Nutcracker Week: Lisbeth Zwerger

The Nutcracker illustrated by Lisbeth Zwerger is my final entry for Nutcracker Week. Zwerger is no stranger to fairy tales. She has been published in many countries and her version of The Nutcracker is filled with earthy tones and soft images, unlike the brightly colored versions I've shared earlier this week.


The extra images came from Childscapes which sells first editions of her work.


Lovely.

Nutcracker Week: Up and Coming Illustrators

To finish off Nutcracker Week, I wanted to share some of the illustrations I found by up and coming illustrators at Picture Book.


by René Milot (Check out his illustration gallery to see the covers of some familiar book covers and more. He did the illustration for one cover of The Queen of Attolia, from one of my favorite books series. Is anyone else waiting with bated breath for A Conspiracy of Kings by Megan-Whalen-Turner? I preordered months ago and just rebought the other books for my Kindle.)


by Linda Bronson


by John Aardema


by Dan Hubig


by Catherine Kanner

Nutcracker Week: Vladimir Vagin

The Nutcracker Ballet by Vladimir Vagin is today's offering for Nutcracker Week. Vagin's illustrations for the story remind me of Jan Brett's work, with the intricate details and I also detect a bit of the influence of Ivan Bilibin among others, understandable with Vagin's Russian heritage. (He also illustrated Jane Yolen's The Flying Witch, a Baba Yaga story, and The Firebird.)

Publisher's description:

It's Christmas Eve in 19th century Europe. And on this magical evening, young Clara's eccentric godfather has given her a beautiful wooden nutcracker. As midnight strikes, Clara's wooden toy transforms into a handsome prince, and Christmas quickly becomes even more enchanting. The prince takes Clara on a romantic overnight adventure into a dream world of delicacies called the Land of Sweets.Clara's adventure ends as she wakes up snuggly tucked in her bed. As she embraces her nutcracker, she realizes that the best part of Christmas...is the magic it brings.

A review from Booklist:

Vagin's intricate period watercolors, not the straightforward telling, will pull readers into this story. Clara and the other children dress in formal nineteenth-century clothing and are lovely; Herr Drosselmeier dons a black cape and an eye patch and is just strange enough to be effective; the Nutcracker stands tall, proud, and well polished (so does the prince); the Mouse King and his soldiers are dark and nasty; and the inhabitants of the Land of the Sweets have a fantastical, dramatic quality about them. The paintings are rich and dense, and Vagin's ability to capture the flavor of the different cultures reflected in the various dances lends credibility and appeal to his version of the story. Children will pore over the details in the Christmas tree decorations, costumes, architecture, and landscapes and always discover something new. --Kathy Broderick

Nutcracker Week: Maurice Sendak

Here's the picture book version of The Nutcracker a few generations grew up with--not me, I'm just slightly too old--but the cover has become a common image used in posters and other materials. After all, it's by Maurice Sendak, of Where the Wild Things Are fame. Used copies are available and your favorite library should have it although its copies may have to have been retired from wear.

I don't have any other images to share, but this blog entry by Lance Mannion about the story and one child's experience with the 'Christmas' story is charming and has several images, albeit blurry ones. It also reminded me that the story is quite boy friendly although the ballet influence and marketing seems to have pushed it firmly into girls' territory these days. Rats, soldiers, battles, oh my! Sendak's version is also quite boy friendly in tone and style.

Nutcracker Week: Pop-Up Books

My love of pop-up books is no secret so today I share three Nutcracker versions.

The first is by one of the masters of pop-ups, David A. Carter, The Nutcracker Limited Edition: A Pop Up Adaptation Of E T A Hoffmanns Original Tale. This one came out almost ten years ago in standard and limited edition versions, the latter of which is still in print. (The standard one is out of print but almost as expensive now to buy used.) Pop-up books have quite a collectibles value growth over the years. The limited edition has a special pop-up on the cover as well as the pop-ups that are found in the inside of both versions, some I've pictured below in very small images, unfortunately. Either version is quite charming though.



I'll admit I've not seen the following--The Nutcracker by Patricia Fry--that came out last year, but it happens to still be in print having been released last year. This one appears to be geared more specifically at the younger set and makes a cheerful introduction to the ballet.


This last book, The Nutcracker by Nick Denchfield and Sue Scullard, is also out-of-print. I have to include it here because I actually own it and have spent warm hours over the past few years sharing it with some of my favorite children, one of whom even received a gift copy. The pop-ups are fairly standard, but elaborately colored and intricate enough to be interesting. They have a much more sophisticated appearance than Fry's version above.


And now I have dreams of Robert Sabuda doing his own version of the tale since he is my favorite pop-up engineer although David A. Carter is so close behind that it's almost a tie for first place. Sabuda's partner, Matthew Reinhart, is also holding his own very well. I've gifted his Star Wars: A Pop-Up Guide to the Galaxy more than any other pop-up book.

