.
Fact: Almost all of these illustrious illustrators who also do children’s books are men. Hmm. Yet a bunch of women did covers as well.
Zoe said, on 7/28/2011 5:30:00 AM
Thanks for this – has brightened up my lunch time coffee no end!
Marisabina russo said, on 7/28/2011 6:41:00 AM
You can add me to the list though my covers and spots came out when you were probably just a tot! Interesting post.
Sharon Creeech said, on 7/28/2011 7:30:00 AM
Love this; thanks so much for compiling.
Paul Zelinsky said, on 7/28/2011 7:51:00 AM
This is great to look through; thanks! What you can’t tell from looking is that some of these illustrators were New Yorker illustrators who were approached by New-Yorker-reading editors or art directors, and others were book illustrators before they became New Yorker cover artists. I am guessing that the Sendak one is the only case of The New Yorker approaching a book illustrator.
If I may pile on with suggestions for more, you could also include Ross MacDonald and Douglas Florian. I was going to say Marisabina Russo but she said it herself, and she said it, according to the indication on the post, almost three hours after I am writing this now. How did she do that?
About that wonderful NewYorkistan picture– I don’t know how it was credited in the magazine, but it was created jointly by Maira Kalman and Rick Meyerowitz.
jules said, on 7/28/2011 8:31:00 AM
I wrote this for Kirkus recently—http://www.kirkusreviews.com/blog/childrens/seven-impossible-things-new-yorker-effect/—-and started a list of those editorial illustrators who migrated to children’s book illustration. This post is PERFECT and adds to my list (which exists for no other reason than to just….exist). Bravo to this post!
Victoria Stapleton said, on 7/28/2011 8:47:00 AM
And now there is Frank Viva, whose first book is ALONG A LONG ROAD (Little, Brown).
Genevieve said, on 7/28/2011 9:06:00 AM
As a long-time New Yorker reader, I adore this post. Many of these covers look so familiar to me, I remember seeing them originally, but most of them I had not known were done by children’s book illustrators. Now I need to go find their books!
Elizabeth Bird said, on 7/28/2011 9:13:00 AM
I found a Viva cover that looks identical to Along a Long Road but didn’t get a chance to include it.
Jules I wondered if you’d done a New Yorker piece but neglected to check Kirkus. Consider yourself linked.
Wish I could get my hands on the covers of other artists mentioned. Didn’t know about Roxie.
I had a pounding headache and a bit of a neural spin, so I retreated to the couch with this week's New Yorker. The article "O Pioneer Woman: The Creation of a Domestic Idyll," Amanda Fortini's story about Ree Drummond, the blogger, found me. I read.
It's not as if I hadn't previously heard about this millionaire blogging phenom. I was just insufficiently informed about the size of Drummond's empire—the numbers of books and their rapid succession, the appearances, the 23.3 million page views per month and the 4.4 million unique visitors (according to the article), the million-dollars-plus revenue Drummond received in 2010 for her blog alone. She's a pretty lady with a big camera, a Marlboro Man husband, four kids, and a diesel-powered blog that offers photo tips, recipes, giveaways, and up-to-the-minute details of her life as it is on her Oklahoma farm (and, increasingly, in her celebrity haunts). It's all turned her into a mega-star—her stories about closet cleanings and book tours, dyed hair and laundry runs.
Who'd have thought it? She certainly originally didn't, so the story says. Indeed, Drummond started blogging because it seemed like a "fun, efficient method of keeping in touch with her mother" and her first posts were "... audio recordings of herself burping, and folksy, Reader's Digest-style anecdotes about country living, such as happening upon two dogs mating."
Is it my mood? Is it the weather? Is it any wonder that I wonder (don't we all wonder) how, of the reported 14% of online women who blog, a woman writing about burping and dog love rose so very quickly to the top? Can anyone ever, truly, predict stardom, Big Things, It?
We can't, I think. We can't prescribe it or force it; we cannot choose whose voice will smoke its way up and through, whose images and stories will dominate.
We can only watch and wonder.
6 Comments on In which I am not The Pioneer Woman, last added: 5/8/2011
Absolutely, Beth F. That is a huge undertaking, an absolutely full time job. I would never last a day of it.
It's the origins that intrigue me. What made the early musings so popular—before the giveaways, before the books, before she really mastered the camera.
