The Snowy Day: Diversity and Honesty into the 21st Century

The Snowy Day: Diversity and Honesty into the 21st Century

Article 4

by Lyn Lacy

5000 words

In memory of Ezra Jack Keats (1916-1983) and Maurice Sendak (1928-2012) and for David Shannon (1959—), giants in children’s literature who have honestly shown us what little boys can be made of.

 

    In the first half of the 20th century, truthfulness about less-than-perfect children was swept under the rug in favor of a tidy Victorian portrayal of pleasant, well-behaved young ladies and gentleman. American parents preferred early British illustrators Kate Greenaway and Beatrix Potter and American illustrator Jesse Willcox Smith, all of whom presented sweet stories and pictures about little ones and baby animals.

    Just as rowdy behavior was frowned upon, so also was racial and ethnic diversity rarely evident. In fact, picture books perpetuated stereotypes of African-American as servants and Native American as “noble savages”, as in two Caldecott Medalists, They Were Strong and Good (1940) by Robert Lawson and The Rooster Crows (1945) by Maud and Miska Petersham. (The Petershams’ book was reprinted in 1987 without offensive illustration.) Even in the 1960s, an alligator in a headdress represented “I is for Indian” in Alligators All Around: An Alphabet (1962) by Maurice Sendak. 

    Such illustrations influenced each new batch of white American children that came along to view minorities in the same way their elders had, keeping alive into the 21st century an “us and them” mentality— such as the issue of “Indians” as sports mascots, even though Native people throughout the country protested for over seventy years and continue to demand the right to be treated with as much respect as their fellow citizens (Lacy, “’Indian’ Stereotypes in Children’s Picture Books,” Minneapolis Public Schools, 1986).  

    Important exceptions during this period were Hispanic children realistically portrayed by illustrators, such as Leo Politi in his Caldecott Honor Books, Pedro, the Angel of Olvera Street, (1946) and Juanita (1948) and 1950 Caldecott Medalist, Song of the Swallows (1949). Marie Hall Ets also contributed contemporary Hispanics in Gilberto and the Wind (1963) and in1960 Caldecott Medalist, Nine Days to Christmas (1959), written by Aurora Labistida. And Japanese children were sensitively portrayed by Taro Yashima in Caldecott Honor Books, Crow Boy (1955), Umbrella (1958) and Seashore Story (1967).

    However, two prolific young artists (who had been spending their early careers in New York illustrating other people’s texts) were both given a chance in the early 1960s to break free of tradition and illustrate their own stories. Each had a little boy, Peter and Max, who could not have been more different from each other in their adventures. The  book designs were also as different as they could be, but each illustrator in his own way guided the world of American picture books in a new direction.

    The two illustrators were Ezra Jack Keats (1916-1983) and Maurice Sendak (1928-2012). Keats received the 1963 Caldecott Medal for The Snowy Day (1962), and the next year Sendak was awarded the Medal for Where the Wild Things Are (1963),

    These titles signaled a new age for stories and pictures, and both authors/illustrators initially provoked criticism with their bold moves into areas not seen before. However, six decades later, proof that each artist has captured the hearts of the picture-book audience came with the news in 2020 that The Snowy Day is the most checked-out book in New York Public Library’s history, being checked out 485,583 times, and Where the Wild Things Are is fourth on the list, checked out 436,016 times. (NYTimes, 13 January 2020).

    Keats not only presented mixed-media as an introduction to collage for an exciting medium in picture-book art, but his Medalist was the first to portray an African-American child as the main character. “My hero would be a black child,” the artist said. “I made many sketches and studies of black children, so that Peter would not be a white kid colored brown.” Keats was also inspired by four photographs of a little black boy in the May 13, 1940, Life magazine that he had kept tacked to his studio wall for over twenty years. 

    As Andrea Davis Pinkney said in the author’s note for her “tapestry narrative,” A Poem for Peter (2016), illustrated by Lou Fancher and Steve Johnson, “As an African-American child growing up in the 1960s, at a time when I didn’t see others like me in children’s books, I was profoundly affected by the expressiveness of Keats’s illustrations…Interestingly, the ad copy and the text of the book never mention Peter’s race, which speaks to the story’s universal celebration of every child having fun.” 

    Unthinkable today, however, Keats faced criticism for The Snowy Day by the Council on Interracial Books for Children in the 1960s and early 1970s because its creator was a white man with “no right to fashion books about black characters, stealing money from legitimate African-American creators. But with nearly two million copies in print, The Snowy Day alone would confirm Keats’s place in the pantheon of great children’s book creators. To have made one of the two picture-book masterpieces of the early 1960s would be enough of a legacy. But by bringing multicultural publishing to the forefront of our consciousness, Keats has influenced children’s books for decades…The very success of The Snowy Day opened the door for…an extraordinarily talented group of African-American authors and illustrators who began their work in the 1960s and 1970s” and succeeding generations of African-American creators stand on “the shoulders of giants” like Keats (Anita Silvey, Introduction to Keats’s Neighborhood, Viking, 2002). 

    Meanwhile, Sendak had already pictured unruly little boys like bossy James who took all the crayons in Let’s Be Enemies by Janice May Udry (1961). The next year he wrote as well as illustrated Pierre (A Cautionary Tale), about a sassy boy who obstinately proclaimed about any and everything, “I don’t care!”  When Sendak published Where the Wild Things Are, the mischief-maker was Max – disobedient, defiant, dictatorial, destructive, and yes, homesick and despondent, but only toward the end.

    All the things parents and grandparents know to be true about kids—pouting, tears, exuberance, joy, love, glee—would now begin to be explored through children’s literature. As Sendak explained, “The great nineteenth-century fantasy that paints childhood as an eternally innocent paradise bores the eyeteeth out of children…What is too often overlooked is the fact that from their earliest years children live on familiar terms with disrupting emotions, that fear and anxiety are an intrinsic part of their everyday lives, that they continually cope with frustration as best they can…It seems a distortion, rather, to pretend to a child that his life is a never-ending ring-around-the-rosie.” 

    Fifty years since the two books were published have seen other Peters, Maxes and Maxines in marvelous picture books –including David Shannon’s “David” series– walk right in, sit right down and make themselves at home in our hearts. Thanks in large part to all that Sendak and Keats did, a flood of titles in the 21st-century bring diversity and honest approaches to children who are both naughty and nice, with incredibly innovative artwork and an abundance of people of color. Gentle suggestions for conversation starters are given an asterisk* at the beginning of the following reviews for titles that have the power to help children open up about their own feelings and behaviors.

2000  Shaun Tan (Australian, 1974-), Author and Illustrator.  The Red Tree, Vancouver: Simply Read Books, 32 pp, 9.5” x 12.5”

    *Depression, but with a little sign of hope

    A little girl has a room piled so high with worries that she runs away, only to have a sad journey outside with more troubles at every turn. The colors are very dark, but notice that Tan placed a bright red leaf on every page, like a cheerful promise of joy to come. The artist writes that he wants his art to “say something that is true to real life,” and that his wordless book “is inspired by the impulse of children and adults alike to describe feelings using metaphor - monsters, storms, sunshine, rainbows, and so on.” The Red Tree can be found in a collection, Lost & Found: Three (2011). In the author/illustrator’s Cicada (2019), an industrious bug never gets respect at work, and in Rules of Summer (2014), a little boy learns about arbitrary rules, his bossy brother, despair and hope.

2001  Jerry Pinkney (American, 1939-), Illustrator. Goin’ Someplace Special by Patricia C. McKissack, Atheneum, 40 pp, 8.6” x 11.5”

     *Life can be unfair, but you’re not alone

    “The girl squared her shoulders, walked to the back, and took a seat…Tricia Ann rides the bus to the library, her favorite special place, a place her grandmother calls ‘a doorway to freedom.’” The time for this story is before the civil rights movement when ‘Tricia Ann must sit in the back of the bus because she is African American, and her face reflects her pain, anger, and dignity as she wonders why life’s so unfair. Friends along the way remind her she's not alone in her frustration, and she returns quietly triumphant from her bittersweet journey downtown. An illustrator of over sixty books, Pinkney was awarded the 2010 Caldecott Medal for The Lion and the Mouse (2009) (see Article 5). 

2003  R. Gregory Christie (American, 1971-), Illustrator. Yesterday I Had the Blues by Jeron Ashford Frame, Random House, 32 pp, 8.9” x 11.4”

*Maybe you feel blue? Waiting for a sunny yellow day?

