My Favorite Children's Book

My Favorite Children’s Book

My friend and fellow writer (she is actually published) Katherine Harbour recently asked me if I could write a few words about my favorite children’s book.

Katherine Harbour

Here goes.

I work at Barnes & Noble in the Children’s Book Department. I do storytime. I have a 5 shelf bookcase at home full of children’s books.

There are so many to choose from.

I have been an avid reader for most of my life. I attribute this to a couple of different influences.

My father (through means unknown to me) came across a cache of comic books when I was a young lad. He paid my allowance in comic books. It worked like gangbusters, until I discovered the secret location of his troll hoard in a cubby ‘neath the stairs.

Those comic books sent an electrical shock wave up and down my spine and caused my eyes to spin and unleashed torrents of my imagination.

My Great Grandmother Naomi used to take me to the Velma Teague Library in Glendale, Arizona.

I remember dozens of people thumbing through vinyl records searching for an LP to check out. There were comic books there as well. My obsession was the discard racks at the entrance full of pulp science fiction novels with lurid and fantastical covers.

To this day I still fetishize discarded books. My particular kink lies in books from far off libraries that still have the library cards inside with names and dates.

That is how things get embedded in our psyches and our collective unconscious minds methinks. A mixture of childhood sense overload and budding hormonal desires. I still get a particular warm shiver when I find a certain book at a used bookstore or when my rabid comic book desires get whetted.

Anyway, we were talking about children’s books. Let’s hit on a few while I try to settle on one.

Brighty of the Grand Canyon by Marguerite Henry. As an Arizona kid reading a true legend about the place I was from was a real treat. The illustrations by Wesley Dennis are like kid catnip. I love this book so much I currently have two copies.

Tales of a Fourth Grade Nothing by Judy Blume. When I was in fourth grade an elderly teacher began reading this to us as a treat. I was desperate for each installment. I had to know what happened next. I was feverish. I was manic. I was obsessed. The way my teacher would lick her finger before slowly turning to the next tantalizing page filled me with unquenchable anticipation. I tried looking at a new version of this book to see if I would get the same sense memory from it to no avail. Without the Roy Doty illustrations, it just wasn’t the same.

How To Eat Fried Worms by Thomas Rockwell. With laugh out loud humor and Vonnegut like short chapters, I read and re-read this one until it literally disintegrated in my hands. This is the only cover for me. New updated covers of books you loved as a kid seem, at the very least, to take away some of the ownership you might feel for a beloved tale of childhood yore. Here is an example below.

You see? Just not the same.

There are others. So many others. Bunnicula - which sent me spiraling into the vortex of anticipation known as the Scholastic Book Fair…

My Side Of The Mountain by Jean Craighead George and the film that followed…

Where the Red Fern Grows by Wilson Rawls which spoke to the spiritual yearning that has been a companion to me and something for which I have had to struggle to reconcile in the face of what I know now vs. what I knew (or thought I knew) then.

The Mouse and the Motorcycle by Beverly Cleary …

There are some children’s books that transcend the genre and becoming something more. They speak to us at the various stations in our lives and are as relevant to us when we are young and when we are old. Like…

And…

The above you could read to an infant, or a graduate, or at a wedding, or to someone on their deathbed, and it would have meaning at all those occasions.

Okay? Okay. I’ve stalled long enough…

Drum roll.

a beat...

(insistently) Drum Roll!

My favorite children’s book (at this time) is…

As much as I love Quentin Blake, Joseph Schindelman has been and will be the only illustrator for Roald Dahl’s Charlie And The Chocolate Factory. I have focused a lot on illustrators throughout this piece. Illustrators are vital. Tellers of tales are vital. When you find the perfect partnership between the two, sparks and magic are created.

Is there a Hunter S. Thompson without Ralph Steadman?

What would The Wizard of Oz be without William Wallace Denslow?

No, for a children’s book to become a classic it has to fire on both cylinders - a fantastically written tale married to timeless illustrations. That is why I love “Charlie And The Chocolate Factory” so much.