I scanned this too quickly the first time, and read "vapid succession" instead of "rapid succession." Oddly enough, I first learned of this woman on Monday (gotta be the same gal), while waiting to get my car repaired — she had a piece in Guideposts. And, whatever I thought about the originality and depth of her writing, I kept reading ... until my car was fixed. At which point I completely forgot about her — until now. Insert your moral here ...
I started reading Drummond's blog about 3.5 years ago, just before the take-off. For me, her appeal was not the content, but her 'voice', the way she observed the world and how she brought that to the page (or webpage). I truly thought she could be my best friend. Apparently, so did 4.4 million other women. I now have VERY complex feelings about her rise to stardom...as in, I have had in-depth discussions with my real-life friends about my intense jealousy of her million dollar book deals ("one day I woke up and wrote a book!" "I had an idea for a picture and, golly!, there it was on the shelf one day!") And how I don't feel the intimacy I used to feel while reading her blog. (I'm dead serious and I realize how ridiculous this is.) Now, I will probably endure hours on a therapist's couch talking about the ways in which the Pioneer Woman has toyed with my emotions. lol.
Coming out of lurkdom here to voice my opinion. I followed TPW a year or two ago (right about the time her cookbook was published). I was wowed by her photos and writing and looked forward to popping over to her blog to read the latest about her kids, MB and Charlie (who now has his own book!). I admit, she won me over with her humor and down-to-earth personality. But a few months ago, I started to feel like it was all too much. Too many sub-blogs. Too much celebrity. Too much detachment from her readers. Honestly, I don't know how one woman can publish such a complex blog, while raising (homeschooling, no less!) her kids and taking care of the household stuff. Maybe I'm a cynic, but I'd bet she has some "help" with her blogging. Final thoughts: I'd much rather visit your beautiful blog. Your photos are lovely and your writing is thought-provoking and lovely.
We always count on the New Yorker to point us in the direction of the best-looking books and film, and this literary guide to holiday movies is no exception. We're glad they mentioned our slick new edition of TRUE GRIT (read that excerpt below!) but we're also excited for the new adaptation of THE TEMPEST starring Helen Mirren as Prospera.
“True Grit” (December 25th) is the latest from the Coen brothers, and is based on the novel by Charles Portis ,which has been given a spruced-up new package and an afterward by Donna Tartt (“The Secret History”). Featuring Matt Damon, Josh Brolin, and Jeff Bridges, “True Grit” is the tale of Mattie Ross, whose father has been murdered; she attempts to track down the killer with assistance from a U.S. Marshal.
Do you plan on seeing any of these films? (And more importantly, will you read the book first?) Happy movie-going!
0 Comments on TRUE GRIT ... and other great book-to-film adaptations this fall! as of 1/1/1900
Distinctive New Yorker cartoonist Leo Cullum passed away over the weekend. He had published four cartoon collections, including in 2009.
The cartoonist served as a TWA pilot for 30 years before retiring to work as an artist. He once explained the transition: “I would draw during my layovers and on my days off from flying, so it really wasn’t much of an adjustment, except that I wasn’t drawing in Paris or Rome anymore.”
The NY Times has a great collection of Cullum cartoons. In an interview, Cullum once explained why he loved working for the magazine: The New Yorker pays attention to the cartoons just as they do the articles. The cartoons are not an afterthought, but an equal part of the equation, and they expect the best. Many people will begin reading the magazine’s cartoons before they get in the habit of reading the magazine from cover to cover … Other magazines just use them as filler.”
Dear friends from middle-school, I will probably be buying these shoes and you can’t stop me. [hypebeast]
I just discovered that there is a University dedicated to providing “the highest quality training for the cannabis industry.” So, more on that Monday… [Oaksterdam]
0 Comments on Linked Up: Amazing Aidan, Lite-Brites, Cannabis U as of 1/1/1900
Tickets will go on sale on Friday at noon, Eastern time. http://www.newyorker.com/festival/tickets for info. Getting on the internet from here is hard work, so I probably won't remind you.
I'm disappointed that I won't get to see Ian Frazier or Malcolm Gladwell talk, as they are both on when I'm on. Not sure if I'll get in to New York in time to see Michael Chabon and Zadie Smith on the Friday night, although I'll do my best. I definitely want to see the Live From New York SNL panel on the Sunday (waves at Bill Hader and Seth Myers).
And yesterday I climbed a tree, and picked a shopping-bag full of plums. I think I should climb more trees. Have already cooked and/or eaten most of them. Tomorrow I go back up the tree. Depending on how the writing is going I may or may not ever come down again.
