Books about Books – Post #4

 

A Horn Book Sampler: On Children’s Books and Reading – Selected from 25 years of the Horn Book Magazine, edited by Norma R. Fryatt.

The Horn Book Magazine was first published in 1924 by the Boston Bookshop for Boys and Girls. Its purpose was to promote new books in children’s literature, post book reviews, and interview authors and illustrators of children’s books, and publication continues today.

This book, published by The Horn Book in 1959, contains selections from 25 years of publication from 1924 to 1948. The sections of the book include: How the Story Happened, Let Us Now Praise Artists, Reviews and Criticism, What Fairy Tales Mean to a Child, Particularly for Parents, Youth in the War, Small Children and Books, and Touching Poetry.

Read a story written by Edward Ardizzone about why he wrote the Tim and Lucy books. Learn about Wanda Ga’g from Ernestine Evans who knew her personally. Follow the story by George Macy who was a dear friend of Arthur Rackham. “We sat in his studio for hours, in a desultory discussion of other books he might do. I am sure now that it was in a desultory fashion that I said: ‘What about The Wind in the Willows?’ Immediately a wave of emotion crossed his face; he gulped, started to say something, turned his back on me and went to the door for a few minutes. Then he came back and said that he had for many years been trying to persuade an English publisher to let him illustrate The Wind in the Willows. He had been asked by Kenneth Grahame, nearly thirty years ago, to illustrate that book; and had for all those years deeply regretted his refusal. It may not be generally known that The Wind in the Willows was not a successful book when it first appeared….The editor of Everybody’s turned it down; and it is nice to know that’, years later, the editor of Everybody’s built a house in the Adirondacks which he proceeded to call ‘Toad Hall.’ When the book appeared, this time under its permanent title, it had a slow beginning. It was then that Kenneth Grahame called upon Arthur Rackham, and asked him to make illustrations for a new edition….he said No to Kenneth Grahame….So Mr. Rackham lived in disappointment, until that summer afternoon four years ago, when I suggested the title to him. He immediately insisted that he would illustrate The Wind in the Willows.” Have you seen his illustrations of this book? “When the spring of 1938 came around, Mr. Rackham could only report progress…In the fall of 1938 and in the spring of 1939, he wrote me to say that he was now himself confined to hie country house in Surrey, he was permitted to work only a short time each day, but he was giving every minute of his time to the completion of this job which he now considered his final labor of love….Once these water-colors are given to the world, it will be seen with what affection Mr. Rackham made these pictures…It was Mr. Bruce Rogers who brought me the news that Arthur Rackham had died on September 7.”

Some other articles included in this book, A Horn Book Sampler, are “The Genius of Arthur Rackham” by Robert Lawson, “Homer Price” by Eric Gugler and James Daugherty, “On Reading the Bible Aloud” by Ruth Sawyer, “A Part of Victory” by Armstrong Sperry, “Small Children and Books” by Alice Dalgliesh, and a poem “A Valentine for Old Dolls” by Rachel Field.

My favorite quote by Armstrong Sperry, written in 1943 at the height of World War II, is this, “And so I say I think it is our great privilege—the privilege of all people who work in any way with children—to help to keep alive that vision of freedom, that these children of today may carry it with them into the world of tomorrow: that imperishable dream of the right to live, to work, and to worship, as free men—in peace.”

I highly recommend this book and other publications of The Horn Book Magazine, which give you an inside look at the authors and illustrators we so admire in the world of children’s literature.