Nutcracker Week: Susan Jeffers

Today for Nutcracker week, I offer the picture book by Susan Jeffers, The Nutcracker.

This is one of my favorite versions because the simple, short prose makes it easy to share with young childrena and the illustrations are just lovely. Jeffers has illustrated several fairy tales over the years and several other "winter" or holiday tales. Her version of Silent Night is my favorite to share with children and their parents.


Here are some reviews, courtesty of Amazon:

"Energetic and child-friendly...Jeffers’s soft watercolors...capture both the drama of the classic story and the elegance of choreography." -- Publishers Weekly

"Jeffers’ lush watercolors...will wholly satisfy families...this treatment will earn curtain calls galore." -- ALA Booklist

"Skillfully retold with just a few lines of text per page...an excellent introduction to the ballet for younger children." -- Kirkus Reviews

"[Jeffers’s] romantic, detail-rich illustrations are based on the Balanchine ballet...Jeffers offers a satisfying extension" -- The Horn Book

I didn't have many images to share from this book, but do look for it at your bookstore or library. My sister and her husband have a collection of holiday books, one to read each night of the month up to Christmas as a literary advent calendar. This is the version of The Nutcracker I recommend for such a collection.

Tis the Season for The Nutcracker

Every year I field several Nutcracker queries, not as many now that Wikipedia offers some reasonably accurate articles (see The Nutcracker and the Mouse King and The Nutcracker). However, most information focuses on the ballet.

My parents tossed the figurative coin over who would escort me to see the ballet when I was old enough to beg and/or ask for it as part of my Christmas presents each year. The first tape of music I ever wore out personally was of Tchaikovsky's music. So, I am quite familiar with the ballet myself although I never knew much about the story behind it. So I was one of the ballet and Nutcracker obsessed as a child. My interest waned over the years as other things grew in personal importance, but I am still fascinated with the story and its history, since that is one of the things I do.

A few years ago, the prolific Jack Zipes offered a short book with new translations of the two original Nutcracker stories that inspired the ballet as well as an introductory essay. The first is The Nutcracker and the Mouse King by E. T. A. Hoffman and the second is Alexandre Dumas's adaptation of Hoffman's story.


Nutcracker and Mouse King and The Tale of the Nutcracker edited by Jack Zipes

The original stories behind everyone’s favorite Christmas ballet.

It wasn’t until the 1950s that seeing The Nutcracker at Christmastime became an American tradition. But the story itself is much older and its original intent more complex. This eye-opening new volume presents two of the tale’s earliest versions, both in new translations: E.T.A. Hoffmann’s Nutcracker and Mouse King (1816), in which a young girl is whisked away to the Land of Toys to help her animated nutcracker defeat the Mouse King, and Alexandre Dumas’s 1845 adaptation, The Tale of the Nutcracker, based on Hoffmann’s popular work. Irresistible tales of magic, mystery, and childhood adventure, these timeless delights and fresh interpretations about the importance of imagination will captivate readers of all ages.

If you are also interested in the history of the ballet and the story of how it has become so popular, I also recommend the following:


Nutcracker Nation: How an Old World Ballet Became a Christmas Tradition in the New World by Jennifer Fisher

Here's a review from Publishers Weekly:

Dance scholar, critic and former snowflake Fisher presents a lively historical and cultural analysis of The Nutcracker. The beloved ballet bonbon has been performed by the world's most prestigious dance companies, shown on television, adopted and adapted across North America, leaving one dance critic to grumble that, every year, we are all "one more Nutcracker closer to death." Still, Fisher's thoughtful account puts the phenomenon in perspective. Created in 1892 to Tchaikovsky's lush score, The Nutcracker was introduced to North America in the early 20th century by Russian touring companies and legitimized in the 1950s by George Balanchine, who had danced Lev Ivanoff's original steps at St. Petersburg's Maryinsky Theater. Balanchine choreographed his own distinctly Americanized version, adding it to the New York City Ballet's annual holiday repertoire. Televised in the late 1950s, NYCB's Nutcracker was seen across the continent, and as baby boomers were sent off to ballet classes, The Nutcracker became the perfect vehicle to showcase their talents. With its secular holiday appeal, it also became a moneymaker for struggling regional dance companies, who lent their versions of the ballet a unique flavor-hulas in Hawaii, cowboys in Arizona, cross-dressing in Mark Morris's The Hard Nut. Fisher deconstructs many of these versions, analyzing how the ballet has become both an annual ritual and a rite of passage. The Nutcracker may be, as Fisher writes, "the ballet we love to hate," a "cliche‚ in a world that craves constant innovation," but she also explains why it has become a meaningful ritual that Americans have "taken to heart." 40 illus.

I plan to make this week a Nutcracker week, sharing more books and music connected to the story and ballet in addition to my regular posts. This tale has certainly become part of our folklore and traditions and deserves a little time.