This photo of a happy birthday girl and her birthday car is deceptive.
Four quick links I've not posted here.
First: On September 26th I'll be one of four authors (Karen Hesse, Grace Lin and Jerry Spinelli are the other three, which is wonderful company) being honoured at Boston Public Library. It's a fundraiser ( "Proceeds from this event will fund children’s services and special programs for children and young adults.") and the event is ticketed. There will be a signing afterwards open to the public, though.
(And note -- "People are encouraged to sponsor children who would otherwise be unable to participate, by purchasing and donating extra tickets to the awards presentation & tea party".)
Second: In early October there will be a New Yorker festival. The New York Times Blog explains,
Today’s secret words are alter ego: Paul Reubens, the artist known forever in our hearts as Pee-wee Herman, will make a rare out-of-character appearance as himself for a public interview as part of the 11th annual New Yorker Festival in October, its organizers said on Tuesday. Other performers and authors who will appear in conversations with that magazine’s contributors include the “Office” star Steve Carell, the actress Patricia Clarkson, the musician James Taylor, the fantasy writer Neil Gaiman and the filmmaker Werner Herzog.
The festival, which runs from Oct. 1 through 3, will also feature panel discussions on “Saturday Night Live,” with Seth Meyers and other cast members, and moderated by The New Yorker editor, David Remnick; vampires in popular culture, featuring Stephen King and the “Twilight” screenwriter Melissa Rosenberg and moderated by Joan Acocella...
I'll be interviewed by Dana Goodyear, who did the profile of me in the New Yorker earlier this year. Tickets and the schedule will go up on http://www.newyorker.com/festival on September 10th.
And third...
At the end of October is the House on the Rock American Gods event, "A Low Key Gathering". (Details and information at http://thehouseontherockjournal.blogspot.com/).There's a benefit being organised by the Thingies (those stalwart individuals who have been with us since the dawn days of alt.fan.neilgaiman), and I've donated a handful of things to their auction, things I found in the attic. The auction is to help bring long-term fans in, and anything left over will go to the CBLDF. Misstress Mousey donated cool stuff (including one of the limited run of Sandman 8s), as has Kitty from Neverwear.
Up in the attic there are boxes. I went and found three things I've donated to actions once or twice before, and one thing that's never been up for sale ever - the limited prints I do every few years for friends (they are meant to be out for the holidays but sometimes wind up being sent out in February): The Dangerous Alphab
0 Comments on Not a Maddy's birthday post. Actually about four other things. as of 8/28/2010 10:23:00 PM
Hi everyone:Second Lives, an excerpt from my novel-in-progress is in this week's issue of The New Yorker. / Un fragmento de la novela que estoy terminando se ha publicado en el New Yorker de esta semana.
I met criollo guitarist Walter Goyburu last week here in Lima, and recorded a few things for La Pelanga. / Conocí al guitarrista criollo Walter Goyburu aquí en Lima la semana pasada. Grabé algo de la conversa para La Pelanga. abrazos, d
Rio Grande Kitch & Camp
Río Grande Review abre de nuevo su convocatoria para la edicion de otoño de 2010. Esta vez, además de recibir trabajos tanto escritos como visuales de tema libre, abre un dossier temático dedicado al kitsch y al camp.Puedes ver el video siguiendo el link.
Río Grande Review is calling for submissions for its fall 2010 edition. This time, in addition to accepting both written and visual open-themed work in any genre, we’re featuring a thematic dossier dedicated to kitsch and camp.Follow the link and watch the video.
Río Grande Review University of Texas at El Paso PMB 671, 500 W. University Ave. El Paso, Tex. www.riograndereview.com [email protected] www.facebook.com/TheRGR
0 Comments on New Yorker latino. Call for subs. Woman in Afghan as of 1/1/1900
With one post, Larry Nolen simultaneously offers a thoughtful and well-informed response to folks who got all "wwaaaahhrrr! waaaahhhhrrr! genre good! waaahhhhrrrr!" about the New Yorker's"20 Under 40" promotional list (whereas I just offered snark) and he proves what we already knew -- that he was the perfect successor as Best American Fantasy series editor, because his perspective is exactly the one we wanted for the book when we created the series (and he's a much faster reader than I am, which will make the work perhaps a bit less arduous for him than it was for me). It's a post well worth reading -- one of the things being inundated with piles of lit mags does is show you the extraordinary variety of writing out there, both in terms of content and form.
