• Abstract and Figures
• Public Full-text

7KH$QQRWDWHG&DW8QGHUWKH+DWVRI6HXVVDQG+LV&DWV UHYLHZ 0HJDQ/DPEHUW &KLOGUHQ V/LWHUDWXUH$VVRFLDWLRQ4XDUWHUO\9ROXPH1XPEHU6XPPHU SS 5HYLHZ 3XEOLVKHGE\-RKQV+RSNLQV8QLYHUVLW\3UHVV '2,FKT )RUDGGLWLRQDOLQIRUPDWLRQDERXWWKLVDUWLFOH KWWSVPXVHMKXHGXDUWLFOH Access provided by Simmons College (1 Aug 2016 19:16 GMT) no matter how well-versed the authors reductive. Although Bradford’s inten- may be in the cultures about which tion is to examine how children’s texts they are writing. She points out, for in- represent indigeneity, her examples stance, that some of Paul Goble’s most provide models for reading all chil- highly acclaimed retellings of Lakota dren’s texts by, about, or referencing narratives draw on sources written by cultures marginalized in the United ethnographers who filtered what they States. Her opening example of Lynne heard through their own Eurocentric Cheney’s America: A Patriotic Primer worldviews. In fact, she asserts—and alone is practically worth the price of here she draws on the Canadian writer the book. Thomas King for corroboration—the past as subject matter is virtually lost Susan Stan is a professor in the English to the Native writer in North America, Department at Central Michigan University, where she teaches courses in multicultural having been told so often and so au- and international children’s literature. thoritatively by the dominant culture that it is no longer open to reconstruc- tion. The response, she quotes King as saying, is for Native writers “to use the The Annotated Cat: Under the Hats of Seuss Native present as a way to resurrect a and His Cats. Introduction and Annotations by native past and to imagine a Native Philip Nel. New York: Random House, 2007. future” (104). The field of multicultural literature Reviewed by Megan Lambert criticism in America has been mired for a while in questions such as what There is a certain appropriate air of makes a work culturally authentic scholarly mischief in the undertaking and who is entitled to write about of an annotated version of Theodor what. These and other questions Seuss Geisel’s two groundbreaking revolve around cultural authenticity beginning reader books about the and are too often framed in binary Cat in the Hat, which seem at first form: authors as cultural insiders blush to be surprising candidates for or outsiders; cultural appropriation annotation. After all, annotated books vs. cultural consciousness; aesthetic are designed to provide interpretive truths vs. cultural truths. An infusion context by creating layers of back of new tools is needed to take the story, analysis, and expansion around discussion beyond authenticity of the the central text, and the central texts in texts themselves and into the greater this case, The Cat in the Hat and The realm of how the texts represent stated Cat in the Hat Comes Back, are ones and unstated ideologies in America. designed with controlled vocabulary, These tools are what Bradford offers brevity, and accessibility as their defin- in Unsettling Narratives. It is an ambi- ing elements. One might ask, “What is tious book, grounded in the theories there to annotate?” By pursuing this of postcolonial studies and filled with somewhat surprising project, Nel po- examples of close textual readings and sitions himself as a maverick worthy analyses that are nuanced rather than of the subversive feline object of his Book Reviews 213 study as he responds with “a variety of Fairy, First Class—a masculine contexts in which we might interpret Tinker Bell with a five o’clock the books—biographical, historical, shadow—tells SNAFU at the end of the “Gripes” episode (July 1943), political, cultural, formal, aesthetic “The moral, SNAFU, is the harder and others” (17). you woik, the sooner we’re gonna What is there to annotate? Plenty. beat Hitler, that joik.” This sentence To paraphrase another Seuss classic: has the same meterical emphasis Nel can annotate here. Nel can anno- as “‘You should not be here / When our mother is not. / You get out of tate there. Nel can annotate anywhere. this house!’/ Said the fish in the Acknowledging the interdependent pot.” The presence of these anapests nature of art and text in the begin- suggests that in writing the SNAFU ning reader form, Nel appropriately cartoons, Seuss developed skills he attends to the Cat books’ illustrations would use in writing the Beginner Books series. In a sense, Private and words in his work and thereby SNAFU is an uncle (or father) of provides insight into Geisel’s creative the 236-word The Cat in the Hat process as both a writer and illustrator. (54). Ultimately, Geisel’s spare, controlled texts get an exhaustive, line-by-line Ultimately, the book’s greatest strength analysis, though at times the anno- is its wealth of visual material, which tations read as