Little Red Riding Hood

by Charles Perrault, Charles Welsh (Translator)

Overview

When Ichabod Crane becomes the new schoolmaster of Sleepy Hollow, he quickly and happily adjusts to the local ways. He delights in the bountiful dinners he's served when visiting the prosperous farms of the region; he enjoys the local yarns and scary legends that fill the firelit evenings of autumn; and he comes to love the idea of marrying Katrina Van Tassel and of one day owning her father's wealth and lands. There's one problem with his plans, though: Brom Bones, the local hero, who decided long ago to wed Katrina himself. And now, to his annoyance, this pasty-faced bookworm named Ichabod is making a serious bid. This droll tale of romantic rivalry climaxes with the appearance of the Headless Horseman. The spirited narration by Glenn Close, radiant illustrations by Robert Van Nutt, and original music by Tim Story capture all the wit, fun, and shivers of this early American tale. In 1988 the audio was honored with a Grammy nomination in the category of best recording for children.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9788726668032
Publisher:	Saga Egmont International
Publication date:	02/26/2021
Sold by:	De Marque
Format:	eBook
Pages:	3
File size:	434 KB

About the Author

Charles Perrault (12 January 1628 – 16 May 1703) was a French author considered the founder of the modern fairy tale.

Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm are considered by some to be the most well-known tellers of European folk tales, responsible for popularising such classics as "Cinderella", "Rapunzel" and "Snow White".

Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm are considered by some to be the most well-known tellers of European folk tales, responsible for popularising such classics as "Cinderella", "Rapunzel" and "Snow White".

When he had completed one year at the New York art school, DIK BROWNE quit school to start working at The New York American newspaper, where he made various technical illustrations. He joined the art staff of Newsweek, and then was inducted into the Army, where he spent three years in the Corps of Engineers.

Simultaneously he published his first comic, 'Ginny Jeep', which was distributed among American soldiers. In the 1940s he began an association with Johnstone & Cushing, an ad company specialized in advertising comics. Browne worked on promotional comic art for most of the 1950s, including the design of 'Chiquita Banana', the redesign of the 'Campbell Soup Kids' and a comic for Boy's Life, the official magazine of the Boy Scouts of America.

Browne's contribution was a strip called 'The Tracy Twins', that he drew from 1953 to 1960. But it would take him until 1954 before he got his lucky break: King Features editor Sylvan Beck, who noticed his work in Boy's Life magazine. Beck introduced him to Mort Walker, who was looking for an artist to draw a newspaper comic about the family life of the sister of his famous comic soldier 'Beetle Bailey'. By then, Walker had already picked the artist of the newspaper ad comic 'The Trouble Twins', which turned out to be Browne as well!

'Hi and Lois', written by Walker and drawn by Browne, debuted in October 1954. The strip met with great success and after two years, a Sunday page was added to the daily. Over the years, Browne has been assisted by Jerry Dumas, Bob and Greg Gustafson, as well as Mort Walker's sons Greg and Brian (script) and his own son Chance (art), who finally took over completely after Browne's death in 1989.

In 1973, Browne came up with the viking family comic 'Hagar the Horrible', also for King Features. Both 'Hi and Lois' and 'Hagar' have earned Dik Browne a place among the greatest comic artists of the U.S. 'Hagar' was continued by Browne's other son, Chris Browne.

WILLIAM "BILL" CROZIER WALSH was born in New York City on September 30, 1913. "Bill" Walsh joined the Disney Studio in 1943 as a gag writer for Mickey Mouse. He was also known as an illustrator for Classics Illustrated Comics. He later was the developer of the Mickey Mouse Club television show. He died in Los Angeles on January 27, 1975.

Read an Excerpt

The Author's Account of Himself

I am of this mind with Homer, that as the snaile that crept out of her shel was turned eftsoones into a Toad, and thereby was forced to make a stoole to sit on; so the traveller that stragleth from his owne country is in a short time transformed into so monstrous a shape that he is faine to alter his mansion with his manners and to live where he can, not where he would.

I was always fond of visiting new scenes and observing strange characters and manners. Even when a mere child I began my travels and made many tours of discovery into foreign parts and unknown regions of my native city; to the frequent alarm of my parents and the emolument of the town cryer. As I grew into boyhood I extended the range of my observations. My holy day afternoons were spent in rambles about the surrounding country. I made myself familiar with all its places famous in history or fable. I knew every spot where a murder or robbery had been committed or a ghost seen. I visited the neighbouring villages and added greatly to my stock of knowledge, by noting their habits and customs, and conversing with their sages and great men. I even journeyed one long summer's day to the summit of the most distant hill, from whence I stretched my eye over many a mile of terra incognita, and was astonished to find how vast a globe I inhabited.

