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Overview
100 Books for Reading and Sharing 1995 (NY Public Library)
Product Details
| ISBN-13: | 9780062059260 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | HarperCollins |
| Publication date: | 03/07/1998 |
| Edition description: | Reprint |
| Pages: | 192 |
| Sales rank: | 474,215 |
| Product dimensions: | 6.75(w) x 8.88(h) x 0.42(d) |
| Lexile: | 750L (what's this?) |
| Age Range: | 8 - 12 Years |
About the Author
In His Own Words...
"I have been writing and drawing comic strips all my life, first as a six-year-old, when I'd try to draw like my heroes: Alex Raymond, who did Flash Gordon, E. C. Segar, who did Popeye, Milton Caniff, who did Terry and the Pirates. The newspaper strip back in the 1940s was a glorious thing to behold. Sunday pages were full-sized and colored broadsheets that created a universe that could swallow a boy whole.
"I was desperate to be a cartoonist. One of my heroes was Will Eisner, who did a weekly comic book supplement to the Sunday comics. One day I walked into his office and showed him my samples. He said they were lousy, but he hired me anyway. And I began my apprenticeship.
"Later I was drafted out of Eisner's office into the Korean War. Militarism, regimentation, and mindless authority combined to squeeze the boy cartoonist out of me and bring out the rebel. There was no format at the time to fit the work I raged and screamed to do, so I had to invent one. Cartoon satire that commented on the military, the bomb, the cold war, the hypocrisy of grown-ups, the mating habits of urban young men and women: These were my subjects. After four years of trying to break into print and getting nowhere, the Village Voice, the first alternative newspaper, offered to publish me. Only one catch: They couldn't pay me. What did I care?
"My weekly satirical strip, Sick Sick Sick, later renamed Feiffer, started appearing in late 1956. Two years later, Sick Sick Sick came out in book form and became a bestseller. The following years saw a string of cartoon collections, syndication, stage and screen adaptations of the cartoon. One, Munro, won an Academy Award.
"This was heady stuff, taking me miles beyond my boyhood dreams. The only thing that got in the way of my enjoying it was the real world: the Cuban missile crisis, the assassination of President Kennedy, the Vietnam War, the civil rights revolution. The country was coming unglued, and my weekly cartoons didn't seem to be an adequate way of handling it. So I started writing plays: Little Murders, The White House Murder Case, Carnal Knowledge, Grown Ups. All the themes of my comic strips expanded theatrically and, later, cinematically to give me the time and space I needed to explain the times to myself and to my audience.
"I grew older. I had a family and, late in life, a very young family. I started thinking, as old guys will, about what I wanted these children to read, to learn. I read them E. B. White and Beverly Cleary and Roald Dahl, and, one day, I thought, Hey, I can do this."
"Writing for young readers connects me professionally to a part of myself that I didn't know how to let out until I was sixty: that kid who lived a life of innocence, mixed with confusion and consternation, disappointment and dopey humor. And who drew comic strips and needed friends—and found them—in cartoons and children's books that told him what the grown-ups in his life had left out. That's what reading did for me when I was a kid. Now I try to return the favor."
Jules Feiffer has won a number of prizes for his cartoons, plays, and screenplays, including the Pulitzer Prize for editorial cartooning. His books for children include The Man in the Ceiling; A Barrel of Laughs, A Vale of Tears; I Lost My Bear; Bark, George; and Meanwhile... He lives in Richfield Springs, New York.
In His Own Words...
"I have been writing and drawing comic strips all my life, first as a six-year-old, when I'd try to draw like my heroes: Alex Raymond, who did Flash Gordon, E. C. Segar, who did Popeye, Milton Caniff, who did Terry and the Pirates. The newspaper strip back in the 1940s was a glorious thing to behold. Sunday pages were full-sized and colored broadsheets that created a universe that could swallow a boy whole.
"I was desperate to be a cartoonist. One of my heroes was Will Eisner, who did a weekly comic book supplement to the Sunday comics. One day I walked into his office and showed him my samples. He said they were lousy, but he hired me anyway. And I began my apprenticeship.
"Later I was drafted out of Eisner's office into the Korean War. Militarism, regimentation, and mindless authority combined to squeeze the boy cartoonist out of me and bring out the rebel. There was no format at the time to fit the work I raged and screamed to do, so I had to invent one. Cartoon satire that commented on the military, the bomb, the cold war, the hypocrisy of grown-ups, the mating habits of urban young men and women: These were my subjects. After four years of trying to break into print and getting nowhere, the Village Voice, the first alternative newspaper, offered to publish me. Only one catch: They couldn't pay me. What did I care?
"My weekly satirical strip, Sick Sick Sick, later renamed Feiffer, started appearing in late 1956. Two years later, Sick Sick Sick came out in book form and became a bestseller. The following years saw a string of cartoon collections, syndication, stage and screen adaptations of the cartoon. One, Munro, won an Academy Award.
"This was heady stuff, taking me miles beyond my boyhood dreams. The only thing that got in the way of my enjoying it was the real world: the Cuban missile crisis, the assassination of President Kennedy, the Vietnam War, the civil rights revolution. The country was coming unglued, and my weekly cartoons didn't seem to be an adequate way of handling it. So I started writing plays: Little Murders, The White House Murder Case, Carnal Knowledge, Grown Ups. All the themes of my comic strips expanded theatrically and, later, cinematically to give me the time and space I needed to explain the times to myself and to my audience.
