Monday, May 11, 2009

On My Bookshelf: Andrew Henry's Meadow

So this blog is beginning to feel a bit like my desk, cluttered and unorganized. I pile, I stack, I cram things into cabinets and quickly shut the doors hoping everything stays put. I am going to try to collect myself a bit by organizing my thoughts into weekly/bi-weekly themes of things that inspire me.

To start, I want to share with you some of my favorite children's books from the growing collection on my shelf. Fun? Right? Right!

Here are some scans from a goodie called Andrew Henry's Meadow (1965). LOVE this one, it's a keeper for sure. This book was a fairly recent addition to my library, and I had somehow never heard of it until last year. For some reason it was extremely hard to find then, but I scored a super cheap copy on ebay (however, it was a bit water damaged and smells like basement, but still good!) The illustrations remind me of Robert McCloskey's (Homer Price specifically) and the story is great. It looks like they re-released it, so it is easily found on Amazon. Worth it for sure.

Andrew is a boy who loves to build crazy contraptions, but they just annoy his family. He decides to move to the meadow where he won't bother anyone. Other children follow and Andrew builds them all houses until they have basically set up their own little village. But then the adults start to miss them...Trust me, it's very sweet.

That wallpaper? Delightful!

Look at that U-isn't it wonderful?!

Don't you just want to live in that tree/bird house?

LOVE the use of line/cross hatching.

How great is their little village?

6 comments:

  1. I like how the tree trunks/canopy dissolve into the white of the page! Nice.

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  2. I absolutely LOVED this book when I was a kid. It was in my favorite top ten along with Where the Wild Things Are and Kristina Katrina and the Box. I would sit for hours and study the illustrations of the contraptions that Henry built and daydream about my own little get-away in the meadow with all the other misunderstood children.

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  3. I have been looking for the name of this book for almost a decade, this morning I finally found it. I got a little teary! It was one of my all-time favorite books as a child and now that I am a teacher I have been looking for it to share with MY students. I am so happy to have found it and can't wait to get it again and read it to my students. BIG SMILES!!!

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  4. Just pulled out my own worn copy from when I was a kid to read to my granddaughter. Did a web search to see if a reprint had ever been done (It had) and found there is a movie planned for 2010 by Zach Braff. Hmmm, kids saving the world against bad guys? Like a cross between Goonies and Baron Munchausen? Hang on, as a society are we so lame as to require this from every movie?

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  5. What I am reading about the movie tells me that this kid Zach or his brother doesn't get it. Why not make it a lesbian zombie movie then? It's not about bad guys, it's not the Goonies. There are plenty of other "properties" out there to leverage for that kind of stuff.

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  6. So has anyone heard anything about the movie? Did it come out already? Are they still making it? It will be very interesting to see how they turn this beautiful book into a version for the big screen.

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