various authors and illustratorsNelson Doubleday, Inc., various years
I'm probably way behind the curve on this, but here goes. It all started a few weeks ago when my friend gef snaked me by 15 minutes at a library sale and walked away with what she described as this "series of really cool old books." A week later, I am thrifting and I come across two coverless books from a Doubleday series I've seen before but never cracked open and what was inside was a collection of the most vivid and wonderful stories, all illustrated by different artists.
As I was flipping through one of them later that night, I happened across a story called The Magic Porridge Pot and noticed the author was Andy Warhol. And I thought to myself, "THE Andy Warhol". It took about two seconds of Internet searching to find this blog post explaining the Warhol/ Nelson Doubleday connection and in an instant, I was hooked to find more. Not just the Warhol volumes, but the collection includes early works (some commissioned just for this) from everyone: Garth William, Leonard Weisgard, Feodor Rojankovsky, Ezra Jack Keats, Paul Galdone, Adrienne Adams, Peter Spier, Richard Scarry, Barbara Cooney, Ruth Ives, Don Freeman, Garth Williams, Leonard Kessler... I could go on but my wrist is cramping. Really, it is a nauseatingly fabulous array.... like a yearbook of illustration from my favorite era and beyond.
In the last week, I've been buying them wherever I can. (Needless to say, these were the books "my friend" snaked me on. Blah.) I think there are more than 40 volumes, but I don't know for sure. Anyone have anymore history? I won't go into every story, but they include folk tales and fairy tales and silly stories and historic reenactments and even some photo travel essay. Way, way, way beyond cool. Here is a sampling of just some of the awesome illustration you will find. Really, don't be fooled by the high pricing on some of the volumes when you start sniffing around. The less expensive volumes are just as good. Every book has something that will blow your flipping mind. (I've added some of Sendak's Velveteen Rabbit drawings at the end.)
17 comments:
I grew up with the Maurice Sendak drawn Velveteen Rabbit from this series (not published anywhere else). Great books to be read to kids, and for kids to read to themselves.
It always weirds me out when I see a familiar story in an anthology with brand new illustrations. I buy anthologies/school readers all the time for my son for our long car trips.
I recently purchased one that had the original Marjorie Weinman Sharmat "Nate the Great" story in it (unabridged), but it was totally illustrated by someone else (not Marc Simont).
Another anothology had Robert L. Crowe's "Clyde Monster" in it, but it wasn't illustrated by Kay Chorao. The different illustrator gave this story a totally different feel (big green ugly monsters, as opposed to Kay's cuddly elf-like monsters).
swoon, i've GOT to have them. how easy will they be to get hold of here i Blighty? i always seem to be asking you that. sorry. what an incredible stream of illustrations. my pulse rate just doubled.
ok, I'm hooked. Now officially searching for some for me! thanks for posting.
Claire
My mother subscribed to these when I was a kid. I think we received one every month.
I still vividly remember the story of the young woman who was cursed to wax and wane with the moon. When the moon was full she was beautiful and young. When it was new, she was so old and frail that she couldn't even walk. The curse could only be lifted by being kissed under the new moon.
So it does go beyond 40 because the volume with MS's Velveteen Rabbit is in Volume 35 but there were two more stories as well...
Volume 31: Windy Wash Day and Other Poems by Dorothy Aldis with illustrations by Maurice Sendak
Volume 35: Velveteen Rabbit by Margery Williams with illustrations by Maurice Sendak
Volume 41: What the Good-Man Does Is Always Right by Hans Christian Andersen with illustrations by Maurice Sendak
I just bought the VR on e-bay today... i can't wait! I'll scan pictures and as them too when I get it.
there are a ton of volumes available on ebay in lots of different price ranges.
Those are some great illustrations!
Oh, what a fantastic find! I am insanely jealous!
There are 42 original volumes to this set. I am having a devil of a time pricing them as a set as no one seems to have a full set, and some of the books you cannot locate at all. I have a very rare full set or original books with dust covers, no A's either, all original. If anyone knows of a good buyer, please let me know. They are fairly up in price just for certain editions that are difficult to find, but you can still find them. The ones you can't find, I seem to have them too.
^^Try listing them on ebay. I followed these before and saw the full set going for about $170. I was lucky enough to snatch 44 books (the full set and 2 'A' editions, most with dustjackets)for $38 shipped!!
Thanks for your post. I grew up with these books and have about 12 of them from when I was a child. I have since bought about 12 more on ebay for less than $1.00 each plus shipping. These are what I call living books. They feed the minds and imagination of children. A great find!!
Julie
These books are terrific - my mom got them as a kid, and my brother and I grew up reading them.
Overall they're awesome, but sometimes their antiquity is just funny - I remember one of them had a story in it about what space was like in the form of a Q&A, and one of the questions was "what is it like on the moon?" The answer was something like "Don't worry your little head about it! No one has ever visited the moon, and since people cannot live in space, no one will ever know what the moon is like."
I have also found these books on Amazon and Alibris. I have one almost complete set of the original 42 books (the last two that I need to complete the set should be here withing a week) and I've been working on building a complete second set so that I have a set to hand down to each of my two girls. I remember reading these when I was little. My grandmother was a subscriber and my mother still had quite a few copies. I loved these books when I was a child and I am looking forward to sharing them with my own daughters. Too bad we can't talk Random House/ Nelson Doubleday Inc into re-releasing them all. They are such an excellent collection of books.
My mom started buying these books in 1957, when I was four. I spent hours pouring over the pictures. I have 28 books (1957-61) with most still in jackets. The spines have pictures that correlate to the stories so a child can easily find favorites on a bookshelf. In the 1980s I dusted them off and read them with my own children, and soon I'll be sharing them with my grandchildren--poems with wonderful rhythm like "The Raggedy Man," and wild tales like "The Man Who Didn't Wash His Dishes" who let things go so long he had to eat out of his ashtray (both of my parents smoked, so that one freaked me out for years.) The good memories will refresh again...
As I recall, they were released in a 'book club', which my Grandma enrolled me in when I was small. The oldest book I have is from 1959, and the newest from 1963.
I remember that I really didn't like them as a kid, but the stories from different places around the world were great fodder for 'show and tell'.
When my daughter was born, I started reading the books to her and absolutely fell in love with them. Her favorite stories have the character "Kiki" in them, and even at the ripe old age of 24, she still remembers the books.
I own 12 of them and would love to have more. I used to peruse Half Price Books years ago and would sometimes get lucky finding one I didn't have.
There's an index of the entire set online:
http://www.lib.usm.edu/~degrum/html/research/re-bestindex.shtml
I've visited that site before. The author doesn't include the later volumes however.
I love these books. We had them at my house when I was growing up in the 80s, not sure where they came from. We never had a complete set. And no covers. I'll never forget going into an antique store when I was a teenager and finding one of these books with a dustjacket-I had no idea! I have most of the set now and replaced the ones without dustjackets for ones with. I love looking through library sales and used book stores for these books.
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