A boy talks about moods as colors of the rainbow – he’s got “the go away, Mr. Sun, quit smilin’ at me blues” while his sister’s got a joyful case of the ballet-dancing pinks. Christie says, “I guess we all have had our bad days from 2 years old and up. So perhaps people like the ability to listen to a small boy's seemingly tragic day, written and pictured in a very beautiful way?” He was awarded a 2017 Caldecott Honor Book for illustrations in Freedom in Congo Square (2016) written by Carole Boston Weatherford. 

2003  Mo Willems (American, 1968-), Author and Illustrator. Don’t Let The Pigeon Drive The Bus! Hyperion, 32pp, 8.8” x 8.8”

    *Begging for something (even when you know it’s not good for you!)

    With childishly simple line drawings, the stubborn and willful attitude of the very young comes through loud and clear with Pigeon. Just as a mother says no to a child, the bus driver forbids the pigeon to drive his bus, so Pigeon pouts, wheedles, cajoles and shouts that the audience must allow him to do what he isn’t supposed to do. He explains his cousin Herb drives a bus almost every day, he bribes with a promise of five bucks and he finally pleads that, after all, he has dreams too. Willems wrote about his 2004 Caldecott Honor Book, “Born in the margins of my notebook filled with potential picture book ideas, my doodles of Pigeon were complaining that his ideas were better than mine,” so he created seven more picture books about Pigeon.

2007  Mo Willems (American, 1968-), Author and Illustrator. Knuffle Bunny Too: A Case Of Mistaken Identity, Hyperion, 32pp, 8.8” x 8.8”

*Making a first best friend

Willems was awarded a 2008 Caldecott Honor Book for his second in a series about Knuffle Bunny, in which Trixie’s stuffed toy is accidentally taken home by a classmate before dad comes to the rescue yet again (and Trixie has found a friend). Starting in Willem’s 2005 Honor Book, Knuffle Bunny: A Cautionary Tale (see Article 5), parents and grandparents have recognized such toddler behaviors as a “boneless” meltdown when they see one. Dad’s frustration grows when he simply can not understand Trixie’s baby talk, but he finds the toy and saves the day. The series continued with Knuffle Bunny Free: An Unexpected Diversion (2010).

2008  Chris Raschka (American, 1959-), Illustrator. Sourpuss and Sweetie Pie by Norton Juster, Di Capua, 32pp, 10.5” x 11.5”

    *“You’re not my mama!” never gets you anywhere

    “NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO I WON’T DO IT! NEVER NEVER NEVER NEVER I’M NOT LISTENING WHO CARES YOU CAN’T MAKE ME I WILL NOT COOPERATE! NO GO AWAY!” All the vignettes of Sourpuss show her as a strong-willed little tyrant until she finally curls up with exhaustion and whimpers, “I don’t like you anymore.” With love from her patient Nanna and Poppy, she can go quickly from Sourpuss to Sweetie Pie. Juster and Raschka had teamed up earlier about Poppy and Nanna with their granddaughter for the 2006 Caldecott winner, The Hello, Goodbye Window (2005). Raschka also wrote and illustrated Everyone Can Learn to Ride a Bicycle (2013), in which a father and daughter face her challenge together.

2008 Uri Shulevitz (American, 1935-), Author and Illustrator. How I Learned Geography, Farrar Straus Giroux, 32pp, 10.3” x 10.3”

*Sometimes grownups can be right—more than we even imagined

As a child, Shulevitz survived the Warsaw blitz of 1939 and fled with his parents to Turkestan, where the family lived in poverty. He tells a story in his 2009 Caldecott Honor Book about how furious he was with his father who brought home a map instead of bread from the marketplace. He thought he would never forgive him, and his despair is eloquently shown by his huddled figure beneath a blanket. After studying the map, however, and spending enchanted hours being “transported far away without ever leaving our room,” he did forgive his father and admit, “He was right, after all.” 

The dark and somber palette changes to vibrant explosions of color as he imagines flying high overhead exotic landscapes, reminiscent of the hero’s flight in the illustrator’s 1969 Caldecott Medalist The Fool of the World and the Flying Ship (1968). The contented boyish smile on sandy beaches and in shady fruit groves conveys all the joy young Shulevitz found “far from our hunger and misery.” Among forty books, another picture book was about the illustrator’s childhood, When I Wore My Sailor Suit (2009), and he received two more Honor Book awards for The Treasure (1979) and Snow (1999).

2011 Javaka Steptoe (American,–), Illustrator. What's Special About Me, Mama? by Kristina Evans, Jump At the Sun, 32 pp, 10.4” x 8.4”

*What would we do without those we love?

A mother and child’s back-and-forth conversation about what makes the boy special to her is warmly intimate in Steptoe’s textured-paper collages, which are perfect backgrounds for the mother’s large, brightly-colored hand-lettered responses. The illustrator’s bold paper collages also excel in Hot Day on Abbott Avenue (2019) by Karen English, in which best friends Kishi and Renée each wait for the other to apologize after a breakup, even though they’re bored without each other’s friendship. Steptoe was awarded the 2017 Caldecott Medal for his biography, Radiant Child: The Story of Young Artist Jean-Michel Basquiat (2016), the young graffiti artist who overcame family hardships to ultimately achieve world-wide fame for his paintings (see Article 5). He also illustrated In Daddy’s Arms I Am Tall: African Americans Celebrating Fathers (2013) by Folami Abiade and a dozen other authors.

2012 David Ezra Stein (American,–), Author and Illustrator. Interrupting Chicken, Candlewick, 40 pp, 8.7” x 10.6” 

*Maybe someone’s begging for attention?

  An irrepressible kid who just can’t resist interrupting a story is well known to anyone who has read aloud to one. Stein’s mixed-media illustrations in his 2013 Caldecott Honor Book engage the reader in moments both funny and sweet as Little Chicken and her exasperated father enjoy story time, each in their own ways. Stein’s sequel is Interrupting Chicken and the Elephant of Surprise (2018), and he illustrated The Worm Family Has Its Picture Taken (2021) by Jennifer Frank, in which a young worm learns to be proud of her family. 

2013  Courtney Pippin-Mathur (American, 1976-), Author and Illustrator. Maya Was Grumpy, Brooklyn: Flashlight Press, 32 pp, 10.2” x 10.2”

*There’s just something about grandmas

Pippin-Mathur writes about Maya’s hair getting bigger and wilder as she gets grumpier, ”My daughter was three years old and stomping around the living room with her curls bouncing to show everyone just how grumpy she felt. I thought how funny it would be to have a little girl's hair grow as her mood got worse. I added a grandma because my grandmother was the only person who could ever jostle me out of my crispy, cranky, grouchy moods.” To calm Maya down, Grandma suggests a trip to the park, where all the wild things Maya had emulated in her grouchy mood are found to be playground equipment. Pippin-Mathur published Dragons Rule, Princesses Drool! In 2017.

2015 Molly Bang (American, -), Author and Illustrator. When Sophie’s Feelings Are Really, Really Hurt, Blue Sky Press, 40 pp, 8.9”xX10.2”

*“If they don’t get it, that’s their problem, not mine,” said every artist ever

Sophie paints a picture of her favorite tree, but it looks sad being gray. So she paints it a vibrant blue with an orange sky behind it to make the tree look happy. She is hurt and begins to question her choices when classmates laugh at her colorful, expressive painting and tell her it’s wrong because it’s different. The class looks at all of the trees painted by classmates and realize that every tree is different, there isn't a wrong way to do art and they should enjoy expressing themselves. This is a sequel to 2000 Caldecott Honor Book, When Sophie Gets Angry—Really Really Angry (1999), in which Bang floods her pages with red and orange in a demonstration of how ugly anger can be (see Article 5). She published another book about Sophie, When Sophie Thinks She Can’t…(2018).

2016 Raul Nieto Guridi (Spanish–), Illustrator. The Day I Became a Bird, by Ingrid Chabbert, Kids Can Press, 40pp, 8.4” x 11”

*Making new friends means finding out what they like

First love looks pretty familiar when a boy is in love with the girl who sits in front of him at school, but she has no time for the likes of him. Sylvia in only interested in birds, so in order to attract her attention, he builds a fantastic bird costume, shown in delicate pen-and-ink drawings. Wearing it makes him feel handsome even though classmates make fun of it, until the day arrives when Sylvia finally sees him. The author-illustrator team also published The Last Tree (2017) and A Drop of the Sea (2018).

