The Tale of Peter Rabbit

The Bibliography
Potter, Beatrix. 2001. The Tale of Peter Rabbit. Ill. by Michael Hague. New York: SeaStar Books. ISBN 1587170523

The Plot
Mrs. Rabbit goes to market one morning and leaves explicit instructions for her little rabbit children, Flopsy, Mopsy, Cotton-tail and Peter, to stay away from Mr. McGregor's garden, lest they be made into rabbit pie like their dear old father. Of course, Peter goes straight there and gets into trouble. Mr. McGregor catches him wandering through the garden and chases him through the cabbages, the potatoes, the gooseberries and finally into the toolshed. Unfortunatley, during this little escapade, Peter loses his shoes and his fancy jacket. Looking for the gate so he can go home, he comes across a mouse and a cat, but neither help him find his way out. He finally spots the gate, but it's right behind Mr. McGregor! Peter sneaks around and escapes under the gate just as Mr. McGregor spots him again. Since he's so tired from his brush with rabbit pie, Peter collapses as soon as he gets back home. Mrs. Rabbit puts him in bed with a spoonful of camomile tea while his sisters enjoy a delicious meal of bread, milk and blackberries. Poor, poor Peter should have listened to his mother.

The Analysis
The artwork for this book was made with pen and ink, watercolor and colored pencils and it creeps me out. The colors are rich and beautiful and some of the illustrations don't freak me out, but some of them definitely do. The page where Peter rushes all over the garden and loses his shoes is perhaps the creepiest of all. It should almost be called Peter Rabid instead of Peter Rabbit.... Anyway, other than the sometimes eerie illustrations, this tale of a badly behaved bunny teaches us all a lesson - to listen to our elders and always follow directions! Children may not understand all the words, such as the sparrows "who flew to [Peter] in great excitement, and implored him to exert himself," but they'd get the idea that the sparrows came to help Peter when he was in trouble by looking the illustrations, and that's what good illustrators do... even though I didn't like the illustrations, I can appreciate the richness of them.

The Review
Kathy Broderick (Booklist, Jul. 1, 2001 (Vol. 97, No. 21))
As he has done before, Hague lends his own style to a classic title in the canon of children's literature. Enlarging the original size of Potter's book and decreasing the length to standard picture-book size, he brings the famous story to a new audience. The flow of text and turn of the page has been changed substantially, but Peter is larger in these pictures, and the colors of his world much brighter. Hague adds details that don't appear in Potter's illustrations--a bright red door on the tree house, the inside of the baker's shop, the "large pea" in the old mouse's mouth. There's also more of Mr. McGregor's garden, his house, and the wood beyond. There are fewer illustrations in Hague's version, but his double-page spreads flesh out Potter's world (as the video adaptations of her stories do, as well). This format is certainly better suited to storytimes, and the text, with one exception, is faithful to the original: the white cat is now black, and the word white has been deleted.

The Connection
So, since I chose to review three rabbit books for the picture book genre, I apparently, deep down on the inside, want to do a Rabbit Storytime. I'd add in a few more books, like Bunnies on the Go by Rick Walton or any of the Nicky books by Valeri Gorbachev (Nicky and the Big Bad Wolves, Nicky and the Fantastic Birthday Gift, or Nicky and the Rainy Day). If I don't do a Rabbit Storytime, I at least need to make myself some bunny ears to wear around the library to quell the urge.

My Friend Rabbit

The Bibliography
Rohmann, Eric. 2002. My Friend Rabbit. Brookfield: Roaring Brook Press. ISBN 0761315357

The Plot
Mouse's friend Rabbit is a pretty good friend, but whenever he's around, something crazy always happens. In My Friend Rabbit, Mouse gets a toy airplane and lets Rabbit play with it, too. Uh oh! The airplane gets stuck in a tree! Mouse knew something bad would happen, but, not to worry, because Rabbit has a plan. Rabbit gathers several more friends - an elephant, a rhinocerous, a hippopotamus, a deer, an alligator, a bear, a duck, some ducklings and a squirrel - and stacks them in a precarious pile. Of course, we all know what happens next. Mouse is on top of the pile just inches away from his plane when the pivoting pillar of pals topples to the ground. Luckily, Mouse boards the plane and flies down to rescue Rabbit from his angry cohorts, but wouldn't you know, they crash right back into that tree! Don't worry though, Rabbit has another plan ...

The Analysis
The illustrations in this Caldecott-winning book - heavily outlined, hand-colored woodcuts - tell a wonderful story that doesn't require words, but there are just a few anyway. The story is one of good friends playing well together and the illustrations really convey that with detailed, but cartoony at the same time, facial expressions. As a programmer, I more than likely wouldn't use this book just because there are so few words. Sitting one on one with a child and reading this book would be just fine because they could take in all the illustrations and see what happens on each page, but sharing it with a group of kids wouldn't quite work out so well. I think the majority of the excitement in my storytelling comes from my voices and inflection, so telling a story with only 75 or so words is not very exciting.

