The Green Frogs: A Korean Folktale

by Yumi Heo

Overview

Like most rebellious children, the green frogs in this Korean folktale love to disobey their mother. What-ever she asks them to do, they do the opposite . . . until their bad habit lands them in trouble.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780618432288
Publisher:	HarperCollins
Publication date:	05/25/2004
Edition description:	Reprint
Pages:	32
Sales rank:	226,051
Product dimensions:	10.25(w) x 8.75(h) x 0.11(d)
Lexile:	AD540L (what's this?)
Age Range:	4 - 7 Years

About the Author

Yumi Heo was born and raised in Korea but now lives near New York City. She remembers being told the story of the green frogs when she, a little girl in Korea, had disobeyed her mother.

Editorial Reviews

"Instant child appeal. Heo adds to the fun with her unique illustrations." Horn Book, Starred —

From the Publisher

Two frog brothers always do the opposite of what their mother asks, until she dies and, in a final irony, they obey her wishes. "This Korean folktale is so beguilingly retold and visualized with such individuality that it deserves a wide audience," PW said. Ages 4-8. (May) Copyright 2004 Reed Business Information.

Publishers Weekly

Although its conclusion may sit uneasily with guilt-phobic Americans, this Korean folktale is so beguilingly retold and visualized with such individuality that it deserves a wide audience. The ebullient, sensory-overload style of illustration Heo brought to One Afternoon is turned down several notches here, creating a busy, funny, yet delicate backdrop in oil and pencil. The story focuses on two frog brothers who always do the opposite of what their beleaguered mother asksthey even croak backward. Well aware of her sons' contrariness, the mother, dying and wishing to be buried on the sunny side of a hill, tells them, "Please bury me in the shade by the stream." Ironically, this time they obey and bury her by the stream. When it rains, they beg the stream not to wash their mother's grave away, "and ever since then, whenever, it rains, green frogs sit by streams and cry." This is a strong lesson in obedience, but deftly rendered with a light touch. Ages 4-7. (Sept.)

Publishers Weekly - Publisher's Weekly

From a Korean folktale, the story of two frogs who always do the opposite of what their mother tells them. When it's time to wake up, they don't; when it's time to eat duckweed soup, they won't; when it's time to clean up, they make a mess; when it's time to be quiet, they start croaking. Their mother's dying wish is expressed carefully: So that she will be buried on the sunny side of the hill, she purposely asks her sons to bury her in the shade by the stream. Regretful of their past behavior, the sons obey her wish, which is why each time the stream threatens to flood her grave, they sit by the waters and weep. It's also why naughty children in Korea are called "green frogs."

Heo (Father's Rubber Shoes?, 1995) provides a gleefully fatalistic retelling, but the writing is surprisingly wooden. The magnificently eccentric illustrations, full of tortured proportions and twisted perspectives, depict three ungainly frogs surrounded by a bizarre variety of bugs, plants, wallpaper patterns, and little squiggles, all in an idiosyncratic palette of grimy green mixed with beige, pink, and blue.

Kirkus Reviews