2017 Michael Emberley (American–), Illustrator. Priscilla Gorilla by Barbara Bottner, Atheneum, 40pp, 8” x 10.5”

*Going with the flow

Priscilla is another little girl who is single-minded in her obsession, this time with gorillas, and she wears her gorilla pajamas everywhere, even when it is picture day at school. After being “invited” to sit in the “Thinking Corner” after a clash of wills with her teacher and getting some help from her parents in understanding that gorillas can also be cooperative, she sort of apologizes. A field trip to the zoo results in a spontaneous, four-page gorilla dance similar to the exuberance in Sendak’s “wild rumpus” scenes. 

2018 Jessica Love (American–), Author and Illustrator. Julián Is a Mermaid, Candlewick, 40 pp, 9.4” x 10.3”

*Doing things differently is absolutely, perfectly, categorically ok

A little boy on a train with his grandmother sees ladies dressed up as mermaids (going to a party? an audition?), and when he gets home he creates his own fabulous mermaid costume—a curtain for a tail and fronds from a potted fern for a headdress. But what will his abuela think of him dressed up as female? All children should be as supported as this happy little boy whose grandmother loves him just as he is and wants him to be himself. Love continued the story of Julián and his abuela, this time with cousin Marisol, in Julián at the Wedding (2020).

2018 Matthew Cordell (American–), Author and Illustrator. King Alice, Macmillan, 40pp, 8.7” X 11.3”

*Hey, Dad, you got a super duper “IDEA!” 

On a snowy indoor day, bossy Alice decides to write a book about herself as King Alice the First. (When pressed by her father, she insists she is not Queen, but he gets to be Princess Dad and mother and baby will be royal brave knights). As the family goes along with the scenario, Cordell captures perfectly the way kids talk when they’re pretending—“This is some delicious tea!” and “I’m so, so, so, so, so sorry I bonked you with my unicorn, Daddy.” Cordell illustrated in pen and ink, colored pencil and watercolor again in his 2018 Caldecott Medalist Wolf in the Snow (2017) with a stunning new departure for the shape of a child in a red coat (see Article 5), similar to Keats in The Snowy Day (1962). Cordell also illustrated Special Delivery (2015) by Philip C. Stead and The Knowing Book by Rebecca Kai Dotlich, whose text urges readers to take risks by exploring the world.

2018 Pamela Zagarenski (American,–), Illustrator. Zola’s Elephant by Randall de Sève, Houghton Mifflin, 40pp, 9” x 11”

*Jumping to conclusions can result in “Uh oh.” 

A shy little girl figures that a new neighbor Zola will not want to be her friend because she has a friend already—surely it’s an elephant, which is the only thing possible in the enormous box being moved into Zola’s new home. Zagarenski’s colorful, digital and mixed-media illustrations portray all the chummy adventures Zola must be having with her elephant, until the reality of Zola’s own loneliness is shown and the little girl next door is brave enough to make her acquaintance. Zagarenki has been awarded two Caldecott Honor Books, Red Sings from Treetops: A Year in Colors (2009), written by Joyce Sidman and Sleep Like a Tiger (2012), written by Mary Logue (see Article 5). She also illustrated What the Heart Knows: Chants, Charms, and Blessings (2013), a collection of poems by Sidman that “provides comfort, courage and humor at difficult or daunting moments in life” for ages 12 and up.

2018 David Shannon (American,– ), Author and Illustrator. Grow Up, David!, Blue Sky Press, 32pp, 8.5” x 11”

*Long Love the Kings of Mayhem—David and Max!

As the fifth in his David Books series, Shannon continues in precise detail all the ways little David can cause trouble, this time by pestering his big brother. The first in the series, 1999 Caldecott Honor Book, No, David! (1998), introduced the irrepressible little boy as obvious heir apparent to Max, Sendak’s mischief-maker “of one kind and another.” Shannon has said, “A few years ago, my mother sent me a book I made when I was a little boy. The text consisted entirely of the words ‘no’ and ‘David’ – they were the only words I knew how to spell – and it was illustrated with drawings of David doing all sorts of things he wasn’t supposed to do.” 

Shannon wants his illustrations to look like a kid drew them. He draws round heads and nubby teeth just like he did when he was five years old. He has a child’s viewpoint by showing adults from the waist down and went on to create a series also for babies about this rowdy “21st-century Max.” Shannon’s other books portray spot-on understandings about  children’s sensibilities, as in Alice the Fairy (2004), A Bad Case of Stripes (2004) and Too Many Toys (2008).  

2019 Rudy Gutierrez (American,–), Illustrator. Double Bass Blues by Andrea J. Loney, Knopf, 32pp, 10.2” x 10.4”

*Teasing, taunting and tormenting can’t stop you

In this 2020 Caldecott Honor Book, Nic is a little boy struggling to haul his double bass home from school while he is teased by the other boys, pelted by the rain and tormented on the bus by grownups for taking up too much room. Determined, resolute and resilient, Nic makes the journey to his granddaddy’s jam session and improvises a jazz solo using all the street sounds he has heard along the way (see Article 5).

2019 Vashti Harrison (American, –), Illustrator. Sulwe, by Lupita Nyong’o, Simon and Schuster, 48pp, 9” x 11.4” 

*Black Is Beautiful

A little girl born the color of midnight (and whose name means “star” in the Kenyan language) is teased by her schoolmates and tormented emotionally because she is not lighter-skinned like the rest of her family. Mama comforts her after she tries everything from erasers to diet to makeup to prayer for her skin to be lighter. A shooting star brings magic into her room to celebrate Night and Day, “the dark and beautiful, bright and strong.” Harrison also illustrated Hair Love (2019) by Matthew A. Cherry, a true-to-life depiction of a loving father and his independent little daughter, and How to Become a Fairy Handbook (2021) by Gill Guggenheim, Brooke Vitale, et al., in which Princess Emunah learns that fairies are known for good acts like generosity and forgiveness. 

2019 Oge Mora (American,–), Author and Illustrator. Saturday, Little Brown, 40pp, 10.4” x 10.5”

*A special person makes a special day

Ava’s mother works six days a week, so when Saturday rolls around the two of them cherish their time together. When everything goes wrong to ruin their trip, Mom has a meltdown and needs her loving daughter to remind her that just being together is the part of Saturday that makes it special. Mora’s radiant, warm and mellow cut-paper collages create each character’s sweet face, just as they did when strangers arrived at the door for Omu’s stew in her 2019 Honor Book, Thank You, Omu! (see Article 5). 

2019 OHora, Zachariah (American, –), Illustrator. Who Wet My Pants? by Bob Shea, Little Brown, 40pp., 8.8”x11.2”

*With friends there to help, things aren’t too bad

Reuben the bear is the familiar kid in a family or class at school who angrily blames everyone else when something goes wrong. When that plaintive strategy does not work, he claims the awful thing causing the problem was broken to begin with and thus, the “accident” is no one’s fault after all. So it is when Reuben wets himself, he gets away without accepting any responsibility and spends the rest of the day without wearing the offensive “leaky broken pants.”  His buddies are empathetic in ways that suggest they’ve found themselves in a similar situation, and they field Reuben’s accusations with such comforting words as, “It could happen to anyone.”  OHora wrote and illustrated Fuzzy, Inside and Out: A Story About Small Acts of Kindness and Big Hair (2021).

2019 Sydney Smith (Canadian,–), Author and Illustrator. Small in the City, Neal Porter Books, 40 pp., 7.3”x11.3”

*Feeling anxious, but then maybe things aren’t so scary after all

When you are little, bustling city streets with their crowds, towering buildings and traffic on a cold winter’s day can be scary. People rush past and don’t see you, loud noises startle and confuse you, and not knowing what to do next, which way to go or who to ask are big worries for a small person. Smith’s book is a quiet monologue by one little boy on the courage needed by the very young to overcome their fears and strike out into the big, loud world to discover all that is out there. He illustrated I Talk Like a River (2020) by Jordan Scott, “a book for any child who feels lost, lonely, or unable to fit in.”

