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Corduroy

 To me, Don Freeman's "Corduroy' is like another version of "Make Way for Ducklings."


Both stories have innocent creatures paving a way through this crazy world. McCloskey's ducklings chat with the plastic figurines on a swan boat, do battle with menacing bicycles, and pay little attention to the irritating vehicles that think they "own" the streets of Boston.

Freeman's Corduroy, a stuffed bear without a button, crazily decides that an escalator is a mountain, a furniture showroom is a palace, and a piece of a large roped-off bed is available for anyone's use. (Corduroy rips a button from the mattress and says, "This must be part of my overalls!")

Like McCloskey, Don Freeman has a gift for detail: the green overalls against a sea of red, the embrace between bear and girl-owner, the shelf of distressed, unwanted clowns, giraffes, plush rabbits.....

"Corduroy" is among the iconic books from the last one hundred years, and I can't get tired of it, and my son seems invested, too. I love that little bear.



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