Joseph Schindelman in The New Yorker

I love classic Disney. Roald Dahl is like the anti-Disney. He is the Agent Smith to Walt’s Neo…

Whereas (most of the time) Walt & crew polished over the rough edges, Roald Dahl dove right into them with sinister delight. The book is like a children’s version of Dante’s Inferno. Dahl was a treasure. His voice is sorely missed.

Schindelman’s illustrations scratch an itch deep down in my soul. I am as satisfied when studying his delicate whimsical crosshatching as I would be eating a Wonka Scrumdiddlyumptious Bar. Truly a masterpiece.

I even tried to duplicate his drawing technique. 

Like Charles Schulz, Schindelman's exquisite technique is far more complex than it appears upon initial inspection. Don't believe me? Try to draw Charlie Brown. A lifetime of experience and practice can make the hand into a magical instrument.

Well, there it is. My favorite. For so many reasons.

My own well worn and much loved copy.

What is yours?

I’ll close with this quote from the film version…

fin

The Retail Manifesto

From my novel "The People's Republic of Retail". As things begin to unravel at Mega Mart, despotic store manager Bill Cox doubles down on meting out punishment in an effort to quell the oncoming rebellion. Eric George, as a suspected ringleader, is suspended (exiled) for two weeks. He sits down at his manual typewriter and begins typing out what will become known as "The Retail Manifesto".

The Retail Manifesto

Part I.

    We are the ghost generation. We are the hidden mechanism that runs your service economy. We are the spectral hands that stock your bread & milk - your staples. We are the expired student I.d. generation - forced to work menial jobs for minimum wage. We are a generation stunted by debt - held back from our greater aspirations by maxed out credit cards and high interest rate loans.

   
You lured us in, before we had a chance, with the promise of things we couldn't afford, and now we are stuck making french fries - sweeping floors - and selling your gasoline. We have been locked in a prison cell whose only key is submission. We have a name for our prison. We call it Retail!

Part II.

    We are the wage slaves. America's forgotten sons and daughters, trapped behind WAL's (sic). You see a big box - we see a gulag. You see low prices - we see the true cost in the precious blood & sweat of foreign children. Children who should be in school rather than manufacturing things that could be made in American factories by American workers paid decent wages. You see economic development - we see urban sprawl & the death of the middle class. You find comfort in the monotony of suburbia - we are wondering, "where is our American dream?"

Part III.

    The corporations have become tyrannies - ruling vicariously through media outlets that spread more lies & misinformation than news, through politicians bought & paid for, through political action groups who capitalize on fear & hysteria to get the populace to vote against their own self interests. Did you know that the money squandered on wars and disinformation could pay for universal health care and education for all - several times over? These robber barons and their stooges spend more to oppress public initiatives than it would cost to allow them to just pass. It’s time to wake up - strike torches - and burn our way through the web of lies that protects the rich while crushing the poor and working classes!

Part IV.

    We have been in a coma - turned into zombies by corn syrup and Ritalin and anti-depressants. We medicate ourselves into a stupor to hide from the bleak realities of roles we didn't choose but were lead to like cattle down a chute to the slaughterhouse floor. I say we face the world awake - with our eyes wide open! We don't need more medicine. The situation is depressing. Only when we face this inescapable fact - consciously, can we effect real change!

Part V.

    We are beginning to rise from our slumber. There are those of us - inside the machine, who are sounding the alarm. We were educated inside your institutions despite your best efforts. You cut taxes for the rich while slashing public education perennially. But in spite of it all we have uncovered the truth. We have read the banned books. We have learned the story of labour movements - excised from our history books. We know - now, that our world has fallen to shadow. It has come to pass, as Orwell prophesyed, that all the hard won advances now lay rusting across the landscape, the promises abandoned like Midwestern factories, the ghosts of prosperity reflected in shattered windows and ivy-entwined brick. The once mighty cities have fallen - like mythic civilizations, into modern day ruins. Detroit - Cleveland - Allentown - Baltimore - Flint: Once they were citadels of enlightenment & culture - now infested by drugs & poverty. How could so much promise be wiped away, and for what? To make room for big chains? Multi-National conglomerates bringing forth low wages - poor benefits, and big box blight? It doesn't have to be that way. The future is not yet written. We have a choice. We can wrest control of these monstrosities, and against all odds, we can rebuild the dream!