2020 Margaret Chodos-Irvine (American,–), Illustrator. Where Lily Isn’t, written by Julie Paschkis, Henry Holt, 32pp, 9.3” x 11.2”

*Sadness with sweet memories

All the little things that make a girl love a small, brown dog named Lily change to all the things no longer done by Lily after she is gone. The descriptions and illustrations communicate the girl’s sadness while also showing her acceptance and loving memories for one she has lost. Chodos-Irvine is author and illustrator of the 2004 Caldecott Honor Book, Ella Sarah Gets Dressed (2003), in which the five-year-old defies her family’s suggestions that she wear something other than mismatched clothes (see Article 5). Their objections only bring about pouting, stomping and throwing a toy, three scenes with delightfully recognizable postures and gestures, matched only by a double page spread of charming vignettes showing how a little girl dresses herself. After Ella Sarah gets dressed, her friends arrive for a tea party, each sporting—of course—his/her own five-year-old fashion sense Chodos-Irvine also illustrated Best Best Friends (2006), in which jealousy threatened a friendship. 

2020 Molly Idle (American,–), Illustrator. We Believe in You, written by Beth Ferry, Roaring Brook Press, 32pp, 10.3” x 10.34” 

*Believing in yourself

For this poetic text, Idle creates warm, honest illustrations that inspire children to do what they can do best, even if that is just being themselves. Lingering on pictures that show others in activities that are funny and fun validate that even the youngest or smallest or shortest or plumpest can live up to who they are. Messages are many: affirmation of our own uniqueness does not mean we can not rejoice in others’ achievements; families may value different things, so bringing everyone together encourages a sense of how diverse communities are; and everyone faces many of the same challenges. See also Idle’s 2014 Honor Book Flora and the Flamingo (2013) in Article 5.

Ordering Bibliography

Bang, Molly. When Sophie’s Feelings Are Really, Really Hurt, 2015, Blue Sky Press 

Bottner, Barbara. Priscilla Gorilla illustrated by Michael Emberley, 2017, Atheneum 

Chabbert, Ingrid. The Day I Became a Bird, illustrated by Raul Nieto Guridi, 2016, Kids Can Press

Cordell, Matthew. King Alice, 2018, Mcmillan 

de Sève, Randall. Zola’s Elephant illustrated by Pamela Zagarenski, 2018, Houghton Mifflin

Evans, Kristina. What's Special About Me, Mama? Illustrated by Javaka Steptoe, 2011, Little Brown

Frame, Jeron Ashford. Yesterday I Had the Blues, illustrated by R. Gregory Christie, 2003, Random House  

Juster, Norton. Sourpuss and Sweetie Pie illustrated by Chris Raschka, 2008, Di Capua 

Loney, Andrea J. Double Bass Blues illustrated by Rudy Gutierrez, 2019, Knopf 

Love, Jessica. Julián Is a Mermaid, 2018, Candlewick 

McKissack, Patricia C. Goin’ Someplace Special, illustrated by Jerry Pinkney, 2001, Atheneum

Mora, Oge. Saturday, 2019, Little Brown

Nyong’o, Lupita. Sulwe, illustrated by Vashti Harrison, 2019, Simon and Schuster 

Paschkis, Julie. Where Lily Isn’t, illustrated by Margaret Chodos-Irvine, 2020, Henry Holt 

Pippin-Mathur, Courtney. Maya Was Grumpy, 2013, Flashlight Press

Shannon, David. Grow Up, David!, 2018, Blue Sky Press

Shea, Bob. Who Wet My Pants? illustrated by Zachariah OHora, 2019, Little Brown

Shulevitz, Uri. How I Learned Geography, 2008, Farrar 

Smith, Sydney. Small in the City, 2019, Neal Porter Books

Stein, David Ezra. Interrupting Chicken, 2012, Candlewick 

Tan, Shaun. The Red Tree, 2000, Vancouver: Simply Read Books 

Willems, Mo. Don’t Let The Pigeon Drive The Bus! 2003, Hyperion

Willems, Mo. Knuffle Bunny: A Cautionary Tale, 2004, Hyperion

 

Coping with the Pandemic: C-PTSD, Children and Picture Books

Article 3

by Lyn Lacy

1500 words

Photo by Bryan Goodwin, posted on Facebook May 6, 2021

A story enriches us by giving a glimpse into someone else’s life— the good or bad, triumph or hardship, joy or sadness. A story is also a non-threatening path that can lead to insight about one’s own emotions, environment, life itself. If this were not true, stories would not have lasted through the ages. 

Of the many ways adults help children adapt and thrive, sharing stories can help them both work toward a better awareness of themselves and their relationships. For stories to heal is a value of a well-told tale, an aspect that cannot be approached frivolously or by chance. How-to or so-called bibliotherapeutic books with strategies for improving behaviors or attitudes certainly have their place in child development. However, stories are better. A good story paired with thoughtful art is even better yet, for everybody likes pictures, and many children are visual learners.

Enter—the picture book.

Since the Covid-19 pandemic began, picture books can be especially important for parents, grandparents, caregivers and teachers who can use them in thoughtful ways to guide children in trying to understand their situation. During the crisis, children’s lives have been turned upside down as they sheltered at home, separated from friends, teachers and classroom routines. Schools sat empty while some 55.1 million K-12 students had to make the dramatic adjustment to learn from home and deal with loss of basic freedoms and loss of a sense of community they get from attending school. Not only do children share the adults’ concern about everyone’s physical health, but they also deal with adverse effects on their own emotional, social and intellectual well-being.

“Let’s face it: Right now, everyone who has been stuck at home—whether a kid or an adult—has been experiencing a lot of emotions. One minute you might have felt terrified by the latest news; the next, you might have been ready to scream if you had to be around your little sister for one more second. Admit what you are feeling. This is hard. This stinks. I don’t like this. Life during a global virus outbreak does that to you.” (Daisy Yumas, “So, How Are You Feeling?, NYT, 26 April 2020) As early as April, 2020, child welfare agencies were noting, “Our concern is children for whom school was a safe space are now perhaps in environments where they really don’t have a lot of leverage to move or go outside or leave…That means many children are suffering in silence” (Amy Beth Hanson, The Associated Press, 19 April 2020). 

Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is an anxiety disorder that results from a traumatic event, such as a natural disaster or car accident. Another psychological disorder is called Complex post-traumatic stress disorder (C-PTSD; also known as developmental trauma disorder) that can develop in response to an adverse, prolonged experience, rather than a single event. C-PTSD can especially develop in children when they have been deprived of normalcy by a disruption in their lives over which they have no control or chance of resolution. (“What is Complex PTSD?” by Matthew Tull, PhD, verywellhealth.com, 30 March 2020). 

This concern has grown about how children manage to cope during the pandemic and how, when they return to school, they will have to make yet another drastic adjustment with different teachers, classmates, even little things like seat assignments. ”While kids are resilient, they’re not make of stone…Ongoing stress can be traumatic…In fact, nearly any event can be considered traumatic to a child if it happened unexpectedly, it happened repeatedly and the child was unprepared for it…or watched a loved one suffer….It’s also important to remember that it doesn’t mean he’ll automatically be traumatized…and the vast majority return to normal. (However,) between 3 and 15 percent of girls and 1 to 6 percent of boys develop C-PTSD following a traumatic event.” (“Treating the Effects of Childhood Trauma,” by Amy Morin, LCSW, verywellhealth.com, 24 Feb 2020)

Having a condition like C-PTSD can be isolating for youngsters, because they do not understand or know how to articulate what has been going on. Once they return to school and perhaps for a long time afterward, they may have different identities from those they had before the pandemic. They may even exhibit certain symptoms and behavioral characteristics of C-PTSD, such as:

Anxiety, depression, sadness

Lack of self-control, inability to express needs and wants

Impulsive behavior, irritability, aggression, anger

Isolated, trouble with relationships, lack of empathy

Low self-esteem, loss of interest, feeling hopeless

Lack of concentration, memory, decision-making

Fear for safety, lack of trust, feeling helpless 

Medical problems, sleeplessness

 (“Treating the Effects of Childhood Trauma,” by Amy Morin, LCSW, verywellhealth.com, 24 Feb 2020)

Characters in picture books act out some of the same behaviors at home, at daycare or at school. They throw temper tantrums. They get the blues. They feel lost. Sharing these books offer children the opportunity to look and listen for ways a character copes. A sensitive approach while reading aloud gives an adult the opportunity to call attention to a key point or have conversations about the character and situation in the story. Simply asking may be enough—“Have you ever felt like this character?”, “Have you ever been in such a situation?” or “Has anyone you know ever acted like this?”

This is not to presume that the authors and illustrators intended any such underlying messages when they created their books. This is also not to suggest these exquisitely-crafted picture books are like bibliotherapeutic titles. Gentle messages, however, may be on their pages if one only looks and listens. 