mere rephrasing of includes process pieces alongside the Seuss texts. Happily, Nel usually finished art and ample connec- moves well beyond this to provide tions to Geisel’s illustration work in engaging insights and expansions on advertising and in his other books. the stories, and the notes frequently (There is even a depiction of the delve into the realm of adaptation aforementioned Technical Fairy, First studies as Nel analyzes how the Class, complete with his five o’clock original beginning reader texts were shadow.) This allows the reader molded into scripts for stage, film, insight into Geisel’s broader life as and animated productions. In a note an artist who worked and reworked reflecting on an opposite progression, his compositions in order to achieve Nel draws a connection between the their comic brilliance and whose work controlled vocabulary Geisel used in outside of the children’s book world his beginning reader books and the shows remarkable connections with work he developed while employed work within this realm. by the U.S. Army’s Information and For example, Nel refers the reader Education Division, during which to Charles Cohen’s suggestion that he created educational films about a the Wild Tones from Seuss’s 1937 character named Private SNAFU, who advertisements for Stromberg-Carl- taught troops by negative example. son radios might be antecedents for Nel writes: the Things in The Cat in the Hat. Nel quotes Cohen’s assessment that the Since many U.S. troops were not Wild Tones “`bear a bushy resemblance well educated or even literate, these to the equally untamable’ Things One cartoons had to get their message and Two” and continues, “Just as the across in plain English. As Technical 214 Children’s Literature Association Quarterly Wild Tones ‘made such a ruckus and establishing the beginning reader ruined radio broadcasts,’ so Thing One book as an emerging form in the field. and Thing Two ‘wreaked havoc on an After years of not-so-much-fun with entire household’”(80). The reader Dick and Jane, The Cat and the Hat is treated to a small reproduction of offered children learning to read some the advertisement featuring the Wild “good fun that is funny” (35). Nel Tones, positioned on the verso page has expanded on this fun by bringing across from a recto page reproduction the Cat in the Hat, and by extension, of the double spread on pages 50–51 the beginning reader form, to the of The Cat in the Hat depicting Thing annotated table. This is an exciting One and Thing Two (80–81). The move because it both signals both visible resemblance between the Wild greater attention to illustration in Tones and the Things is apparent, but critical studies of children’s literature a compositional similarity is clear as and acts as part of a broader push to well: the large net hoisted aloft by the acknowledge and study the beginning boy narrator of The Cat in the Hat reader form as a distinct area of the mirrors the uplifted arm and balled fist field. On the latter point, children’s of the Wild Tone in the advertisement. literature studies, librarianship, and Nel does not comment on this connec- education are still playing catch up tion, but viewers can make their own with beginning readers as a form, and visual interpretation of the images due the emergence of the Geisel Award to their thoughtful juxtaposition. makes the time ripe to defining exactly Nel’s annotated work arrives in what distinguishes a beginning reader the fiftieth anniversary year of The from a picture book and how these Cat in the Hat’s publication and at differences might inform how these a time when the easy reader form is books are used, critiqued, and studied. garnering new critical attention. The Nel’s latest, focused work is a valuable American Library Association’s new contribution to this broader area of Theodor Seuss Geisel Award is inquiry. On the former point, with Nel’s careful attention to illustration given annually beginning in 2006 to coming on the heels of earlier anno- the author(s) and illustrator(s) of tated illustrated novels such as The the most distinguished contribution to the body of American children’s Annotated Charlotte’s Web and The literature known as beginning reader Annotated Alice, I wonder how long it books published in the United States will be before annotated picture books during the preceding year. The start to emerge as well. award is to recognize the author(s) and illustrator(s) of a beginning Megan Lambert is an instructor of Children’s reader book who demonstrate Literature Programs at the Eric Carle great creativity and imagination Museum of Picture Book Art and has in his/her/their literary and artistic served as a visiting lecturer in children’s achievements to engage children in literature at several colleges and universities reading.

Load more

  4

Copy Link