Now if I can just get him to stop calling it "mimetic fiction", I'll have achieved all of my goals for world domination, bwahahahahahahahaaaa!
Update: The link for "20 Under 40" above goes to interviews with the 20. Here are some questions and responses:
What was the inspiration for the piece included in the “20 Under 40” series?
Kate Bernheimer asked me to contribute a piece to her new anthology of fairy tales, “My Mother She Killed Me, My Father He Ate Me,” and I was excited to have a chance to revisit a story that disturbs me: Goethe’s “The Erlking.”
What was the inspiration for the piece included in the “20 Under 40” series?
[...]I wanted to try a sort of fantastical-historical story—Hitchcock meets the swamp.
What are you working on now?
New stories and a novel about a whacked-out imaginary town during the Dust Bowl drought.
Who are your favorite writers over forty?
Just a very few on a long list would be George Saunders, Kelly Link, Joy Williams, Ben Marcus, Jim Shepard, and whole cemeteries of the well-over-forty deceased ones.
4 Comments on 20 Under 40 and the Fantastic, last added: 6/26/2010
Well, to quote one of my least favorite people of the moment, Tony Hayward, I wanted my life back! I'm a slow reader, and because of that BAF took over most of my reading life. I got so I didn't want to see another short story for the rest of my life. I've begun to recover, but it was a really tough job, and I just didn't think I could honestly do it. When we struck on the idea of asking Larry if he'd take over, it just seemed perfect. And he's in a good position to help us expand the "American" part, because he reads Spanish and Portugese. I'm still hanging out as an occasional advisor, because I love the series and all the folks involved with it, but I needed to be able to have someone else doing the preliminary reading or I was going to have a total meltdown.
Thanks for the high praise, Matt! I will note, however, that the past 2-3 months have made me a bit numb after reading all those journals, but there have been some outstanding stories that have more than made up for the occasional drudgery.
I'm hoping next year will be much smoother, with twelve months to devote to reading rather than three full months. It might also give us time to net more Latin American writers, since I would be able to have the time to read those e-zines and inquire about translations of suitable stories that I just didn't have this time around.
But I am optimistic that BAF 4 will continue the good things started with the first three. Plus, it has been a godsend to have you, Ann, and Jeff helping me along the way!
I never realized how much I love the art of New Yorker cartoons until I spent some time browsing the New Yorker Cartoon Bank. Check it out, hundreds of free cartoons!
Yes, New York Times Headline Writer, my envy is vast! It contains multitudes! Well, not quite multitudes. More like twenty little sharp needles of bitter, concentrated envy. Why why why New Yorker elitists didn't you pick ME?!? I coulda been a contender! You know I'm out here, because I write to you every week to tell you how wrong you were to never publish a story by David Eddings!
Clearly, the only thing your editors appreciate are boring realistic stories about middle-aged professors who have affairs. Like the stories by Daniel Alarcón and Chris Adrian in Best American Fantasy. And Sarah Shun-lien Bynum's Madeleine Is Sleeping. And the title story of Wells Towers's Everything Ravaged, Everything Burned. And all of Karen Russell's stories, certainly. Dirty realists! Nasty rotten winning smug literary brats! Baaaaaaah! (Russell has even been photographed at that Communistic dirty realist gathering, the KGB Fantastic Fiction series!)
Sure, the New Yorker editors say they just want to offer some names of writers they think show a lot of promise for the future, but I know what their real purpose is. It's to torment me! That's why they keep sending me their magazine every week! To show me how much they disdain me!
At least the New York Times headline writer knows the truth, even if she/he didn't mention me by name. I know that headline writer was thinking of me. They always are. It's why I read the Times every morning -- to see what they're saying about me today...
8 Comments on Feel the Envy!, last added: 6/3/2010
Still, I do think that there is a real argument to made about the exclusion of "core" genre writers, i.e. writers who actually market and sell their work in the genre sections of the book store. Sure, lots of the folks who made the list will turn out to have been not-so-secretly writing fantasy all along: see for example how the NYTimes gives honorable mention to Chabon and Diaz, from the previous decade's list.
But Chabon openly admitted to biding his time until he had enough widespread fame to risk "sullying" his rep with a SFWA membership.
Meanwhile, the exclusion of writers lik Kelly Link (*)(**) says to me that the New Yorker really wouldn't know a cutting-edge core-genre writer if one fell into their lap.