This is also not to say other helpful messages are to be found in these extraordinary picture books. Calling attention to joy and success over adversity brings out the power of a picture book to provide children with comfort during bad times. Finally, this is not to suggest such messages are obtrusive in the storytelling experience. A conversation should not interrupt the narrative, but key points may be saved as a focus for conversation after the book is closed.

Conversation starters may be something like these:

Has someone in the community helped you or your family?”

What do we have that we can share with others?

What is something to do when you feel bad?

Who is special in your life?

What was a good thing to do when you could not go to school?

What gives you sweet dreams?

What can you do that makes your family proud?

How can you make a special new friend?

When you regret something, what can you do?

Can you think of a way to make good things out of bad?

What is a way to get over anger or disappointment? 

Have you ever gotten frustrated when you cannot explain what you want?

What can you do when you don’t understand?

Exemplary 21st century picture books such as those below can help children understand and articulate what has been happening in their lives. These picture books are reviewed in Article 4, with a gentle conversation starter noted by an asterisk*. They offer a unique attempt to help children cope, such as a story about an obstacle overcome, a fortuitous turn of events, a lighthearted surprise or an example of strength and hope. 

Now more than ever children are looking for validation, reassurement, comfort, honesty, positivity, security and hope (“What is Complex PTSD?” by Matthew Tull, PhD, verywellhealth.com, 30 March 2020). For children today with C-PTSD, the hope is they may come away from sharing their feelings with belief in a brighter future and all the good that life can bring.

"Go easy on yourself. You're doing great. This is just really hard." Thank you, Bryan.

                                    Titles reviewed in Article 4:

Bang, Molly. When Sophie’s Feelings Are Really, Really Hurt, 2015, Blue Sky Press 

Bottner, Barbara. Priscilla Gorilla illustrated by Michael Emberley, 2017, Atheneum 

Chabbert, Ingrid. The Day I Became a Bird, illustrated by Raul Nieto Guridi, 2016, Kids Can Press

Cordell, Matthew. King Alice, 2018, Mcmillan 

de Sève, Randall. Zola’s Elephant illustrated by Pamela Zagarenski, 2018, Houghton Mifflin

Evans, Kristina. What's Special About Me, Mama? Illustrated by Javaka Steptoe, 2011, Little Brown

Frame, Jeron Ashford. Yesterday I Had the Blues, illustrated by R. Gregory Christie, 2003, Random House  

Juster, Norton. Sourpuss and Sweetie Pie illustrated by Chris Raschka, 2008, Di Capua 

Loney, Andrea J. Double Bass Blues illustrated by Rudy Gutierrez, 2019, Knopf 

Love, Jessica. Julián Is a Mermaid, 2018, Candlewick 

McKissack, Patricia C. Goin’ Someplace Special, illustrated by Jerry Pinkney, 2001, Atheneum

Mora, Oge. Saturday, 2019, Little Brown

Nyong’o, Lupita. Sulwe, illustrated by Vashti Harrison, 2019, Simon and Schuster 

Paschkis, Julie. Where Lily Isn’t, illustrated by Margaret Chodos-Irvine, 2020, Henry Holt 

Pippin-Mathur, Courtney. Maya Was Grumpy, 2013, Flashlight Press

Shannon, David. Grow Up, David!, 2018, Blue Sky Press

Shea, Bob. Who Wet My Pants? illustrated by Zachariah OHora, 2019, Little Brown

Shulevitz, Uri. How I Learned Geography, 2008, Farrar 

Smith, Sydney. Small in the City, 2019, Neal Porter Books

Stein, David Ezra. Interrupting Chicken, 2012, Candlewick 

Tan, Shaun. The Red Tree, 2000, Vancouver: Simply Read Books 

Willems, Mo. Don’t Let The Pigeon Drive The Bus! 2003, Hyperion

Willems, Mo. Knuffle Bunny: A Cautionary Tale, 2004, Hyperion

The Night Before Christmas: Santa Claus into the 21st Century

 Article 2

by Lyn Lacy

5300 words

For Bruce Whatley, for revealing the startled man behind Santa’s cool façade—and the struggle the frantic reindeer had getting onto that roof.

America’s Santa Claus is magic. He may be pictured as an elf or as a full-grown man. His coat is red, green, brown or even black. Best of all, Santa can be of any race—all he has to do is lay his finger aside of his nose. He was first described almost two hundred years ago in “A Visit from Saint Nicholas, or ‘Twas The Night Before Christmas”, a poem of 56 lines that have been called “some of the best-known verses ever written by an American.” The poem has been published in hundreds of editions, anthologies and parodies, has been visually interpreted more often than any other text and was the text for one of the first children’s books published in America to be illustrated in color.

The poem was first printed publicly on December 23, 1823, in the Troy Sentinel of New York anonymously and without illustrations. For the holiday in 1830, the Sentinel attached a woodcut by Myron King (n.d.) as the first illustration for the poem. 

In 1838 Clement Clarke Moore (1779-1863), was cited as the poet, but he did not begrudgingly admit it until 1844. Some historians say that Moore—a well-known New York scholar of Hebrew and Greek—considered a sweet holiday tribute written for children as too frivolous to have been written by a pious man of the cloth. 

A debate about whether Moore was indeed the author was examined by Don Foster in Author Unknown: On the Trail of Anonymous (Holt, 2000), in which he used, among other things, textual analysis of the anapestic verse to insist that the poem was written by Major Henry Livingston, Jr. (1748-1828) of Poughkeepsie, New York, seventy miles up the Hudson River from New York City. Livingston’s children remembered their father reading the very same poem to them as his own as early as 1807. Livingston himself never claimed authorship, but his descendent Mary S. Van Deusen (n.d.) published the poem under his name in 2016, illustrated by various illustrators of the 19th century.

The question of authorship has been as fascinating as the idea of where Santa Claus came from in the first place. Of all the world’s traditions and folklore surrounding generous gift-givers, the Netherland’s Sinterklass or Sint-Nicolass had the most direct influence on the poem. Both Moore and Livingston would have been aware of the Dutch culture in New York that had existed since the 17th century, when the Nederlanders settled the southern tip of Manhattan Island and called it New Amsterdam. The Dutch brought with them their tradition of a benevolent old gentleman with long white hair and beard who rode either in a horse-drawn wagon or mounted on the white horse itself to deliver gifts in good children’s shoes. Only the name “Sinterklass” (which became “Santa Claus”) and names for two of the reindeer—“Dunder” (thunder) and “Blixem” (lightning)—would attach themselves to The Night Before Christmas.

And both Moore and Livingston would have been familiar with their fellow New Yorker, Washington Irving (1783–1859), who wrote a gentle lampoon of the “hard-headed, hard-handed, stout-hearted” Dutch settlers in his novel A History of New-York from the Beginning of the World to the End of the Dutch Dynasty (1809). Irving wrote, “the good St. Nicholas would often make his appearance in his beloved city, of a holiday afternoon, riding jollily among the treetops, or over the roofs of the houses, now and then drawing forth magnificent presents from his breeches pockets, and dropping them down the chimneys of his favorites…he never shows us the light of his countenance, nor ever visits us, save one night in the year…confining his presents merely to the children.” 

Irving also created a character Oloffe “The Dreamer” Van Kortlandt who had a dream in which he recognized “the good St. Nicholas…by his broad hat and his long pipe, which smoke ascended into the air and spread like a cloud overhead…And when St. Nicholas had smoked his pipe, he twisted it in his hat-band, and laying his finger beside his nose, gave the astonished Van Kortlandt a very significant look, then mounting his wagon he returned over the tree-tops and disappeared.”

The first illustrated book of the poem was a little 16-page chapbook in 1848 with eight wood engravings of a high-stepping Santa dressed as a Dutchman in frock coat, vest and knickers by Theodore Chauncy Boyd (1830-c1899). 

Following that was an even slimmer 10-page edition in 1862 illustrated by the prestigious illustrator, Felix Octavius Carr Darley (1822-1888). Darley had earlier illustrated Irving’s “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow” and “Rip Van Winkle,” and the artist explained that for “A Visit from Saint Nicholas” he used Irving’s description of Saint Nick as an American Dutchman—“plump, short fur-lined coat, black boots and pipe.” Some other early versions were published with no credit given to the illustrator and are today known as the “Charles Graham” edition of 1870 or the “McLoughlin Bros” edition of 1888.

