Nursery Rhyme Comics

edited by Chris Duffy
introduction by Leonard S. Marcus
First Second  2011


Fifty timeless rhymes! From fifty celebrated cartoonists! At least forty-nine excellent classic nursery rhymes in a cartoon format!

There are a number of ways to approach nursery rhymes. You can either take them at their most surface story level. You can interpret them literally or figuratively or historically. You could also enjoy them strictly for their sound, for the way they roll with linguistic cadences. And with subjects like animals behaving oddly or inanimate objects coming to life or simply reveling in the absurdity of fairy tale-like imagery it is easy to see why nursery rhymes endure: they are wide open to interpretation and imagination.

Mother Goose and other nursery rhyme collections tend toward the cute, or the sweet, or at the very least, non-threatening. Most collections settle for a single image or two that illustrates some element of the story and leaves the rest out. For the truly young the story and the image become linked, forever lodged without explanation or the desire to even understand. It's a marvelous and sometimes bizarre thing to plant in a young mind the image of a Jack and a Jill tumbling head-first down a hill simply for doing their chores.

Enter sequential storytelling.

Sequential visual narratives strive to tell a story not only in the pictures but between the panels. Like picture books, they extend the characters and the narrative from one to the next, each panel like a page unto itself, each transition like a page turn. Structurally, comics and graphic novels make for great transitional narrative for readers as they are dialog driven and tend to build scene upon scene. Add nonsensical nursery rhymes and the interpretation of cartoonists and you've got quite a wild ride.

How many times have you heard or read Humpty Dumpty? How does it end? It ends in tragedy, like Shakespeare, inevitable and unchangeable. Ah, but cartoons have a long history of the punchline, the change-up at the end, a twist that turns everything on its ear. What if the Egg Man fell, cracked open, and out sprang a half dozen smaller versions of himself? This is precisely what Gilbert Hernandez does in his retelling, and in doing so transforms the familiar into the new.

In other rhymes the narrative is subverted for a parallel story not even hinted at in the original. Little Boy Blue remains a farm boy shirking his duties, but here the barnyard animals are the ones who are featured. Bob Flynn has the sheep in meadow throwing Frisbees, and the reason no one is willing to wake him is because the animals have a pretty good poker game going on.

On the historical front, leave it David Macaulay to turn London Bridge into a lesson about all the different architectural forms the bridge has taken in its time. From rickety wood to stone and steel, Macaulay manages to erase the notion that the rhyme is only suited for playground games where some unlucky sod gets caught in the gated arms of classmates (usually some boy trapped between two girls).

The collection of cartoonists involved is fantastic. Personal faves include Jules Feiffer, Eleanor Davis, Craig Thompson, Sara Varon, Marc Rosenthal, Kate Beaton, Tony Millionaire... a collection too numerous to mention. Most I have encountered somewhere along the way, either in alternative comics or picture books or graphic novels, and with the exception of a single artist whose style I just don't care for I find them all to be equally suited to the task.

For most families with children I would say this shouldn't be the first or only collection of nursery rhymes. But for those who might want a second book this might make a great addition for the family with a new reader looking to read nursery rhymes to younger siblings. It'll make them the hip and cool kid who introduces their kid brothers and sisters into the joys of reading, storytelling, and the slightly subversive world of comics.

Whistle, Mary, Whistle

an old jingle adapted by
Bill Martin, Jr.
with pictures by
Emanuele Luzzati
and handlettering by
Ray Barber
Holt Rinehart, and Winston 1970

Yes, as a matter of fact, there are some books I do read for the pictures.

One of the lasting after effects of wanting to grow up an be an animator is that I still keep an eye open for blogs and news about cartoons and animation, especially from the pre-digital era. It's also no secret that I hold a fondness for mid-century modern illustration, and anything else that feels like my childhood. So when these things all come together in one place, or in this case a book, my curiosity is piqued.

Emanuele Luzzati was an illustrator, animator and graphic artist whose work has a very familiar look that carried a lose, childlike feel to it. When coupled with Bill Martin Jr. in a small picture book the hook is irresistible. But what we land when the hook is reeled in is a bit odd to these adult eyes.

"Whistle, Mary, whistle, / And you shall have a..." is the text on the verso page, with the last word being an object promised to Mary id she will whistle. On the recto Mary offers up her reason why she cannot whistle, surly a made-up excuse, which always rhymes with the first part of the verse. It's a fairly typical call-and-response sort of text whose repetition takes on the sing-song qualities of a playground rhyme or an old folk song.

But the punchline is that the thing that makes Mary whistle.