(*) Just an example, right? I'm not pissed because KL was excluded specifically; it's just telling that NONE of the really neat-o core genre writers did make the list.
(**) Also, I have no idea which side of 40 KL is. She was just an example, okay!
And if F&SF published such a list, should they include Sarah Shun-lien Bynum? Though certainly that would be interesting and fun, it would be a big surprise, and lots of devoted readers would scream bloody murder. Most of the writers on the NYer list are people who (surprise surprise) have been published by the NYer. It's a list that promotes and confirms their own taste (a list that promotes and confirms somebody else's taste would be odd). It's useful in giving a snapshot of the editors' interests, but not much more than that, which is why envy is such an odd feeling to ascribe to all the millions of writers in the world not on the list. The only people who should be envious are other NYer writers under 40.
But I think your point only really moves the 'no core genre writers' argument back to the original editorial decision process?
Also, "This is how the folks who run this particular magazine view their published writers" is not exactly how the NY Times is choosing to read or portray the NYer 20<40 list. The NY Times article is more like: "People! Pay attention! THIS IS WHERE THE ACTION IS!"
Okay, I'm not sure at this point if I'm still defending the annoyed genre writers on twitter, or just rehashing your original complaint with the NY Times? Let me know if you figure out what I'm trying to say before I do.
Yes, I think we're on the same page, though perhaps not the same sentence. And honestly, I don't really feel very passionately about it -- I just happened to have seen some Twitter notes that seemed ridiculous and then, against my better judgment, I finally went and saw the NYT story and laughed at the headline, so I wrote a silly, sarcastic post that drew on the two things I'd happened to think were absurd in the last few hours.
Various partly-composed blog entries seem to have vanished, which means a VERY hasty rundown of stuff, rather than the leisurely stroll through the last few days I was hoping for.
1) Peter and the Wolf was wonderful. No, it wasn't recorded/videoed. I'd love to do it for posterity with Gary Fagin (my cousin! His grandmother and my great-grandfather were brother and sister) and the Knickerbocker Orchestra, if a way can be figured out to make it happen.
2) I went to the Golden Globes for Coraline. We lost. But we lost to Up! so no surprise there. Amanda wore a classic 1920s beaded dress with very little underneath it, and nobody noticed me at all. The Golden Globes were interesting. The strangest moment was as we were leaving the NBC party, the photographers grumbled that they hadn't got any photos of us going in, so we agreed to pose for them... and when they complained that Amanda was no longer wearing the amazing beaded dress she'd worn on the Red Carpet, she changed back into it for them (with me holding up a jacket as a makeshift changing area -- the area was deserted but for photographers). They took photographs. (When shot with a flash the dress looks a lot more naked than it did when I was standing next to her.) My favourite bit was that when the photos appeared I was listed as "and guest".
My favourite afterparty moments: talking to Robert Downey Jr about the Baker Street Irregulars (he hopes to attend the Dinner next year, and I am an invested Irregular), and watching Steve Marchant and Amanda trying to figure out where they know each other from (she'd been on his Radio 6 show). I mistook some Hollywood Power Broker for a producer I know and was in my turn told how much someone had loved my performance in a movie I wasn't actually in. So it goes.
(I've hung onto the envelope with the Golden Globes and afterparty invitations and such in, and I'll donate it to be auctioned for Haiti.)
3) The New Yorker profile is out. It's pretty good actually, although given the amount of time I was on the phone with the New York Times Fact Checker for, I'm surprised at the number of things Dana still got a little bit wrong (from the Golden Age Sandman "killing" people with his gas gun on up, or down). I found myself feeling protective of the readers, and was disappointed that there wasn't actually more about the stories in there: the huge signings and bloggings and book-sales numbers such are a tiny by-product of the stories, and, for me, not the most interesting bit (it would be like seeing someone describing a classical concert: the funny man with the stick waving it around at the front, and all the people in their best clothes sitting patiently while other people blow or pluck or scrape or bang at things on the stage, which all seems a bit peculiar if you aren't talking about the music). Glad it's done, though.