 

Thomas Nast (1840-1902), a famous political cartoonist for Harper’s Weekly, was the first to picture Santa Claus as a rotund little elf in a red fur suit, based on the artist’s German tradition of Sankt Nikolaus. In 1890, Nast published Thomas Nast's Christmas Drawings for the Human Race, which had a few illustrations for select lines from the poem. Haddon Sundblom (1899-1976), in advertisements for Coca-Cola from 1931 to 1964, pictured Santa as a full-grown human—always holding a bottle of Coke but never drinking it and never with a pipe—who is recognized around the world today. Although neither Nast nor Sundblom illustrated a picture book of the full text from The Night Before Christmas, much credit is due them both for their contributions to an American Santa.

 

The first half of the 20th century had editions of the poem by famous artists, all of whom remained true to their traditional styles, such as those by William Wallace Denslow (1856-1915) in 1902, Jessie Willcox Smith (1863-1935) in 1912, Margaret Evans Price (1888-1973) in 1917, A. E. Kennedy (1883-1963) in 1918, Frances Brundage (1854–1937) in 1927 and Arthur Rackham (1867-1939) in 1931.

Other illustrators were Keith Ward (n.d.) in 1934, Fern Bisel Peat (1893-1971) in 1936, Berta Hader (1890-1976) and Elmer Hader (1889-1973) in 1937, Thelma Gooch (b.1895-) in 1937, Grandma Moses (1860-1961) in 1948 (see below), Leonard Weisgard (1916-2000) in 1949, Eleanora Madsen (n.d.) in 1949 and Corinne Malvern (1901-1956) also in 1949.

The second half of the 20th century offered a flood of classics by well-known picture book illustrators, some of whom exhibited an almost reverential attitude toward the famous poem. Settings were customary scenes of moonlit winter nights and cozy interiors, such as those by Gustaf Tenggren (1896-1970) in 1951, Roger Duvoisin (1900-1980) in 1954, Gyo Fujikawa (1908-1998) in 1961, Douglas Gorsline (1913-1985) and in 1975, Tomie dePaola (1934-). Additional illustrators were Anita Lobel (1934-) in 1984, Tien Ho (n.d.) in 1986, John Steven Gurney (n.d.) in 1989, Greg Hildebrandt (1939-) in 1990 and Cheryl Harness (n.d.) also in 1990, Mike Artell (n.d.) in 1994, Ted Rand (1916-) in 1995, Christian Birmingham (n.d.) also in 1995. Private and small press editions of the poem were works of art illustrated by Valenti Angelo (1897-1982) in 1937, John dePol (1913-2004) in 1957 and Emily Wentworth (n.d.) in 1988.

However, more than half a dozen illustrators in the 1980s and 1990s presented new details for characters, plot or composition. For example, Rene Cloke (1905-1995) in 1980 pictured a slew of fairies that helped Santa (who knew he had fairies?). A worthy mechanical edition of The Night Before Christmas from this period was by Michael Hague (1948-) in 1981. A coloring book by John O’Brien (n.d.) in 1981 showed 12 kids, 30 stockings and a twinkle-toed, elfin Santa reminiscent of ones by Nast and Denslow. 

James Marshall (1942-1992) in 1985 pictured Santa in cowboy boots, raiding the family’s fridge and posing for a photo with the family’s bulldogs, cats and chickens. Scott Gustafson (n.d.) in 1985 had an awe-inspiring view from very high above of Santa arriving in his sleigh and devoted an illustration that lingers on the narrator coming down the dark stairway, heightening the anticipation of seeing Santa himself in the living room. James Rice (1934-2004) in 1989 depicted very homely, exhausted reindeer and a houseful of mice that were already living it up before a bespectacled, hard-working Santa came along with elves to be the mice’s dance partners. 

William Cone (n.d.) in 1992 presented a fun point of view from a solemn Santa looking into the chimney. For the stanza “To the top of the porch! to the top of the wall!” Julie Downing (n.d.) in 1994 showed reindeer in the foreground headed right off the double-page spread. Jan Brett (1949-) in 1998 had two of Santa’s elves doing all the work while Santa himself was barely in the pictures at all. Tasha Tudor (1915-2008) changed a portrayal of Santa from a traditional “peddler” in her 1962 and 1975 editions to a glowing, goblin-like elf in 1999. 

Continuing into the 21st century, many beautiful editions with a traditional approach have been published by illustrators such as Caroline Pedler (n.d.) in 2001, Mary Engelbreit (1952-) in 2002, Tom Browning (n.d.) in 2009, Lesley Smith (n.d.) in 2010, Christopher Wormell (1955-) also in 2010, Charles Santore (1935-) in 2011, Angela Barrett (n.d.) in 2012 and Antonio Javier Caparo (n.d.) in 2017. Will Moses (n.d.) in 2006 lavished his edition with familial details that firmly anchor the story in a sense of place, as his great-grandmother had done over half a century before.

As handsome as these holiday books are, they are not in keeping with the focus here on exciting innovations regarding characters, plot or composition. Also excluded from this study are parodies, re-writes for select audiences, editions with animals as characters, miniatures and uses of photography or novelty media such as clay models or stitchery. Others not surveyed are editions in which the text has been edited. The only acceptable edits here are two common changes – one for the title, in which The Night Before Christmas has supplanted the poem’s original longer title, and one for the last line, in which “Happy Christmas” has become “Merry Christmas.” 

The following illustrators have been faithful to the text itself, whether their visual interpretations are contemporary, classical, comical or surreal. Some of the artists are award-winners for their other picture books, and those from outside the U.S. are proof that America’s Santa now belongs to the world.

1999 Bruce Whatley (Australian, 1954-), Illustrator. The Night Before Christmas. New York: HarperCollins

For the last Christmas of the 20th century, Bruce Whatley ushered in a truly bold new age of innovative 21st-century illustrations. The first double page spread was from the viewpoint of the mouse’s nest on a shelf high above the living room. Then, his reindeer exploded off the pages for the couplet, “To the top of the porch! to the top of the wall!” This was followed by two more spreads depicting the continuing tumultuous action as the animals stampeded into our space beyond the picture frame, truly in a panicked frenzy that demands our involvement. The illustrator’s attention to the stanza about “dry leaves that before a wild hurricane fly” resulted in the reindeer rolling their eyes, tangling up with the leaves and bugling frantically. 

Most artists before and since have ignored this stanza altogether as irrelevant to the story or perhaps as too awkward and troublesome to illustrate. Whatley pictured the reindeers’ arrival in a way no one had done before, and his superb sequence of four double-page spreads was as exciting to see as Chris Van Allsburg’s (1949-) single-page rhino scene in Jumanji in 1981 and Maurice Sendak’s (1928-2012) three “wild rumpus” double spreads in Where the Wild Things Are in 1963.

Whatley also gave endearing, larger-than-life facial expressions to Santa and the father, including their surprise at first seeing each other. He included a plot twist by having the jolly old elf give the father a nostalgic little present of his own. Plus, as Santa flew away, the reindeer once again burst off the page right into our laps. In 2004, HarperFestival released a board book of Whatley’s 1999 edition.    

2002  Robert Sabuda (American, 1965-), Illustrator and paper engineer. The Night Before Christmas Pop-up, New York: Little Simon, 12 pp, 8”x8”

A master paper engineer like Sabuda has elevated the pop-up book to a work of art with the power to entice and educate in the razzle-dazzle of a high-tech age. Sabuda’s mechanical edition enhanced the magical theme of Santa Claus and the poem itself when, for instance, paper performance showed Santa going down the chimney, then back up again. From the beginning stanza, when the mouse’s head turned as the clock strikes midnight, the special mechanical features acted out the story, advancing an understanding of it rather than simply amusing or intriguing the audience. Sugarplums on wheels encircled the children’s heads and a pull-the-flap propelled Santa above the town in this remarkable tour de force. 

2002  Matt Tavares (American, 1975-), Illustrator. 'Twas the Night Before Christmas: Account of a Visit from St. Nicholas, Cambridge, MA: Candlewick Press, 32 pp, 10”x11.6”

Among all the pitched rooftops in Boston, Santa and his reindeer landed on a particular one -- the beautiful 1804 Nichols House in Beacon Hill. The setting inside the townhouse had old-fashioned furniture, Christmas tree and toys drawn in pencil to create monochromatic scenes from a time gone by. Such close observation can be doubly rewarding when you learn online that the illustrator photographed real-life models for his characters, a sleigh, a papier-mâché reindeer, a Christmas tree with 19th century ornaments and The Nichols House Museum. The book has very few solid black lines or solid white spaces but exhibits a gradation of shades of grey, affecting the softer tones of moonlight and candlelight at nighttime.