Part VI.

    You cannot run from accountability. You who have hidden behind a flag made in China. You who have shouted down opposition with empty gestures of patriotism - while justifying the deaths of scores of young men on foreign battlefields. Did you ever notice that in war, only the blood of the young gets spilled? I say no more! The real war is here! It's time for us to rise up and heed the call!

    
Individually, we can be defeated. But united, we are a revolution! Like a million trees growing out of the cracks of American sidewalks, we will fight and persevere. The goliaths of greed will fall and on their foundations we will till the soil of a better tomorrow!

Today Mega-Mart!

Tomorrow the World!

Eric George

Labor Day

Enough about me. Let's talk more about you. What do you think of me?

I answered one of these questionnaires on October 23, 2010. I decided to update some of my responses. Feel free to copy/paste and insert your own answers. 

1. WERE YOU NAMED AFTER ANYONE?  My father.

2. WHEN WAS THE LAST TIME YOU CRIED?  Yesterday. Thinking about Chooch.

3. DO YOU LIKE YOUR HANDWRITING? Yes. It resembles chicken scratch and some dead language. It would take an enigma machine and a team of handwriting experts to decipher it.

4. WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE LUNCH MEAT? Roast beef - rare.

5. DO YOU HAVE KIDS?  Nope. I love kids, but I fear for their future.

6. IF YOU WERE ANOTHER PERSON, WOULD YOU BE FRIENDS WITH YOU?  Most assuredly not. I would fight myself like the chicken on Family Guy.

7. DO YOU USE SARCASM?  NOOOOoo I NEVER use sarcasm (sarcastically!) 

8. DO YOU STILL HAVE YOUR TONSILS?  Yes.

9. WOULD YOU BUNGEE JUMP? Never. I have a terrific fear of heights.

10. WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE CEREAL?  Admiral O's of course.

11. DO YOU UNTIE YOUR SHOES WHEN YOU TAKE THEM OFF? Nope. I tie them once and that's it. Usually I prefer Van's (no laces).

13. WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE ICE CREAM? Vanilla with bits of Madagascar Vanilla bean. So simple yet so complex.

14. WHAT IS THE FIRST THING YOU NOTICE ABOUT PEOPLE?  Whether or not they are a bullshit artist. 

15.WHAT IS  YOUR FAVORITE COLOR?  Orange. Fall colors. Child of the 70's.

16. WHAT IS YOUR LEAST FAVORlTE THING ABOUT YOURSELF? I am becoming more and more reclusive. When I am forced to be in public I usually adopt a dreadful fake personae.

17. WHO DO YOU MISS THE MOST? My Great Grandmother Naomi.

18. MOST EPIC SONG OF ALL TIME? Supper's Ready by Genesis.

19. WHAT COLOR PANTS AND SHOES ARE YOU WEARING? Black & Black.

21. WHAT ARE YOU LISTENING TO RIGHT NOW? Phases & Stages by Willie Nelson.

22. IF YOU WERE A CRAYON, WHAT COLOR WOULD YOU BE? Hunter Green.

23. FAVORITE SMELLS?  BBQ!

24. WHO WAS THE LAST PERSON YOU TALKED TO ON THE PHONE? Gina.

25. WHO IS YOUR FAVORITE ARTIST? - Ernst Ludwig Kirchner.

26. FAVORITE SPORTS TO WATCH? The Winter Olympics.

27. HAIR COLOR? Brown with a daily increasing amount of Grey.

28. EYE COLOR? Brown.

29. DO YOU WEAR CONTACTS? Glasses.

30. FAVORITE FOOD?  Pho.

31. SCARY MOVIES OR HAPPY ENDINGS?  Both. 

32. LAST MOVIE YOU WATCHED?   Ghost Story w/Fred Astaire.

33. WHAT COLOR SHIRT ARE YOU WEARING? Green Hulk sleep shirt.

34. SUMMER OR WINTER? Winter!

35.  WHO DO YOU ADMIRE? Writers, artists, and anyone who works to achieve social justice.

36. IF YOU COULD WORK IN A DIFFERENT PROFESSION WHAT WOULD IT BE?  Full time writer ...maybe organic farmer.

37. BEST MEAL YOU EVER HAD? KFC in Harrisburg, Illinois. It was snowing. I was a starving college student. They had an all you can eat buffet.