The Review
Susie Wilde (Children's Literature)
You can pretty much guess the story from the first page in My Friend Rabbit. The narrator, a small brown mouse, tells us that his friend Rabbit, "means well. But whatever he does, wherever he goes, trouble follows." After Rabbit launches mouse's airplane into a tree, he drags a cast of creatures ten times his size into a ridiculous pile. Then he mounts the animal mountain to retrieve mouse's plane. Unlike many Caldecotts, this year's award honors a book for young children. And Rohmann got it right in terms of this audience. Rabbit has the silly slapstick humor that young listeners find sublime. A three-year-old will giggle when rabbit hauls the huge elephant, or hoists the fat purple hippo. In this book of few words, the "trouble follows" line is repeated three times, giving young children a place to participate. In terms of illustration, the colored wood-block prints are simple, the backgrounds clear, and page layouts dramatize the story with interesting perspectives and compositions. You have to turn the book to view the climax, a vertical rendering of the pile of precariously balanced animals. The animals' faces lend a strong feeling tone. Thankfully, messages are buried in this book which accents humor instead of moral. But the pictures and words provide comfort for children viewed as troublesome, and offer a strong argument for sticking with colorful, unique playmates.

The Connection
Like I said before, I probably wouldn't use this book during storytime, just because it has so few words; however, if I were so inclined, I could perhaps use this book along with Lettice: The Flying Rabbit by Mandy Stanley and, what else? Knuffle Bunny Free by Mo Willems and have a bunny-riding-in-an-airplane storytime. We could make little paper airplanes and little bunny puppets and launch them across the library. Sounds like fun, right?

Knuffle Bunny Free

The Bibliography
Willems, Mo. 2010. Knuffle Bunny Free. New York: HarperCollins Publishers. ISBN 0061929571

The Plot
Trixie, Knuffle Bunny and Trixie's mom and dad take a trip to visit her grandparents who live all the way in Holland, and Trixie knows that Holland is far away. After a long plane trip, Trixie and her parents finally arrive at Oma and Opa's house! Not long after their arrival, Trixie realizes someone is missing and that someone is KNUFFLE BUNNY! It turns out that Knuffle Bunny stayed on the plane and took a trip of his own to China. While Knuffle Bunny is gone, Trixie has to be brave and have fun without Knuffle Bunny. One night, she dreams of Knuffle Bunny and his amazing adventures and all the places he would go and all the kids he would meet. When she wakes up, she is very happy and she realizes she is getting to be a pretty big girl. Finally it is time for Trixie and her mom and dad to go back home. Who happens to be on the plane when they board? None other than Knuffle Bunny. In a moment of true big girlness, Trixie gives Knuffle Bunny to a crying baby because she knows that Knuffle Bunny can make the baby happy. Trixie is definitely a big girl now!

The Analysis
The Knuffle Bunny series is not my favorite by Mo Willems (Pigeon is, of course!), but this one nearly brought a tear to my eye. Mo Willems always has a certain flair in his illustrations, the facial expressions are fantastic and the layering of inked drawings over actual photographs makes you feel like the story is real, in this case, like you really traveled on an airplane to Holland. The foldout near the end of the book is an excellent addition and makes the reader realize just how far Knuffle Bunny went in that dream, across a HUGE, four-page spread! If children read the first Knuffle Bunny when it came out in 2004, read the second when it was released in 2007, and finished with this one in 2010, they would have grown up with Trixie and maybe would have gone through the same things she did. It's always pleasant when you grow up with books, and growing up with Trixie would have been a heartwarming and learning experience for kids.

The Review
Daniel Kraus (Booklist, Jul. 1, 2010 (Vol. 106, No. 21))
The saga of Knuffle Bunny concludes in this droll, observant, and seriously heartbreaking ode to growing up. Trixie’s a little older now, sporting a shorter haircut, a backpack, and, of course, ratty old Knuffle Bunny. Destination: Holland, the home of beloved grandparents Oma and Opa. Riding in a plane is exciting (watching Knuffle Bunny go through the X-ray machine is a little scary, though), and soon Trixie is sipping chocolate milk with her extended family. Well, you can guess what readers discover next: Knuffle Bunny has been left on the plane. What you might not guess is the poignancy and nuance of everything that follows. The plane, off to China, isn’t coming back. There’s no hysterics this time, just a wide-eyed Trixie dealing with the tension of knowing she is at a milestone of maturation yet afraid to fully commit. Her tour of Holland is alternately happy and sad (the replacement robot bunny that says, Ik Kan Spreken! doesn’t help much) until a gorgeous four-page foldout dream of Knuffle Bunny’s life in the wider world puts Trixie at ease. The denouement is enough to give you goose bumps, and young children may be wiping the tears from their parents’ cheeks. Good night, Knuffle Bunny.

The Connection
I could use this book in programs this summer during SRC, since the theme is One World, Many Stories. It would be interesting to read other stories that mention Holland, like The First Tulips in Holland by Phyllis Krasilovsky, The Hole in the Dyke by Norma Green, or Katje: The Windmill Cat by Gretchen Woelfle. Then we could do a craft with tulips or windmills, since they are also from the Netherlands. An origami windmill would be fun to make!