4) Over on eBay Dave McKean is auctioning a drawing from The Graveyard Book for the Haitian Health Foundation. He has no plans to sell any of the other Graveyard Book drawings -- this is the only one he's offered for sale. The
This week’s New Yorker has a wonderful article on Arabic Literature: "Found in Translation" by Claudia Roth Pierpont. Since my time in Cairo was spent working on contemporary Arab fiction—I sold translation rights to books to American and international publishers, including many by authors cited in this piece—this is a subject close to my heart. Not long before this, A Public Space ran Bryan T. Edward's very smart piece on Cairo's young literati. Clearly, as I remarked to a colleague who acquires international fiction (one of a handful in the publishing industry), these articles presage a new commercial trend, one in which works in translation rocket right to the top of the bestseller lists, elbowing aside assorted tales of the undead.
Stranger things have happened.
1 Comments on Books in translation, last added: 1/15/2010
This list is EXACTLY what I needed...a week before Christmas. Fortunately, the person to whom I gave the first book of the Cairo Trilogy by Naguib Mafouz will be interested in Arabic for a few more years, so I can use this list for the next gift giving occasion.
Two recently published biographies of Ayn Rand have been getting a good deal of attention recently. It’s unusual that two so similar books have been published more or less simultaneously, and the net effect is to make it seem as if we are in the middle of a Rand resurgence. Thomas Mallon writes in the New Yorker that “most readers make their first and last pilgrimage to Galt’s Gulch....sometime between leaving for Middle Earth and packing for college.” Another reviewer (who it was, and the precise words he used, I can not now remember) said that Rand’s books have made it on to the mysteriously constituted but broadly understood unofficial reading list of adolescence. Both observations made me laugh, in large part because they seemed spot on. I read both The Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged in early high school; who recommended them to me, I can’t, for the life of me, recall. Certainly not my parents, though they noted my choice of reading with some bemusement. I wasn’t in search of a political philosophy, and I emerged from my sojourn in Galt Gulch with no die-hard allegiance to Objectivism or snappy habit of wearing a cape. Ditto Middle Earth. I do, now wonder, where this unofficial reading list came from: for me in addition to Rand and Tolkien, it included generous helpings of Daphne DuMaurier (where is the gothic novel today, I ask?); Gone With the Wind; The Hitchhiker’s Guide; The Princess Bride; Down and Out in Paris and in London; Look Homeward, Angel; Lost Horizon. Note that I’m leaving off the books that were part of the official curriculum, such as Hiroshima, Death be Not Proud, A Separate Peace and assorted other death-related tales that I now suspect compose the reading-list-approach to undermining the adolescent sense of invincibility.
But I wonder what made it on to your unofficial list of adolescence? Did you read Rand? And what do Howard Roark and Bilbo Baggins have in common? Also, if anyone can tell me what article I’m paraphrasing, I’d be grateful.
As a mother of four small children, I found this recent article from the New Yorker about today's children's books to be thought provoking, especially since I own many of the books he talks about and read them often to my kids. I don't think there's any question that reading to your children is one of the greatest gifts you can give them, but is what you read worth reconsidering in some cases? I tend to insert my own ideas into books that I feel conflict with my own parenting style (like in the first Olivia book, when Olivia doesn't want to take her nap, I always add "but she does it anyway," because the last thing I need is a nap strike in my house!), at least until my kids are big enough to read them on their own.
What are your favorite children's books? And after reading this article, do you have any new thoughts on what are your least favorite?
-Stacey
12 Comments on Children's Book Corner: Beware!, last added: 11/12/2009
Wow, I haven't bought a kid's book in so long I think I've missed this particular phenomenon. Before everyone recoils -gasp- quelle horreur! My oldest is 19, and I have not only all HIS books, but my own childhood books I loved. And, since I have 6 other children, I have MANY books so I don't often have to run out and grab a new one.
But, after reading that, yes, I pretty much agree with the article. *shrug* It ought to keep The Nanny show going for a few more years, at least.
Having no children, I am in no position to discuss it, but in theory, I do not approve of nor understand the type of story that essentially undermines all parental authority.
Thank you for sharing this article, it was quite enlightening.
My girls LOVE Pinkalicious. I think we have read it well over a fifty times now! No kidding fifty times! There is a part in there where the Mom says, "You get what you get and you don't get upset." It's funny because now my girls say that to each other everytime the other is out of line.
I'm so tired of hippie parenting I could spit beads. I love Max! And his mother.
Anonymous said, on 11/11/2009 9:35:00 PM
I have four children as well. Reading in our house is huge despite the fact that we all have different tastes. Right now my son is into the Diary of a Wimpy Kid series. My oldest daughter loves the Goosebump books and my third daughter loves Dr. Seuss. I also have an infant that is just now discovering books. I can't wait to see what books capture her. As a family our favorites are definitely The Giving Tree and Where the Wild Things Are.
