Time to brush up on your high school German meine damen und herren. Yes The Strange Case of Origami Yoda got its own pretty impressive fan trailer straight outta Germany the other day. It’s interesting, but I was even more taken with the German name of the book. Yoda, I Am! Everything, I Know! As overseas titles go, that’s gotta be one of my favorites. I also like the description of the book that accompanies the video: “Eigentlich ist Dwight ein totaler Loser.” No matter where you go in this world, “total loser” is a universal.
I swear I didn’t mean for this to happen, but by complete coincidence the Germans have the floor today. This next one is actually a small filmed version of a picture book called Vom Kleinen Maulwurf, der Wissen Wollte Wer Ihm Auf den Kopf Gemacht Hatte by Werner Holzwarth and Wolf Eribruch. You can debate what the best possible translation of this might be, but I think my favorite has to be Wikipedia’s The Story of the Little Mole Who Knew It Was None of His Business. See it and you’ll comprehend why.
Needless to say, this book has yet to be published in America. Not even the Plop-Up version. Jules brought to to my attention after her fantastic post on Maurizio Quarello’s take on Bluebeard led to a fascinating discussion in the comments of what Yanks do and do not find squeamish. Thanks for the link, Jules!
Ruh-roh. I heard that someone wanted to do an “updated” musical take on Alice in Wonderland for Broadway. Of course, that brings to mind another musical as well: The Wiz. Updating classics isn’t as easy as all that (though I’ll forgive many things for “Ease on Down the Road”). Here’s an interview with the woman playing Alice. Join me as I wonder if it’s possible that the music was written in 1982. Hoo boy.
Yeah. That ain’t good. Here’s a bit from the Playbill blog post about it as well. Thanks to @MrSchuReads for the link.
This one’s interesting, and related to children’s literature in that much of my own childhood was spent reading New Yorker cartoons. Cartoonist Liza Donnelly and I have something in common. We both attended Earlham College (fight fight inner light, kill, Quakers, kill!!). We also both have an interest in humor and women.
Oh German Day, is it? First of all to be high school teacher pedantic, it is “Damen und Herren” as Germans capitalize nouns. Secondly, yay for der Kleinen Maulwurf! I came across that book years and years ago in Germany and recall some fun child_lit conversations about the fact that it exists in translations all over the world, but not here.
Oh….and notice my silence about your next item. Black hole silence.
Hooray for German day! Still waiting for the scratch and sniff version of “Der Kleine Maulwurf” to arrive.:)
Danke for posting the Origami Yoda video!! I know not a thing about it and was totally surprised to run across it. I think it was actually made by the German publisher of OY.
Hey, wait a minute. I’ve had that mole book in my library for 4 years. The US title is THE STORY OF THE MOLE WHO WENT IN SEARCH OF WHODUNIT. And yes, it makes a great read-aloud.
Silence noted and agreed upon. Capitalization invoked (if Cabaret taught me anything it should have taught me that). Mind you, I took French in school so I’m playing the ignorance card on this one.
Hi Elizabeth, Thanks for posting my TED talk! btw, I also wrote a bunch of children’s books for Scholastic about dinosaurs. When were you at Earlham? cheers, Liza
A-ha! DaNae I’m pleased to hear this. You are absolutely correct. Abrams published it in 2007 and it looks as though it’s still in print. So if anyone here today wants to get their own copy . . . .
Hi Liza! Ah, I was the class of 2000 so we probably lack much in the way of overlap (except we may have both have had Lincoln Blake or Tony Bing for English, eh?). But I didn’t know about the dinosaur book! I believe I shall email you sometime. Your video has fit in beautifully with a personal project I’ve been ruminating over lately.
Seems like fodder for your book:)
Hurray for Abrams! I just looked back in the child_lit archives and see that our discussion of this book was in 1999. I mentioned it in a larger thread about cultural comfort levels. And I totally forgot that Nina Lindsay wrote that there was a US edition titled “The Story of the Little Mole who Went in Search of Whodunit”, published by Stewart Tabori and Chang. We then went on to discuss the relative degree of coyness in the different translations.