The word ‘utopia’ means different things to different people and even comes from two different words. In modern English, we colloquially use ‘utopia’ to mean our own version of a perfect society. Philosophers go deeper. For example, Nassim Nicholas Taleb defines a utopia as a society built according to some blueprint of what “makes sense”.…
Pig the Pug and Trevor the sausage dog live together in a flat. Pig is greedy and selfish and refuses to share his toys. Trevor suggests they play together, but Pig refuses. He piles up all his toys and sits on top of them, but the pile collapses. Pig ends up covered in bandages, completely…
This is a wonderfully frustrating story. The awful character of Gilles will probably remind you of someone you have known at least once in your life. He is a caricature, to be sure, but not so much of one that he isn’t immediately recognisable. You will feel as if you are stuck inside a car…
As an adolescent I was keen to get my hands on the complete works of Judy Blume, but unfortunately only a select few were available to me. I’ve only just read Are You There, God? It’s Me, Margaret, Margaret Simon, almost twelve, likes long hair, tuna fish, the smell of rain, and things that are…
Theorists have been interested for a long while in the question: What makes a story? Aristotle noticed in The Poetics that a plot must allow for a significant change in the fortune of a main character. But you’ve surely read stories in which characters don’t seem to change at all. Perhaps that’s why you’re here,…
I’m sure any visitor to this blog has at least one version of Snow White on their childhood bookshelf. Which version did you have? When you think of Snow White, perhaps you think fondly of the Disney film, or perhaps, like me, you grew up with ‘Read It Yourself’ versions, as well as coming across…
Gray, the color we attach to characterless people, often suggests bleakness, lack of intensity, a cool detachment. The oppressively predominating gray of the stone walls surrounding Snow White’s mother in Burkert’s picture of her demands our detachment from her but also contrasts with the vibrantly colored patterns we see surrounding her as we look through…
At first, “Christmas Is A Sad Season For The Poor” reads like a comical tale but this is a Cheever story, so expect a sombre turn before the end. WHAT HAPPENS IN CHRISTMAS IS A SAD SEASON FOR THE POOR An elevator operator complains of how lonely he is to all who enter his realm.…
Philip Richard Morris – Home, Sweet Home
PICTURE BOOK WORD COUNTS The new digital era may welcome variations in time, but for now the ‘correct’ word count is 400 and the ‘correct’ number of pages is 32. The ‘correct’ target age-range for a picture book is under three, three to six, or six to nine. You can tell a great story with [fewer] than 500…
In “Clancy in the Tower of Babel” (1953), Cheever dealt with homosexuality overtly for the first time. But his treatment is stereotypical; he portrays his homosexual characters as effeminate, hysterical, and tortured. glbtq It’s difficult to read the stories of John Cheever without taking what you know of the author’s life as a palimpsest for…
As outlined by Nodelman and Reimer in The Pleasures of Children’s Literature, here are the common-characteristics of best-selling modern children’s books. They are written and sold as part of a series. They have a simple and straightforward writing style. Central characters are enough like their intended audience for readers to relate to and identify with…
A sobering panel discussion on the gendered nature of book covers from earlier in 2015 can be found here at The Wheeler Center’s website. As was noted by someone on the panel, “It starts with children’s books.” Cover girls: How lipstick, bathing suits, and naked backs discredit women’s fiction from Boston Globe Sexy Backs and…
Story is the chronological order readers discover when they ask “what happened next”? Plot is the order readers experience when they pay attention to what happens next as they read. Plotting is what storytellers do when making decisions about how to unravel their story. Storytellers don’t tell the entire story. They pull out the…
I Want My Hat Back (2011) is one of a trilogy of books written and illustrated by Jon Klassen. The plots are not linked and the characters are different. But they all feature hats. The other two are This Is Not My Hat and We Found A Hat. Holly Storck-Post at SLJ recommends these Jon…