Top 100 Picture Books #6: Make Way for Ducklings by Robert McCloskey

Top 100 Picture Books #6: Make Way for Ducklings by Robert McCloskey

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#6 Make Way for Ducklings by Robert McCloskey (1941)
163 points
McCloskey’s attention to detail and marvelous storytelling are a magical combination. – Heather Christensen
I actually remember, when I was a very little girl, hearing Captain Kangaroo read this book on television. I remember the way the camera panned over the ducks almost getting hit by the cars. Later, I bought the book and read it many times to my sons. Best of all, when we visited the Boston Public Garden when my firstborn son was two years old, we visited the statues of Mrs. Mallard, followed by Jack, Kack, Lack, Mack, Nack, Ouack, Pack, and Quack. I took a picture of my son on Mrs. Mallard’s back, then taped that sweet picture into the front of our book. – Sondra Eklund
Take a back seat, LeVar Burton.  Clearly your book recommendation skills still pale in comparison to the Cap’n.
The synopsis from the publisher reads, “The busy Boston streets are too dangerous for eight little ducklings! But with a little help from a friendly policeman Mrs. Mallard and her family arrive safely at their new home. The public garden was no place for ducklings when they were first born, but now they are old enough to brave the raucous crowds and swim with the giant swan boats.”
I once posted that my Interesting Fact of the Day was that Robert McCloskey was 28 when he won a Caldecott for Make Way for Ducklings.  In fact, I do believe he was the youngest person to win a Caldecott Award until a certain Ms. Erin E. Stead happened to come along. 
Minders of Make-Believe discusses one of the best publicity stunts for a soon-to-be released picture book on record today.  “The editors of Life became interested in what McCloskey was up to when they learned (doubtless thanks  to a well-placed telephone call from May Massee) that the artist had recently purchased a crate-load of ducklings at a local market and hauled them up to his West Twelfth Street apartment to serve as life models . . . . A reporter and photographer were dispatched to the fourth-floor walkup, and the piece was put to bet complete with candid shots of ducklings scrambling adorably up and down the artist’s sleeve.”  Granted the German invasion of Poland scrapped the story, but it would’ve been brilliant!  THAT is how you market a book, people.
Since Life digitized its collection onto Google Image, I had hoped to find the shots mentioned here.  Maybe it’s because the story never ran, but the only thing I was able to find when I put in “Robert McCloskey” was this image of him playing the harmonica.

We take what we can get.  Lovely hands.
100 Best Books for Children reports that the original working title of this book was Boston Is Lovely in the Spring.  Had they kept it, imagine the gift this would have been to the Boston Tourism Board.  The book also points out that the original names of the ducks were “Mary, Martha, Phillys, Theodore, Beatrice, Alice, George, and John.”  The world would be a poorer place indeed without an “Ouack” in it.
There’s an interview with Mr. McCloskey that discusses this book over at The Horn Book from NPR circa 1986.  You may either listen or read the recap, as you prefer.  I like that those first names of the ducks he used were “names of all the girls I knew, not even in alphabetical order.”
Of course the Boston Public Garden created a duckling statue, that is well worth visiting, back in October 4, 1987.  The artist was Nancy Schon who discusses the commission a little on her website.  A kind of McCloskey specialist, she also created the Lentil sculptures over in Hamilton, Ohio.


Interestingly, Boston is not the only city containing statues of the ducks.  Perhaps you have heard of a little place called Novodevichy Park, Moscow?  No?  Oh.  Well they have some too.  A gift from Barbara Bush to Soviet First Lady Raisa Gorbachev.  Ms. Schon did that sculpture as well.

Top 100 Children's Novels #7: From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler

