Johann's Gift to Christmas - Tapa dura

Johann's Gift to Christmas (with bonus book)

Librería:

The Bark of the Beech Tree
(Depoe Bay, OR, Estados Unidos de America)

Valoración

Valoración del vendedor:

Descripción Hardcover. Condición: Near Fine. Estado de la sobrecubierta: Very Good. Len Norris Ilustrador. 1st Edition. Signed by the author and illustrator. This lovely and unusual picture book is something of a team effort from the staff of The Vancouver Sun. Jack Richards worked on the newspaper for over twenty years (partly as Book Review Editor) and the much admired cartoonist, Len Norris, contributed his incisive and wonderful cartoons to the Sun from 1950 - 1988. Such a success is this picture book collaboration that it seems a shame the two of them apparently stopped right here. I can't see that Jack Richards ever wrote another book, and I can't see that, apart from his cartoon annuals, Norris ever illustrated another work, which is particularly disappointing because his sepia and full color wash drawings in this book are really delightful. The story, based on a real account, is about this music-loving mouse called Johann who becomes a starving church mouse and ends up eating the leather from the organ bellows to keep himself alive. This inadvertently leads to the writing and performing of a new Christmas carol: "Silent Night". Excellent stuff! The front endpaper, which doubles as the half-title, carries the signature of both the author and artist (who also dated his signature: '72). Published, same year, in the U.S. by Scribner's, this is the true first edition from the contributors' native Canada. Lower extremities are minimally bumped, and there is very slight browning to endpapers, but a near fine copy in very good, price-clipped dust jacket with some wear along top edge of front panel. Included with the purchase is a second book: "The Story of Silent Night" by Paul Gallico. Published by Crown in 1967, this is very likely one of the accounts that Richards used as a base for his picture book. Gallico admits in his account of the story that "truth is already touched by legend and research is coloured by imagination". This cute little red book gives, obviously, a more detailed and thorough version of the Christmas carol's origin and its development through the ages. Signed by Author & Illustrator. Nº de ref. del artículo: 000402

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