"I grew older. I had a family and, late in life, a very young family. I started thinking, as old guys will, about what I wanted these children to read, to learn. I read them E. B. White and Beverly Cleary and Roald Dahl, and, one day, I thought, Hey, I can do this."
"Writing for young readers connects me professionally to a part of myself that I didn't know how to let out until I was sixty: that kid who lived a life of innocence, mixed with confusion and consternation, disappointment and dopey humor. And who drew comic strips and needed friends—and found them—in cartoons and children's books that told him what the grown-ups in his life had left out. That's what reading did for me when I was a kid. Now I try to return the favor."
Hometown:
New York, New YorkDate of Birth:
January 26, 1929Place of Birth:
New York, New YorkEducation:
The Pratt Institute, 1951Read an Excerpt
Chapter One
The Hunter of Boar or Stag
Roger had a strange effect on people.
Take this guy. See how grumpy he is?
He's been grumpy since he got out of bed, stepped on his little boy'sbeach ball, slid halfway across the house, and flew out the window intothe rosebush. Wouldn't you be grumpy with a dozen thorns in your head?
Don't get too interested in this character. He's in our story just as anexample and we'll leave him forever in nine pages.
Now here is our guy trekking through the forest, hunting boar or huntingstag—something like that-because that's what men did in Roger's day.They got up in the morning and said, "Wife, I am going out to hunt," andWife said, "What will you bring home today, Husband, boar or stag? " Andthe man of the house would reply, "Whatever," because it really didn'tmatter: all food tasted the same (not too good) in those days. Ketchuphadn't been invented.
So he's trekking through the woods-trek, trek, trek-a big frown on hisface because he's thinking: "Why does everything happen to me? First Itrip on my kid's ball, get a crownful of thorns, stub my toe on thedoorsill, get laughed at by my wife who calls me a clumsy oaf, which Iam, but if she truly loved me she wouldn't say so. I hate mywife—er—that is, my life. I also hate hunting boar or stag. I shouldhave been a blacksmith. Thank the Lord that in eight more pages I'll beout of this book forever!"
He's thinking all this garbage when, for no reason at all,
the frown leaves his face.
He treks still another five yards and, for no reason at all, hegrins from ear to ear.
He treks another five yards and, for no reason at all, he smiles.
And he feels wonderful, better than he has since he won last year's sackrace at the Peasants' Picnic.
Now, although I've written "for no reason at all"-and repeated ittwice-there was a reason. The hunter didn't realize that Roger wastrekking toward him from the opposite direction.
And the closer Roger got to him, the more cheerful the hunter became.That was the effect Roger had on people. He made them feel good.
He didn't do anything to make them feel good. He didn't tell jokes. Hedidn't try to please-he didn't have to: he was a prince.
Roger was the son of kindly King Whatchamacallit. And, being a prince,he had the right to be stern, haughty, and bad-tempered. Except hecouldn't be, because he didn't know what it was to be stern, haughty, orbad-tempered. He had never seen any examples. He had never seen hisfather, the king, throw a fit, or his dear departed mother, the queen,stamp her foot in anger. Nor had he seen out of sorts any of the king's ministers, courtiers, chefs,servants, maids, or lackeys. Not once since his birth had he heard anangry scream, shout, curse, or quarrel. Not once had he seen a tear,unless it was tears of joy. And of those he saw many.
Because Roger was a carrier of joy, he spread it before him. It glowedoff his presence like the rays of the sun. He was a special delight tohis mother, and the thought of this he found particularly gratifyingbecause of her sudden demise. Out for a swim one day, she'd beenswallowed by a blue whale.
He missed his mother, but whales were his favorite mammal and blue washis favorite color, so, if she had to go, that didn't seem like such abad way. After a while, Roger came to smile at the thought of that bluewhale on that bright green sea gulping down his mother in a redstripedswimming costume as if she was a candy cane. Everything in life amusedRoger. Here he is waking up in the morning.
This is the morning he planned to go horseback riding on the royalgrounds. But it's a terrible day. It's raining. Not only is it raining,it's sleeting and hailing at the same time. Hailstones, sounding likegunshots, bounce off the palace walls. So what does Roger say to himselfas he looks out the window? He says: "Wow! I'll get drenched to myloincloth in two seconds flat if I go out in this. I can't wait!"
He doesn't go back to bed and read a royal book or magazine as anyprince in his right mind might do. He goes out and gets soaked andslapped around by hailstones and-if you can believe it-he has a goodtime.
Everything, significant or insignificant, gave Roger a good time.Brushing his teeth gave him a good time. Eating and sleeping gave him agood time. Sport amused him: hunting, archery, jousting. Kindness amusedhim, but no more than cruelty. Fat people, skinny people, rich people,poor people, vagrants, all caused him to giggle. People who lived incastles with dozens of servants they couldn't keep track of, this gavehim a good laugh.
Roger's remarkably high spirits cast a spell over anyone or anything whocame within a half mile of him.
Dogs ceased chasing cats.
Cats quit chasing birds. Birds were charmed out of the trees and stoppedhunting worms.
Worms curled and uncurled in spasms of glee.
And laughing hyenas laughed so extra-hard they had to stuff their mouthswith dead branches and foul-tasting foliage in order to regain theircomposure.
By now, you get the picture. And here's our friend, the hunter, back inthe picture.