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#7 From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler by E.L. Konigsburg (1967)
183 points
A brother and sister run away to Metropolitan Museum of art in New York City. Is it plausible? Dude, you’re missing the point. For kids, this 1968 Newbery Medal winner is escapist fiction at its best. – Travis Jonker
I listened to this book on audiobook cassette every night for weeks in the fourth grade. I was too shy to run away to a museum, so I lived vicariously through Claudia and Jamie. Add in an art mystery? I was obsessed! This was also the first I learned the sad truth about movie adaptations. The made for TV movie came out a few years after I read the book and it failed miserably to meet my 13-year-old expectations. I cried so much after the movie aired and consoled myself in the book once again because the book was of course much better. – Sarah (Green Bean Teen Queen)
When I had the kids read this book as part of my library bookgroup I told them all about automats.  They were enthralled.  Now my library is opening an exhibit that will feature a real automat in the center of the exhibit space.   I’m oddly excited about this.
The synopsis from the book itself reads, “Claudia knew that she could never pull off the old-fashioned kind of running away . . . so she decided to run not from somewhere but to somewhere – somewhere large, warm, comfortable, and beautiful.  And that was how Claudia and her brother, Jamie, ended up living in the Metropolitan Museum of Art – and right in the middle of a mystery that made headlines.”
Origins.  According to Perry Nodelman in American Writers for Children Since 1960: Fiction, “Konigsburg has said the book originated at a family picnic in Yellowstone National Park, during which her children complained about everything they could think of: ‘I realized that if my children ever left home, they would never revert to barbarism. They would carry with them all the fussiness and tidiness of suburban life. Where could they go…? Maybe they could find some way to live with caution and compulsiveness and still satisfy their need for adventure’.”  I love that quote.  It sort of allows the entire book to make sense to me.
Anita Silvey in 100 Best Books for Children adds in some other pertinent details.  “In 1965 she read in the New York Times about the purchase of a statue by the Metropolitan Museum of Art – The Lady with the Primroses, possibly the work of Leonardo da Vinci.”  The characters of Claudia and Jamie were also based on her own kids.
In terms of the book, Nodelman quotes John Rowe Townsend who says, “The fact that Mrs. Frankweiler narrates the whole story, which she herself does not enter until near the end, seems to me to be a major flaw.”  Nodelman adds, “indeed, the biggest question about this novel is why Mrs. Frankweiler is in it at all. But it is Mrs. Frankweiler’s presence in the book that allows it to be more than lightweight.”
Pop Quiz, Hotshots: What do the E. and the L. in E.L. Konigsburg’s name stand for?  You have until the end of this post to answer correctly.  Tick… tick… tick…
When asked in an interview in the February 1986 edition of Language Arts how she crafts her stories, Ms. Konigsburg had this to say: “Somewhere in the course of writing the characters take over and often begin writing their own dialogue. I remember very well writing From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler up to the point at which Claudia and Jamie go to Mrs. Frankweiler’s house, and Claudia excuses herself to wash up before lunch, and she sees that marvelous black marble bathtub; I didn’t know until Claudia was in the bathroom that she was actually going to take a bath in that bathtub; it’s telling myself the story as I’m telling it to others. That’s a kind of magic that happens when your characters become so alive that you write something, and review it the next day and you think, ‘Oh, did I write that?’ It’s almost as if you’re a conduit for what’s happening.”
Personally, I was very pleased indeed to read the book and find that the library Claudia visited when she and Jamie need to do some research was the then new Donnell Library on 53rd between 5th and 6th Avenue.  I used to work there.  At the time the book came out New York Public Library’s Central Children’s Room had not yet moved to that location (they would do so in 1970).  Now the library is gone, but it lives on in Claudia’s research.  Personally, my associations with the Metropolitan Museum of Art, however, are tied far closer to Sesame Street Visits the Museum than this book.
The book won a Newbery Award in 1968, beating out The Black Pearl by Scott O’Dell, The Fearsome Inn by Isaac Bashevis Singer, The Egypt Game by Zilpha Keatley Snyder and (amazingly enough) fellow E.L. Konigsburg title (and her first novel) Jennifer, Hecate, Macbeth, William McKinley, and Me, Elizabeth. That was a good year for her.  Indeed, Frankweiler was published just a few months after Jennifer.  Nodelman says, “The Newbery list has not included two books by the same author before or since.”  Imagine that pressure.  Your first two books win both a Newbery and a Newbery Honor.  It’s amazing she ever managed to write anything again!  Weaker souls would have crumbled under the pressure (and indeed book #3, About the B’Nai Bagels, received some criticism for not living up to its predecessors).
Perhaps there is lots of art based on this book out there, but my heart belongs to this image from artist Phil McAndrews.  As you can see, it’s from the beginning of the book when Claudia is attempting to convince Jamie of her brilliant plan. I also love this one of hiding in the bathroom.

Of all the books on this Top 100, this one has probably had the strangest incremental changes made to its jackets.  At the beginning of this post you can see the original cover, illustrated by Ms. Konigsburg herself.  Is it just me, or did authors do their own covers a lot more in the past?  The Giver.  Harriet the Spy.  The Hobbit.  Now this.  Maybe that’s the secret to attaining “classic” status, folks.  Konigsburg’s publishers have always been loathe to let go of the original image.  It leads to some interesting changes.  Watch the slow process of updating.  First the kids became real and then . . . :



Fascinating, eh?  By the end they finally get inside the place.  And then there was this other jacket:

It’s easy to forget about the film.  For one thing, the original unwieldy title would never have fit on a marquee, so they renamed it The Hideaways.  Ingrid Bergman played Mrs. Frankweiler.  Here’s a little clip:

Years later they’d remake the film, this time with Lauren Bacall.  Ingrid Bergman, Lauren Bacall . . . apparently Mrs. Frankweiler is one hotsy totsy dame.  I vote that they make her Isabella Rossellini next time around.
It has also been referenced in films like The Royal Tenenbaums. Wes Anderson has since said that this scene is a direct homage. You can find it at 3:45 in this clip.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AB8bXEp4OIs&feature=embed
Answer to the Quiz Question: The E.L. stands for Elaine Lobl.

