literacy

Booky Goodness, June Edition:

Frindle, Andrew Clements. I don't know why it took me so long to read this book. Wait, no, I have it - it's because there was a classroom set in the classroom and I have an irrationally negative mindset against classroom sets of books that I did not myself select. Wait, no, it's not all that irrational, considering that the other classroom sets are My Side of the Mountain and Sign of the Beaver. But I loved The Last Holiday Concert (Clements) and really should have picked up Frindle a lot sooner. I often commit the crime of judging a book by its cover - it's the reason I own multiple copies of certain books (sweet updated cover art for the likes of everything from Anna Karenina to Ramona Forever) and the reason I own The Iliad at all. Penguin Classics Deluxe Editions - textured cover, soft edges, I am a sucker, oh yes. Since toddlerhood when I was given a book called Charlie Was Just a Chipmunk that smelled faintly of almonds, I have loved the most physically superficial aspects of books - scent, gloss, matte, thickness of page. I bought The Dream of Scipio because I love the author's name: Iain Pears. I refuse to buy a paperback copy of A Patchwork Planet, even though it would make life easier because it's one of my favorite books and I read it all the time, sometimes when I'm cooking or cleaning and could really use an extra hand, which a paperback would free up, because I cannot find a paperback published with the same typeface as the Knopf hardcover. I have three copies of The Hundred Secret Senses - one with heavier, smoother pages but no raised title lettering; one with raised lettering but dusty-feeling pages, and one really ratty one that I lend out to people. Don't even get me started on the Selma Lanes edition of The Art of Maurice Sendak that I borrowed-without-checking-out of the McCully Library that I loved so much I actually returned it because I wanted to share it with others - it had a vellum overlay either over the jacket or as the jacket, and 3D features - popups, mini-books, etc. inside. I found on Amazon what I thought was this treasure, but I should have known that for a price under a bazillion dollars ($34.99 to be exact) it must have been something else. And it was. No vellum overlay. No pop-ups, no miniature replica of the art that evolved into Where the Wild Things Are. I mean, all the essentials were there, the content was the same - but it wasn't the same. I was CRUSHED. Which is why I don't care that I can't find that book right now, to place next to my Kushner book on Sendak from 1980-present. For all I know there is some deluxe Kushner somewhere, but because I have never run my hands over the vellum overlay or popped the pop-ups, it doesn't bother me.

I do actually read books. I don't just sit around pawing them and smelling the pages. I just thought I'd mention that reading is a completely sensory experience. I have not, in recent memory, tasted a book, but I wholeheartedly agree with my language arts training (fragments of Montessori I've been allowed to keep) that says the experience of reading is multi-sensory. Children should love not only to see and hear words - they should grip pages, hear binding crack, taste paper. Well, licking the pages you might not agree with, but it's not like the kid is gonna ingest the entire volume.

I used to give every baby whose birthday party I attended Pat the Bunny (now I give all babies HUG by Jez Alborough instead) and I remember the very first time I did this. It was my cousin's first birthday, and I remember the thank-you note her mommy sent: Dear Christy and ****, thank you for helping at my party and for the book. It was very tasty - all chewed up. Love, Aly."

I understood completely.