Adding to the illustrator, Tavares created unforgettable facial expressions for three characters. First was a lovely young girl, whose model was the artist’s cousin Susan, sleeping with one arm over a dolly to keep it from falling out of bed. Next was the father, modeled by author friend M. T. Anderson, who turned with eyes wide in wonder as he hears from above the “prancing and pawing of each little hoof.” Last of the frozen moments in time showed Santa -- whose model was a Santa’s helper named Art Usher -- with a priceless expression of shock when he realizes he’s being watched, not only by the father but also by us. This Santa was in the old tradition of a 19th-century Dutch gentleman of New York, dressed in a long coat with fur collar, and the startled look on the good sir’s face pulled at our hearts as you realized he’s just as vulnerable as we mortals. Long after you’ve closed the book, the three sweet faces stayed with you. Tavares has illustrated other Christmas books, such as The Gingerbread Pirates (2009) by Kristen Kladstrup, Red and Lulu (2017), and Dasher (2019). 

2005  Lisbeth Zwerger (Austrian, 1954-), Illustrator. The Night Before Christmas, New York: Penguin, 40 pp, 9.5”x11.6”

Zwerger ‘s remarkable double page watercolor showed Santa in his sleigh as a wee gentleman in a red coat and tall headgear with a St. Nicholas’s hooked staff. He had a few tiny elves in a wooden sleigh with toys pulled along behind it by delicate threads. Inside a handsome, austere four-story townhouse, the enchantment continued as the mouse is shown sleeping in his striped pajamas while upstairs six children rested their heads on one enormous pillow and a portly father sprang from his bed with amusing agility. 

These visual details came before the main event itself, which was the most magical of all. Using only five poses, Zwerger illustrated Santa going straight to work, filling small stockings with large toys, bringing in a stack of books, pulling the Christmas tree out of his bag, climbing up the tree to decorate it with little dolls and finally, smiling in farewell. The smile from this whimsical little man – along with his wispy “hat hair” after taking off his headgear – made this edition an impossible one to put down. Zwerger’s remarkable imagination over many years has graced children’s classics, fairy tales and folklore from around the world.

2006  Gennady Spirin (American, 1948-), Illustrator. The Night Before Christmas, Tarrytown, NY: Marshall Cavendish, 32 pp, 8”x10”

A small book with small type and only ten small watercolor illustrations, Spirin’s edition was a lap book begging for close attention. The moon cast long shadows in the snow as Santa, in his handsomely-carved sleigh pulled by bejeweled reindeer, glided up to the rooftop in the only double-page spread, putting on a show for a beautiful boy gazing out the window with pure joy. The child raced his cats downstairs to watch with eyes aglow as the Russian-born illustrator’s huge Santa broke into a jig in heavy boots. The jolly giant was having the time of his life with toys held high, and his exuberance was infectious. This small book with a not-so-elfin Santa offered a whopper of a gift – the unadulterated, feel-good happiness of Christmas Eve. Spirin has illustrated several other Christmas books, as well as folklore and fairy tales.

2006  Richard Jesse Watson (American, n.d.), Illustrator. The Night Before Christmas, New York: HarperCollins, 40 pp, 10”x10”

A chat between Watson and St. Nick at the end of this edition answered the question: How does Santa deliver “so much to so many all in one night?” For one thing, according to Watson, Santa is a “reindeer whisperer” who’s developed a special feed concoction that “stimulates their ability to move very fast,” and he’s also got a super-duper rocket for a sleigh that’s tricked out by the Far North Airline “to expand the moment between ‘tick’ and ‘tock’ on Christmas Eve.” Santa as aviator wore vintage goggles and flight cap, and his rocket’s cockpit had such controls as a Geese Alert, Fast-Faster-Zoom switches and a hot drink machine that offered Tea, Hot Chocolate, Wassail, Espresso, Milk or Borsht. 

To study for his illustrations, Watson made a papier-mâché model of the rocket, which was featured along with the illustrator’s family, friends and a big dog Alfred, all of whom posed for characters. The reindeer invited the audience into the book while they flew past and by the father who reached off the page when he sprang from his bed. No one, young or old, could resist such invitations to join in the fun, certainly not the diverse group of elves (or rather, Watson’s own family and friends). He has also illustrated Biblical verses and fairy tales and wrote and illustrated The Magic Rabbit (2005). 

2007  Niroot Puttapipat (Thai, n.d.), Illustrator. The Night Before Christmas: A Magical Cut-Paper Edition, Cambridge, MA: Candlewick Press, 24 pp, 9”x10”

The black-on-white elegance of silhouettes appeals to children when a bit of color attracts the eye and when something’s going on in the pictures. Add to that a turn-the-flap page, ingenious cutouts and a graceful pop-up, and you satisfy many youngsters’ need to manipulate things in mechanicals or moveable books. Once mechanics have been dissected to see what makes them work, the artistry of a single double page spread where nothing much happens makes its impact. This book’s masterful illustration was an exquisite, perfectly balanced portrait of a regal Santa simply filling a stocking, and the pose showed that the illustrator was a master of the picture-book craft of placement for elements either side of the gutter.

Natee -- as the illustrator prefers to be called -- now lives in London and expresses a strong artistic influence from, among other things, the “Golden Age” of illustrators, known for their delicate, precise characters and settings from the Victorian and Edwardian eras, just like those seen in illustrations here. The illustrator has added editions of Jingle Bells (2015) and The Nutcracker (2016) to a Christmas collection of pop-ups.

2009  Rachel Isadora (American, 1953-), Illustrator. The Night Before Christmas, New York: Penguin, 32 pp, 10”x10”

In the first double page spread, a bright orange sun sets while snow began to fall over an African village. In the next spread, the sky and land changed to darkness as night came and the light snow covered all. As in other editions where Santa does not arrive from the sky, this sleigh glided on the ground outside the window before the reindeer flew “up to the housetop.” The whole family greeted the hearty, robust Santa who looked eager to dance, not an unusual attitude for Isadora since she danced professionally and her art often reflects her love for it. Richly textured cut paper with patterns and paint formed everything in her collages to stunning effect, especially the gaily-dressed dolls and colorful toy animals left for the children. Isadora was awarded the 1992 Caldecott Honor Book for Ben’s Trumpet (1991) and has had published almost two dozen other picture books in the 21st century, the latest being Do I Have to Wear a Coat? (2020). 

2010  Robert Ingpen (Australian, 1936-), Illustrator. The Night Before Christmas, New York: Sterling, 48 pp, 9”x10.5”

Ingpen’s wrinkled and weather-beaten elf who fell calamitously down the chimney was the sootiest, grimiest Santa by far. He looked like one of those good-hearted rascals recognized the world over, and he instantly recovered from his inglorious descent with benevolent but mischievous charm. As Whatley did in his edition discussed above, Ingpen also devoted several double-page spreads to Santa’s reindeer, including an illustration for the problematic “dry leaves” stanza. The house was a stolid, imposing edifice set down in isolated ranchland far from town, and from nearby woods the reindeer ran onto the lawn, pulling Santa across the snow in a low-frame wooden sledge. Only after several pages did they “mount to the sky” and land on the roof. Ingpen’s several Illustrated Classics published by Sterling include his latest, Just So Stories (2018).

2010  Eric Puybaret (French, n.d.), Illustrator. The Night Before Christmas, Watertown, MA: Charlesbridge, 26 pp, 12”x10.8”

An edition by Puybaret began in the endpapers, done in colorful acrylics, bold and fanciful, with before and after scenes of Santa’s elves (one of them wearing sneakers) at his North Pole workshop. Then on the title page, a sweet smiling Santa himself welcomed us to his favorite night of the year. Soon, gliding down gracefully from the sky were eight identical, dignified reindeer as delicate as ceramic figurines in flowing capes and top hats. They escorted the red-robed Santa, who was much like a little porcelain doll, benign and unpretentious, with gorgeous beard, mustache and pointed cap. A lovely fairy witnesses the gift-giving inside the house, which has a décor as child-friendly and toy-like as a toddler’s first dollhouse. Puybaret has illustrated a series of classic children’s songs, complete with audio CD, as well as the story used for the ballet, The Nutcracker (2016), retold by John Cech.