"Whistle, Mary, whistle,
and you shall have a man."

Tweet, tweeet, tweeeet, tweeeeeeeet, tweeeeet,
I just found out I can."

Uh, yeah.

This was 1970? Was this Bill Martin holding on to the traditional verse, or Bill Martin holding onto Victorian ideals in an age of budding feminism? Obviously this book would not pass muster today, and I don't believe it's been in print since originally published.

Visually, Luzzati's work had a playful joy to it that I would still like to see in books today; it's loose, playful, and childlike in a way that is inviting to young children. I find many books today with computer generated images have fine texts but are otherwise cold and sterile. The inclusion of hand-drawn letters (and a title page credit) is something I think would be welcome over the font choices made today. Even when alternative fonts are used today they too often feel like the office temp making posters for the employee kitchen using Microsoft Word. Cold images, cold fonts... reading should be a warm and inviting experience. If this makes me sound like a crusty old man, so be it.

Humpty Dumpty Jr: Hardboiled Detective

Case #1: The Case of the Fiendish Flapjack Flop
written by Nate Evans and Paul Hindman
illustrated by Vince Evans and Nate Evans
Sourcebooks / Jabberwocky 2008

A hardboiled detective series for the chapter book set is a welcome addition to the... wait. Aren't most chapter book series mysteries of one sort or another?

Yes, and with good reason. The mystery story has the opportunity to instantly engage a reader. It makes them feel smart as they puzzle through the clues and watch the hero attempt to solve the mystery before falling in the clutches of the evil villain. In this case, responding to a distress call HD finds Miss Patty Cake has been kidnapped, her secret recipes stolen. But before our hero can get on the case he is accosted by by a street urchin named Rat who thinks HD has kidnapped his morning meal ticket. They join an uneasy alliance, collect clues, and hit the case hard. With the Humpty Dumpty Jr series we have the added benefit of puns. Our hero is a good egg who can be counted on to crack the case and leave no yolk untouched.

There's a lot packed into this series, perhaps just a bit too much. Giving us characters straight from nursery rhymes is fine, if familiar (c.f. Jasper Fforde's The Big Over Easy for an adult version of this same sort of theme), and blending it with the hardboiled noir stories of Raymond Chandler set loose in New Yolk is fine, but when blended with mythological and other anthropomorphic animals surrounded by humans, well, it feels like one element too far. Does the precinct captain need to be a minotaur, and does the police chief need to be a rhino? And how do they fit in with the rest of the fairy tale characters like Little Jack Horner and the Queen of Hearts?

And while I can appreciated replacing guns of traditional detective stories with a magic egg beater and a magic pinwheel, the introduction of this element gives the book a fantasy turn that turns the whole mess runny. Kids who can appreciate the humor of the genre would just as easily understand water pistols filled different liquids that could have destructive effects to various characters. In fact, HD does resort to milk-filled balloons to fell a cake dragon into a soggy mess. But having the egg beater change things uncontrollably, or to have the pinwheel freeze people with the coolness of peppermint candy dilutes the hardboiled atmosphere. Some genres and settings just can't be blended successfully. Moonraker, anyone? Was there anything more ridiculous than Bond in space?

Recently the question was raised about introducing satire or parodies of genres that younger readers wouldn't likely to be familiar with. The argument was that without understanding the point of reference the point of the humor was lost. The counter argument is that the satire plants the seeds, that when readers are older they'll get the joke. Sort of like watching Bugs Bunny cartoons and not getting what Humphrey Bogart is doing begging for spare change until you see Treasure of the Sierra Madre. I would have to say that in order for the humor to be appreciated down the road the satire must be impeccably faithful. The goal is for the reader to one day have an "a ha!" moment that ties them back to their original experience with a fondness and a newer appreciation. If the derivative material is weak, when the reader comes to experience the source they come to feel betrayed.

Watch a kid's reaction when they encounter Lord of the Rings after Harry Potter and learn the subtle difference between homage and borrowing.

All of this to say that I think kids at the chapter book stage would truly enjoy a clever series that mirrors Phillip Marlowe or Sam Spade a little more closely. Kids love mysteries and that includes trying to solve them, unlike with HD Jr. where Rat withholds evidence until it's expedient for him to "suddenly remember" something new. The reader should be able to connect dots and make guesses beyond vague recollection of villains in the first few pages who might have escape prison but have to do extensive monologuing toward the end in order to explain their motives.

For readers sharp enough to catch the puns, and like a little more humor than an A to Z Mystery can deliver, but find The Time Warp Trio intimidating this just might do the trick.