Max may have been sent to bed without dinner, but his mother relents. I haven't read very many of the new behavioral picture books that were listed in the article. My kids and I love reading books by David Shannon, Mo Willems and Kevin Henkes though.
Hmmm...my kids are in their early thirties, but I loved reading "Goodnight, Moon" and "The Runaway Bunny" to them---when they were little, just to be clear. Two years ago I bought "The Teddy Bears Picnic"--for myself. And I'm 60.
Awesome link. I'm a mum to three boys - my oldest is 4 and my twins are 18-months-old. And although it may not be a popular parenting approach, in our house there's no question that mum and dad are in charge. Of course the boys challenge us on a daily basis but my husband and I both believe kids are happiest when the parents are firmly in control. It's an interesting observation (and a true one) that many parents in picture books clearly aren't.
It's great to see an article so well thought out and presented. I'm a writer of picture books and it's no surprise my own beliefs and values come through in my books. I'm also selective about what books I do read my boys and choose books that reinforce the values that our family holds dear. The portrayal of parents is certainly something I'm going to think about some more and keep in mind when I'm writing and reading. Thanks so much.
I was very much into reading Winnie the Pooh stories to my son when he was young. I never really depended on books to teach lessons. I only wanted to introduce characters to my son who were good role models.
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Thank you so much for this retrospective! So lovely to see a Gary Larson cover in there, I had no idea! I’m going to have to check out more of Marcellus Hall, I love that cover.
I also love the covers by Richard McGuire, creator of books like The Orange Book and Night Becomes Day. Check out this old blog entry I wrote, http://handthumbcomics.com/?p=66 , for some of his covers!
Fascinating. I knew of some of them, but. . .
Jane
I love this article Betsy.
For about a year or so, when my son was small, he thought the magazine was about an individual guy who was The New Yorker. My boy scanned every cover looking for glimpses of the guy in a “Where’s Waldo?” sort of way and a few of those covers became favorites of his. He still has a small stack of them in his room.
Great list. Also Charles Martin, Ludwig Bemelmans, Joseph Low, James Thurber (did he illustrate a children’s book? I don’t think so. But he wrote several of my favorites), Roger Duvoisin, James Stevenson, John O’Brien, Roxie Munro, Gretchen Dow Simpson (she did an alphabet book years ago) and probably more.
Fact: our basement is completely filled with New Yorkers.
Fact: Almost all of these illustrious illustrators who also do children’s books are men. Hmm. Yet a bunch of women did covers as well.
Thanks for this – has brightened up my lunch time coffee no end!
You can add me to the list though my covers and spots came out when you were probably just a tot! Interesting post.
Love this; thanks so much for compiling.
This is great to look through; thanks! What you can’t tell from looking is that some of these illustrators were New Yorker illustrators who were approached by New-Yorker-reading editors or art directors, and others were book illustrators before they became New Yorker cover artists. I am guessing that the Sendak one is the only case of The New Yorker approaching a book illustrator.
If I may pile on with suggestions for more, you could also include Ross MacDonald and Douglas Florian. I was going to say Marisabina Russo but she said it herself, and she said it, according to the indication on the post, almost three hours after I am writing this now. How did she do that?
About that wonderful NewYorkistan picture– I don’t know how it was credited in the magazine, but it was created jointly by Maira Kalman and Rick Meyerowitz.
I wrote this for Kirkus recently—http://www.kirkusreviews.com/blog/childrens/seven-impossible-things-new-yorker-effect/—-and started a list of those editorial illustrators who migrated to children’s book illustration. This post is PERFECT and adds to my list (which exists for no other reason than to just….exist). Bravo to this post!
And now there is Frank Viva, whose first book is ALONG A LONG ROAD (Little, Brown).
As a long-time New Yorker reader, I adore this post. Many of these covers look so familiar to me, I remember seeing them originally, but most of them I had not known were done by children’s book illustrators. Now I need to go find their books!
I found a Viva cover that looks identical to Along a Long Road but didn’t get a chance to include it.
Jules I wondered if you’d done a New Yorker piece but neglected to check Kirkus. Consider yourself linked.
Wish I could get my hands on the covers of other artists mentioned. Didn’t know about Roxie.