38. FAVORITE FILM AT THE MOMENT? - Stalker by Andrei Tarkovsky.

39. WHAT BOOK ARE YOU READING NOW? The Court of the Red Tsar.

40. WHAT IS ON YOUR MOUSE PAD? I have a Soviet Propaganda mouse pad.

41. WHAT DID YOU WATCH ON TV LAST NIGHT?  The Tim Tracker.

42. FAVORITE SOUND(S)?  Manual Typewriter.

43. IRONED OR WRINKLED? Wrinkled.

44. BEACH OR SKIING?  I am not the most outdoors-ey kind of guy...

45. DO YOU HAVE A SPECIAL TALENT? Empathy!

46 WHERE WERE YOU BORN?  Phoenix, AZ.

47. WHAT IS THE GREATEST NOVEL EVER WRITTEN? - A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens.

48. HOW DID YOU MEET YOUR SPOUSE/SIGNIFICANT OTHER? At a Barnes & Noble - She asked me to watch her purse - the rest is history!

49. FAVORITE CITY? Chicago.

Magic Soap

Magic Soap

There’s a madman

ranting

on my bottle

of soap

“All One!

All One!

All One!”

It’s magic soap

it cleans

your body

mind - spirit

and purifies

your soul

“All One! All One!

All One!”

but is a

teaspoonful

enough

to wash away

the scent of

ammonia

in a Nazi

bucket of piss?

or Zyklon-B?

or the ash

of loved ones

spewing from

Auschwitz

chimneys?

 “All One!

All One!

All One!”

say’s the blind

old man

bobbing in a pool

lather up

and forget

the tears

of children

left behind

a snapshot

of his son

held aloft

 sun drenched

sinewy

arm

the toddler

in his hand

like lady liberty

offering up

her torch

“All One!

All One!

All One!”

The Moral ABC

his magnum

opus

tinkered

with

added to

subtracted from

from 4am phone calls

dictated for hours

to secretaries

 only to be recanted

“All One!

All One!

All One!”

cement caked

hands

climbing the fence

of an Illinois asylum

 starting his enterprise

in the city of

“broad shoulders”

It’s not a half

bad legacy

a bottle of soap

wrapped in a

label of madness

it’s fair trade

the workers

and environment

are provided

for

The Moral

ABC is lucid

in places

between the lines

there is truth

miracles abound

like a million

tiny bubbles

rising up

in a bottle

of liquid soap

there’s miracles

all around

like Spanish moss

swaying in a warm

breeze

or a bird’s nest

in the crux

of a McDonald’s

arch

or a moments respite

a workers lunch

in a hospital

parking lot

miracles are everywhere

like a girl from

New York

and a boy

from Arizona

born 2,436.54 miles

away from each other

falling in love

in a Barnes & Noble

café

meeting

at just the right

moment

on a perfect afternoon

I met her at

27 years of age

I waited for her

that long

Those 27 years

Those 9,855 days

Those 236,520 hours

Those 14,191,200 minutes

Those 851,472,000 seconds

a millisecond before

and a millisecond after

and we might not have met

we made journeys

her and I

her from New York to Florida

me from Arizona to Illinois

to Florida

everything converged

that day

in that Barnes and Noble

café

and my life has

been made better

my heart’s capacity

grown larger

I’ve returned to the booth

where we met

realized a miracle

took place there

851,472,000 seconds

and it came

down to one

“All One!”

I love Dr. Bronner’s

soap

it’s minty

and refreshing

it makes me

feel clean

it helps me

to see that

although the

Nazi’s murdered

6 million Jews

6,150,000 Jews live in

the United States

with an additional 5,600,000

living in Israel

a state of their own

or that 58,209

Americans died

in Vietnam

but my father

survived

he came

home safe

and had one

child

who met one

girl in one

Barnes & Noble

at one precise

moment

and fell in love

and that is how

the world lives

it’s magic

a miracle

“All One!”