This rambling propensity strengthened with my years. Books of voyages and travels became my passion, and in devouring their contents I neglected the regular exercises of the school. How wistfully would I wander about the pier heads in fine weather, and watch the parting ships, bound to distant climes. With what longing eyes would Igaze after their lessening sails, and waft myself in imagination to the ends of the earth.

Further reading and thinking, though they brought this vague inclination into more reasonable bounds, only served to make it more decided. I visited various parts of my own country, and had I been merely a lover of fine scenery, I should have felt little desire to seek elsewhere its gratification, for on no country have the charms of nature been more prodigally lavished. Her mighty lakes, like oceans of liquid silver; her mountains with their bright aerial tints; her valleys teeming with wild fertility; her tremendous cataracts thundering in their solitudes; her boundless plains waving with spontaneous verdure; her broad deep rivers, rolling in solemn silence to the ocean; her trackless forests, where vegetation puts forth all its magnificence; her skies kindling with the magic of summer clouds and glorious sunshine-no, never need an American look beyond his own country for the sublime and beautiful of natural scenery.

But Europe held forth the charms of storied and poetical association. There were to be seen the masterpieces of art, the refinements of highly cultivated society, the quaint peculiarities of ancient and local custom. My native country was full of youthful promise; Europe was rich in the accumulated treasures of age. Her very ruins told the history of times gone by, and every mouldering stone was a chronicle. I longed to wander over the scenes of renowned achievement-to tread as it were in the footsteps of antiquity-to loiter about the ruined castle-to meditate on the falling tower-to escape in short, from the commonplace realities of the present, and lose myself among the shadowy grandeurs of the past.

Editorial Reviews

No doubt about it--Caldecott Medalist Montresor has a unique, often disturbing artistic vision in his works. This has never been more evident than in his interpretation of Perrault's classic tale. The artist adheres closely to the source, an unrepentantly grisly story that rarely appears in its original form. His Red Riding Hood is a model of earthy innocence; the wolf an urbane, dapper figure turned out with hat and walking stick. Played out against Montresor's trademark dark backdrops, the story unfolds with a theatrical simplicity that accentuates its violent and even sexual undertones. Accompanied by an appropriately gruesome illustration, the tale ends abruptly and segues into an uneasy visual denouement: Red Riding Hood floats inside the wolf's swollen stomach across the final three wordless pages. When the hunter appears in the background on the final page, no clue is given as to his purpose and there is no hint of redemption. Older children and adults may well be riveted by the ambiguity and ferocity here, but youngest readers--raised on more benign versions of the tale--will probably be scared out of their socks. Ages 4-up. (Oct.)

Publishers Weekly - Publisher's Weekly

Gr 4 Up-- From the cover illustration, which both descends from and pays tribute to Gustave Dore's wood engraving of Little Red Riding Hood and the wolf, to the melancholy black endpapers, Montresor has provided a reinterpretation that is both astonishing and esoteric. Although Montresor chooses to omit it, Perrault himself appended a highly didactic moral in verse. In it he warns ``. . . pretty girls, who're bred as pure as pearls,. . . they may serve one day as feast for a wolf or other beast.'' It is the subtext and cryptic nature of the tale that Montresor enlarges and underscores masterfully. In disturbing illustrations heavily overlaid with black, he piles up images and scenes that will haunt readers: a graceful prepubescent Red Riding Hood who is watched silently by the town's women and girls, voyeurs at some obscure rite of passage; the encounter with the beguiling, dapper wolf; the palpable pause as Red Riding Hood stands, uncertain at the dark forbidding threshold of Grandmother's house; the wolf greedily devouring Red Riding Hood head first; three wordless illustrations following the end of the text in which the girl floats cruciformly, transformed and serene, within the distended belly of the wolf--seemingly ready for rebirth, absorbed into the unending chain of reproduction. While Montresor offers an ostensibly straightforward text, he has altered Perrault's original intent both by omitting the concluding moral and by silhouetting the figure of the Grimms's hunter on the final plate. His daring, enigmatic illustrations, saturated with layers of mysterious symbolism, are clearly his vehicle for reinterpretation. It is difficult to assign an appropriate age for this work, but it clearly does not belong on the picture-book shelves. Large folklore collections should consider this provocative version that will reward with endless possibilities for study, discussion, and comparison. --Kate McClelland, Perrot Memorial Library, Greenwich, CT

School Library Journal

Many folk-art paintings illustrate this simplified retelling of Washington Irving's "Legend of Sleepy Hollow". Varied in size from small vignettes to double-page spreads, the colorful paintings are reminiscent of the works of Moses' great-grandmother, better known as Grandma Moses. A large-format picture book that will fill a need in some libraries.

Carolyn Phelan

The unabridged text of Washington Irving's classic folktale is illustrated by Gary Kelley's evocative color chalk drawings and b&w gravestone rubbings. 8x13". Annotation c. Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)

Booknews