Author & Illustrator: David Wiesner
Category: Caldecott Medal Award Book
When I selected this book, I thought I’d be reading a beautifully illustrated picture book about the traditional tale of the Three Little Pigs. The cover features a gorgeous close up drawing of the pigs faces, practically dripping with mischievousness. As the story began, I was struck by how ordinary the illustrations seemed. I began to wonder why in the world that this book had been awarded the Caldecott Medal. Then, just when the first little piggy is supposed to escape and run to stick house of the second little piggy, the wolf ate him…or so the story said. Actually, the wolf blew the pig out of the story and the illustration changed. Now the pig resembled those on the cover, with beautiful detail – almost lifelike. The wolf continued on until he blew all three pigs out of the story. Then the story pages began to turn sideways and curl and turn over – in the illustrations. The pigs decided to explore. One page featured the pigs taking a ride on a paper airplane, made from pages of the story. A beautiful two-page spread shows close-ups of the pigs’ faces against the stark contrast of the storybook page paper airplane. I’m not sure what the exact difference is between the two methods or media used in illustrating this page, but the difference is obvious. It clearly makes the point that the storybook looks a certain way and the pigs look different because they have essentially come to life. One two-page layout is actually completely white, with just a small illustration of the piggies’ tales from behind in the upper left corner of the first page. The next layout is nearly the same, except for an even smaller illustration of the pigs from above, about to land their paper airplane. They crash and then proceed to enter a very colorful nursery rhyme book. They find themselves right in the middle of “Hey Diddle Diddle”. I really like the illustrations that show the pigs halfway in and halfway out of the story. The part that’s in is illustrated in the same fashion as the story itself, while the part that’s outside is illustrated much differently – like the cover. The cat with the fiddle escapes from the story with the pigs. The threesome then frees a dragon, just before he is to be slain by a prince. They continue on walking through halls of pages and crumpled up sheets of paper. They unfold the page in which the wolf knocks on the last door & re-enter the story. The dragon sticks his head out the door to answer the wolf & knocks the wolf to the ground. Realizing the control they now have over the story, The pigs shake the letters loose from the story and make alphabet soup. In the end, the three pigs, the cat, and the dragon sit around the table and happily enjoy their soup. I have to be honest – I did not care for this book. I just found it to be odd and weird. I cannot imagine that I could engage my son in this book. Perhaps I feel this way because I like for things to follow a predictable pattern. This book certainly does NOT do that. It is wild and unreal, and I just didn’t like it. Wiesner also illustrated another Caldecott Medal book, the wordless picture book Tuesday. I’ve also looked at this book and found it strange as well. Wiesner is obviously a gifted illustrator; however, I just find the style used in these two books to be distracting. Many of his books feature fantasy – the improbable, the unimaginable. It reminds me a little of the outrageous illustrations in Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs, although Wiesner’s illustrations are much more colorful and vivid. While I have read some fractured fairy tales, this book is really in a category of its own because of the illustrations. I think his style is totally unique & cannot really compare it to others that are similar. I have definitely learned from this book that mixed media can be used to separate dimensions in a story. I’ve also learned that traditional stories can be re-told with a modern twist.
No comments:
Post a Comment