Peter and the North Wind
PreSchool-Grade 1Young Peter sets off to the North Wind to retrieve flour that the wind has blown away in this retelling of an old Norse tale. Curiously, Howell's pastels exhibit a style reminiscent of the Dutch masters, with sepia, beige, buff, and rose dominating the illustra tions. Peter looks more like Paula, but the burly, bearded North Wind is ap propriately imposing. He gives Peter a magic cloth which creates food on com mand. An inn-keeper steals the cloth, replacing it with an ordinary one. As children will undoubtedly realize be fore Peter, the cloth will not perform. This is repeated with a magic, coin- making goat and a magic stick which Peter uses to beat the innkeeper and retrieve his belongings. Littledale's prose renders a charming tale pedestri an, and the awkward typesetting does not improve matters. The illustrations are pleasant, but there are some curious contradictions. Baby-faced Peter and the feast he conjures up are more medi eval in tone than the story, while his mother is dressed in a plain apron, sun- bonnet, and rustic clogs. She is pic tured in front of a home that, combined with her attire (sans clogs), sets a scene more evocative of dust-bowl Oklahoma than is appropriate for a tale of the North Wind. The story has inherent charm, but this version does little to enhance it. Wait for a more brisk telling to blow by.Joanna G. Jones, Hunter don County Library, Flemington, N.J.Copyright 1988 Reed Business Information, Inc.--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.