Skip to main content

On Books

 











Keith Gessen has a new parenting memoir--"Raising Raffi"--and of course I went right to the section on kids' books.


Gessen writes beautifully about Russell Hoban, who is maybe the greatest of the greats. Gessen admires Hoban for maintaining creative juice all through the Frances series: The concluding book, "Bargain for Frances," seems just as strong as the first entry, "Bedtime for Frances." Gessen admires Frances's crafty and patient parents, who endure Frances's hunger strike and "runaway phase," and who never seem to break a sweat. Gessen also admires Hoban's "lapidary style, somewhere between poetry and prose":

The little hand is at 7.
It is seven o'clock.
It is bedtime for Frances....

I really like Gessen's observations about Eric Carle. Carle spent part of his youth in America, but his German emigre parents were feeling homesick. The parents took Carle on a trip to Germany--then everyone was swept up in World War II. Carle was made to dig trenches on the western front. Carle's father was taken prisoner by the Soviets, and he was forced to do hard labor after the war "as a form of reparations."

All this explains Carle's "tin ear" for English, and also Carle's resolute refusal to discuss war in his books. (By contrast, Maurice Sendak *does* include allusions to World War II.)

Carle admired Matisse--and, on that note, I'm posting a ravishing hippo image and caterpillar image, next to some famous fish, herewith.....
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

How to Host a Baby

-You have assumed responsibility for a mewling, puking ball of life, a yellow-lab pup. He will spit his half-digested kibble all over your shoes, all over your hard-cover edition of Jennifer Haigh's novel  Faith . He will eat your tables, your chairs, your "I {Heart] Montessori" magnet, placed too low on the fridge. When you try to watch Bette Davis in  Hush Hush Sweet Charlotte , on your TV, your dog will bark through the murder-prologue, for no apparent reason. He will whimper through Lena Dunham's  Girls , such that you have to rewind several times to catch every nuance of Andrew Rannells's ad-libbing--and, still, you'll have a nagging suspicion you've missed something. Your dog will poop on the kitchen floor, in the hallway, between the tiny bars of his crate. He'll announce his wakefulness at 5 AM, 2 AM, or while you and another human are mid-coitus. All this, and you get outside, and it's: "Don't let him pee on my tulips!" When...
3 comments
Read more

Joshie

  When I was growing up, a class birthday involved Hostess cupcakes. Often, the cupcakes would come in a shoebox, so you could taste a leathery residue (during the party). Times change. You can't bring a treat into a public school, in 2024, because heaven knows what kind of allergies might lurk, in unseen corners, in the classroom. But Joshua's teacher will allow: a dance party, a pajama day, or a guest reader. I chose to bring a story for Joshua's birthday (observed), but I didn't think through the role that anxiety might play in this interaction. We talk, in this house, quite a bit about anxiety; one game-changer, for J, has been a daily list of activities, so that he knows exactly what to expect. He gets a look of profound satisfaction when he sees the agenda; it doesn't really matter what the specific events happen to be. It's just about knowing, "I can anticipate X, Y, and Z." Joshua struggled with his celebration. He wore his nervousness on his f...
2 comments
Read more

Josh at Five

 Joshie's project is "flexibility"; the goal is to see that a plan is just an idea, not a gospel, not a guarantee. This is difficult. Yesterday, we went to a restaurant--billed as "open," with unlocked doors--and the owner informed us of an "error in advertising." But Joshie couldn't accept the word "closed." He threw himself on the floor, then climbed on the furniture. I felt for the owner, until he nervously made a reference to "the glass windows." He imagined that my child might toss himself through a sealed window, like Mary Katherine Gallagher, or like Bruce Willis, in "Die Hard." Then--thank the Lord!--I was able to laugh. The thing that really has therapeutic value for Joshie is: a firetruck. If we are out in public, and he spots a parked truck, he wants to climb on each surface. He breathlessly alludes to the wheels, the door, the windows. If an actual fire station ("fire ocean," in Joshie's parla...
Post a Comment
Read more