The Important Books: Children's Picture Books as Art and Literature - Softcover

Stanton, Joseph

9780810851764: The Important Books: Children's Picture Books as Art and Literature

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0810851768 ISBN 13: 9780810851764

Publisher: Scarecrow Press, 2005

The Important Books takes a look at some of the most significant and talked about authors, illustrators, and titles in the genre, including Maurice Sendak, Margaret Wise Brown, William Joyce, and Chris Van Allsburg. While focusing on those books that are distinguished by some degree of originality in both word and image, the author points out that the importance of picture books is not primarily pedagogical-they are not intended to serve as "dumbed down" versions of young adult or adult novels-and the audience for these great books is not solely children. Because the children's picture book is designed to provide the context for an intimate transaction involving the imaginations of both parent and child, there is a social value to the form that lends a special poignancy to the pleasure it provides.

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Review:

Recommended - secondary purchase. Better suited for college courses.--Betsy Ruffin, Cleburne ISD

This brief but thoughtful book contains essays about the following picture book authors: Margaret Wise Brown, Arnold Lobel, Barbara Cooney, Maurice Sendak, William Joyce, and Chris Van Allsburg.--Children's Literature Association Quarterly

The author's free-ranging ability to discuss both text and pictures illuminates the genre's underpinnings.--School Library Journal (05/01/2006)

In the six insightful essays comprising this collection, Endicott contributor Joseph Stanton looks at the field of children's picture book and argues convincingly that the best examples of the form can, and should, be valued as works of fine art and literature.--Endicott Scuttlebutt

Although one might expect to find lists of 'best' books in this slim volume, in fact it consists of six critical essays on distinguished children's picture books and their authors. These books are viewed as works of art, and as such, Stanton asserts that the pictures do not function primarily as pedagogical tools, that words and pictures 'reverberate in each other's company in surprising ways, ' and that the books appeal to adults as well as to children. Some of the authors whose works are discussed are Margaret Wise Brown, William Joyce, Arnold Lobel, Maurice Sendak, and Chris Van Allsberg. An example of thorough scholarship, replete with accurate references and essential explanatory notes, this study should benefit teachers, librarians, and students of children's literature.-- (01/01/2006)

Thoughtful and illuminating...Stanton's collection of essays is solidly reasoned and cogently argued. I also found it a good explanation as to why children's picture books hold so much fascination for adults.--Green Man Review

Stanton reminds us of the influence of our first encounters with children's books and also their influence on the other half of their audience, namely the parents, teachers, librarians and other grown-ups who select them. He takes a decidedly grown-up approach to describing a series of those important books, including those by Margaret Wise Brown, Arnold Lobel, Hall and Cooney, Maurice Sendak, William Joyce and Chris Van Allsburg, analyzing their themes, their relationships with themselves in terms of the interrelationships of their art and narratives, and their effect on children's perceptions of the very real and very imagined world about them.--Reference and Research Book News

Synopsis:

Stanton reminds us of the influence of our first encounters with children's books and also their influence on the other half of their audience, namely the parents, teachers, librarians and other grown-ups who select them. He takes a decidedly grown-up approach to describing a series of those important books, including those by Margaret Wise Brown,

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