2013  Zdenko Basic (Croatian, n.d.) and Manuel Sumberac (Croatian, n.d.), Illustrators. The Night Before Christmas, London: Hodder, 32 pp, 11”x 11”

Tiny tubby toddlers marched across endpapers in hooded onesies, carrying snacks, gifts and a stuffed bear. Basic and Sumberac are digital artists and animators with a history of art in the steampunk movement. Landing on the rooftop was a tangle of elegant, spider-like reindeer, with Santa and his truly humungous burlap bag of toys. Santa himself was a gigantic balloon of a fellow with round steampunk eyeglasses, wee mittened hands sprouting from a bulbous red coat and a dozen helmeted elves scurrying around to do all the work.  On every wall of this tilted old funhouse were framed pictures of the toddlers but none of grown-ups. No parents witnessed the craziness of this nighttime visitor -- just a threadbare toy bear sitting in an easy chair. Basic has illustrated a series of Steampunk Classics, featuring works by Dickens, Poe, H. G. Wells and Mary Shelley.

2013  Christine Brallier (American, n.d.), Illustrator. The Night Before Christmas, St. Paul, MN: Brownian Bee Press, 32 pp, 8.8”x10.8”

Mosaics are a difficult medium for the creation of facial expressions -- not just for human faces but certainly for a jubilant, bugling reindeer or a decidedly suspicious cat. However, in Brallier’s stained-glass edition were not only subtle expressions for Santa and the father who crept downstairs but also for a couple of reindeer and more than a dozen exquisite poses of the artist’s own cat.  In fact, the cat itself might well have been the narrator, since the lovely creature obviously has “nothing to dread” when Santa approached on bended knee, then gently picked it up for a cuddle. One could almost hear the cat purring.

2013  Holly Hobbie (American, 1944-), Illustrator. The Night Before Christmas, New York: Little Brown, 40 pp, 11.5”x9.5”

Every adult knows a child who can’t get back to sleep once awakened. On the cover of Hobbie’s edition, the sleepless one was a toddler squished in bed with three older kids and a cat. This little one was a real treat with thumb in its mouth, trailing a favorite blanket down the hall and too young to talk, therefore unable to divulge a secret. The baby went down the stairs on its bottom, into the living room to hide behind a chair while a magical little man in a red coat and suspenders entertained the cat. Dad came too but was unnoticed hiding in the hallway, or the silent scene would be interrupted. As the little man left up the chimney, the baby waved goodbye and all’s well, so back to bed, eyes wide with the wonder of it all.  Here were unadorned, uncluttered Hobbie watercolor paintings of the purest and simplest kind – perfect innocence. Among her many picture books since the early 1970s, Hobbie has illustrated another 21st century holiday title, I’ll Be Home for Christmas (2001).

2015 David Ercolini (American, n.d.), Illustrator. The Night Before Christmas, New York: Scholastic, 32 pp, 10”x12”

If future archeologists unearth a house such as the one in this edition they might figure they’d found the American 21st-Century “Taj Mahal of Tacky.” Every Christmas decoration imaginable by digital-artist Ercolini was found here, inside the house and out, from Santa slippers and a red-nosed-reindeer nightlight to a stupendous inflatable Santa on the roof that was twice the size of the jolly old elf himself when he landed with his maps, megaphone, whistle and reindeer fitted out with costumes, carrots and cameras. Santa relaxed awhile to enjoy the smorgasbord of cakes, pudding, cookies, donuts and cupcakes and listen to family pets’ Christmas lists and play with their toys before he was surprised by Father, got quickly to work and finally scurried up the chimney with soot puffing out all around. That Ercolini sure knew how to throw a party. He did so again in the hilarious It’s a Moose! (2020) by Meg Rosoff.

2017  Charles Santore (American, 1935-), Illustrator. The Night Before Christmas or, A Visit from St. Nicholas Coloring Book, Kennebunkport, ME, Cider Mill Press, 48 pp, 11”x10.5”

In Santore’s traditional 2011 picture book, Santa was the only vividly colorful figure in otherwise dark illustrations. “The luster of midday” in outdoor scenes was missing as well as any light inside the house, except for a candle that Santa used to light his pipe. However, for would-be artists who might choose to lighten up the visuals, an opportunity became available in 2017 when pencil drawings of Santore’s original illustrations were published in a coloring book. The original double page illustrations were skillfully cropped to single-page line drawings in order to focus solely on the action. As adult coloring books became increasingly more popular, Santore’s was certainly one for serious hobbyists to create their own versions for family heirlooms. Coloring books have been issued for several other titles in his series called Classic Edition. 

2020 Loren Long (American,), Illustrator. The Night Before Christmas, Harper

The charm of Long’s edition was the depiction of different kinds of families of diverse ethnicities residing in different types of homes, each group preparing for Santa’s visit — a trio of redheads in a farmhouse, a boy and girl in a trailer home, two boys in a downtown apartment and a girl in an island bungalow with palm trees outside the window. Fathers appeared at windows of three homes, and a mother took his place in the last. Santa, sleigh and reindeer were diminutive as exactly described in the poem, so the illustrator’s choices of settings and characters were the pleasant details not seen before that lend much toward reaching a wider audience of a variety of families. If only Santa would have magically put his finger aside his nose and become as diverse as the families he visits.

   

Note: Some of this information was included in the exhibition “The Night Before Christmas into the 21st Century” at the Museum of Arts and Sciences, Daytona Beach, Florida, 6 December 2018 – 21 January 2019, Ruth Grim, Curator, with Lyn Lacy, Guest Curator.

Ordering Bibliography

Basic, Zdenko and Manuel Sumberac,,Illustrators. The Night Before Christmas, London: Hodder, 2013, ISBN-10: 1444902423, ISBN-13: 978-1444902426

Brallier, Christine, Illustrator. The Night Before Christmas, St. Paul, MN: Brownian Bee Press, 2013, ISBN-10: 0978968824, ISBN-13: 978-0978968823

Ercolini, David, Illustrator. The Night Before Christmas, New York: Scholastic, 2015, ISBN-10: 0545391121, ISBN-13: 978-0545391122

Hobbie, Holly, Illustrator. The Night Before Christmas, New York: Little Brown, 2013, ISBN-10: 0316070181, ISBN-13: 978-0316070188

Ingpen, Robert, Illustrator. The Night Before Christmas, New York: Sterling, 2010, ISBN-10: 1402781822, ISBN-13: 978-1-4027-8182-7

Isadora, Rachel, Illustrator. The Night Before Christmas, New York: Penguin, 2009, ASIN: B00EB0HX8C

Long, Loren, Illustrator. The Night Before Christmas, Harper, 2020

Puttapipat, Niroot, Illustrator. The Night Before Christmas: A Magical Cut-Paper Edition, Cambridge, MA: Candlewick Press, 2007, ISBN-10: 0763634697, ISBN-13: 978-0763634698

Puybaret, Eric, Illustrator. The Night Before Christmas, Watertown, MA: Charlesbridge, 2010, ISBN-10: 1936140063, ISBN-13: 978-1936140060

Sabuda, Robert, Illustrator and paper engineer. The Night Before Christmas Pop-up, New York: Little Simon, 2002, ISBN-10: 0689838999, ISBN-13: 978-1403715821

Santore, Charles, Illustrator. The Night Before Christmas or, A Visit from St. Nicholas Coloring Book, Kennebunkport, ME, Cider Mill Press, 2017, ISBN-10: 1604336838, ISBN-13: 978-1604336832

Spirin, Gennady, Illustrator. The Night Before Christmas, Tarrytown, NY: Marshall Cavendish, 2006, ASIN: B00ERNS05I

Tavares, Matt, Illustrator. 'Twas the Night Before Christmas: Account of a Visit from St. Nicholas, Cambridge, MA: Candlewick Press,2002, ISBN-10: 0763631183, ISBN-13: 978-0763631185

Watson, Richard Jesse, Illustrator. The Night Before Christmas, New York: HarperCollins, 2006, ISBN-10: 0060757426, ISBN-13: 978-0060757427

Whatley, Bruce, Illustrator. The Night Before Christmas. New York: HarperCollins, 1999, ISBN-10: 0060266082, ISBN-13: 978-0060266080

Zwerger, Lisbeth, Illustrator. The Night Before Christmas, New York: Penguin, 2005, ISBN-10: 9888240889, ISBN-13: 978-9888240883