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Going Bananas!

Jan 10, 2018
by Caroline Miller
art as brain food, children's literature, Edgard Allen Poe, Mo Willmems, poetry as a distillation of words of meaning and music, The Bells, We Are In A book
2 Comments

During lunch with a resident at the retirement center, we talked about art and its effect on the aging brain. Both of us thought any form art challenged people’s perceptions and kept that organ active.

From there, we took a short hop to various types of writing: fiction, non-fiction, novels, plays, short stories and poems. Poetry, we agreed, was the most challenging form as words had to be chosen for maximum value: their onomatopoeic quality, for example, as in Edgar Allen Poe’s “The Bells”; their soft or harsh enunciation; their length or their ambiguity which allows various levels of interpretation. Poetry, we agreed resided in both the spheres of music and statement.

 Eventually, we came round to children’s books. Like poetry, they appear simple, using few words and a linear plot. That simplicity is an illusion, of course. A children’s book, if done well, distills the elements of story, emotions and words into a concoction as precise and effective as a well-loved perfume. The whole also must work on two levels, capable at once of satisfying a child’s exploring mind and evoking childhood reminiscence in an adult. The convergence is difficult to achieve.    

 My lunch companion gave one example of a book with convergence: We Are In A Book! by Mo Willems. Willems has written a series of adventures in which Gerald, the elephant, and Piggie, a… well, a pig, appear. But she loved, We Are in A Book! particularly because of the device the author uses to draw in his audience. Gerald begins by whispering to Piggie that he thinks someone is staring at them. Piggie leans out of the page to confirm Gerald’s suspicion.   “A reader is reading us!” he chortles and states the obvious: that he and Gerald are characters in a book A few pages of illustrated jubilation follow. “We are being read! We are being read!” Then Piggie decides to play a game. He tells Gerald he will make the reader say a word out loud. Gerald looks dubious, but giggles when he learns the word is “ Banana!” More jubilation. Then Piggie asks Gerald if he’d like to suggest a word before the book ends. ENDS? Gerald looks horrified. “How many pages are left?” he asks. Piggie takes a peek. At the moment, they are on page 46. The book ends on page 57.   Gerald becomes upset, realizing that now they are on page 47.   No! 48. No! 49. Wait, wait. The pages are turning too fast. “I want more words, more jokes, more ‘Banana,” Gerald weeps to his friend. Fortunately, Piggie has an idea.   When he and Gerald reach the last page, Piggie says to the reader, “Hello. Will you please read us again?”

The device is as simple and elegant as E=MC2, and it, too, is deeply complex. The writer knows the book has two readers: one looking toward the future, the other returning to the past. When Gerald discovers the book will end and sees the pages turning faster and faster, he protests.   He wants more words, more jokes, more fun. The child agrees and claps joyously. But for the adult seated beside the child, the words warn of time’s passage. The book of life cannot be read again and again, forcing him or her to realize that being seated beside a laughing child may be among the best moments of a life.

To write so simply and so deeply isn’t easy.  Would-be writers of children’s books must remember banana is more than a funny word.   It also nourishes.

(Originally 9/7/15)

children being read a story

Courtesy of www.kinderpillar.com

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2 Comments
  1. Betsy September 14, 2015 at 8:05 pm Reply
    Ahhh, Elephant and Piggie! This book is right up there on my shelf with Man's Search for Meaning. Quiet, Stanley Kunitz The Wild Braid. And, of course, Where the Wild Things Are. Books that get the adult and child in us all life long, and the meaning we clutch as we go along.
    • Caroline Miller September 15, 2015 at 7:45 am Reply
      Looks like I have a couple more book titles to add to my reading list. Thanks for the suggestion.

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Contact Caroline at

carolinemiller11@yahoo.com

Portland, Oregon author Caroline Miller had distinguished careers as an educator, union president, elected official and artist/advocate.

Her play, Woman on the Scarlet Beast, was performed at the Post5 Theatre, Portland, OR, January/February 2015

Caroline published a serialized novelette, Marie Eau-Claire, on the website, The Colored Lens.  She also published the story Gustav Pavel,  a parable about ordinary lives, choice and alternate potential, on the website Fixional.co.

Caroline has published four novels

  • Ballet Noir
  • Trompe l’Oeil
  • Gothic Spring
  • Heart Land

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