Top 100 Picture Books #7: Knuffle Bunny, A Cautionary Tale by Mo Willems

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#7 Knuffle Bunny, A Cautionary Tale by Mo Willems (2004)
129 points
These perfect pictures of New York City complement the family tale of Daddy who is wrong, wrong, wrong, and Trixie, who is totally right, but can’t yet say words to tell him. Heartwarming and hilarious. – Diantha McBride
And this is the book that sealed that obsession evermore. Mo-tastic. – Pam Coughlan
There have been others, and they are just as good, but this one still makes all of us smile (and my youngest is six now). Sometimes, the first one is still the best. – Melissa Fox
This may be a shocking inclusion on the Top 10 list to some, but for others they might remember that last time I conducted this poll Knuffle Bunny came in at a reasonable #10.  Now it moves up three spots, which may owe as much to its continued popularity as to the success of its subsequent sequels.  I do wonder if even Mr. Mo knew that Trixie would gain a trilogy out of the tale of one lost bunny.
The plot from my old review reads, “Trixie and her pop are off to the local neighborhood Laundromat one bright and sunny day. They get there, load the clothes, and take off for home when little Trixie comes to an awful realization. Knuffle Bunny, her beloved favorite toy, is missing. Unfortunately for her, she has not yet learned to talk. After some valiant tries (my favorite being the single tearful ’snurp’) she feels she has no alternative but to burst into a full-blown tantrum. This doesn’t make her father any happier and since he hasn’t realized what the problem is, he takes her home as she kicks and screams. Once home, however, her mother quickly asks, ‘Where’s Knuffle Bunny’? Back runs the whole family to the Laundromat where, at long last, the beloved bunny is recovered and Trixie says her first real words.”
Its origin story is rooted in a happy accident.  Alessandra Balzer (of Balzer & Bray, an imprint of Harper Collins) was in an office with Mo and his art director as he vaguely told a story about his daughter.  Alessandra insisted that he turn the story into a book, so he went home to try.  He’d done a comic about his family for a DC comics anthology but, as he says in Leonard Marcus’s book Show Me a Story: Why Picture Books Matter, “the characters weren’t popping and I couldn’t get it to work.  Then one of my drawings accidentally fell on top of one of the photographs on my light box, and I suddenly had the idea to combine the two.”  That distinctive look is part of what sets KB apart from the pack.  He result is that Willems believes that by combining drawings with photos “They’re purer than more realistic drawings of the character would have been, because their design focuses on their emotional side.”
Mo spoke at a SCBWI conference in the Pacific Northwest about five or six years ago.  At the time he discussed the fact that Knuffle Bunny was the first Caldecott Honor winner to contain photography in any way, shape, or form.  He’s been asked since then why he made such a “bold” choice.  The fact of the matter, though, is that he partly saw it as a time saver.  Of course, once he got into it he didn’t realize the amount of soul-sucking hours it would take to resize the characters so that they’d be proportional within their photographic environment.  As it happens, the result is that he managed to create one of the only (perhaps THE only?) Caldecott Honor winners to incorporate photography into its images.
Said Horn Book, “There’s plenty here for kids to embrace. There are playful illustrations and a simple, satisfying story. This everyday drama will immediately register with even pre-verbal listeners.”
Kirkus and its starred review said of it, “Anguish begets language in this tale of a toddler’s lost stuffie . . . The natural audience for this offering is a little older than its main character: they will easily identify with Trixie’s grief and at the same time feel superior to her hapless parent-and rejoice wholeheartedly at the happy reunion.”
The starred review from SLJ said of it, “Personalities are artfully created so that both parents and children will recognize themselves within these pages. A seamless and supremely satisfying presentation of art and text.”
The starred Booklist review (which is more than a little excellent) by Jennifer Mattson said, “This comic gem proves that Caldecott Medal-winner Willems, the Dr. Spock and Robin Williams of the lap-sit crowd, has just as clear a bead on pre-verbal children as on silver-tongued preschoolers . . . Even children who can already talk a blue streak will come away satisfied that their own strong emotions have been mirrored and legitimized, and readers of all ages will recognize the agonizing frustration of a little girl who knows far more than she can articulate.”
But don’t take my word for it.  Here’s a fun activity.  Go to YouTube and type in “Knuffle Bunny”.  The results yield parent after parent after parent reading the books to their children.
Speaking of videos, if you want to see the Carnegie Award winning Weston Woods video of Knuffle Bunny, there’s no better place to watch it than here.  Read, as it happens, by Mo and the real Trixie. Please excuse the bizarre subtitles on this sample:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c_aSYAtzsY4&feature=embed
Live action more your style?  Well here’s one of the theatrical productions of the show.  Dear me.  Would that every picture book author were so lucky.

Top 100 Children's Novels #8: Anne of Green Gables by L.M. Montgomery

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#8 Anne of Green Gables by L.M. Montgomery (1908)
182 points
Oh how I wanted to be Anne Shirley growing up! I could relate to her so much-I was imaginative and had a temper to match, so I always felt as though Anne was a kindred spirit. And who wouldn’t want to end up with Gilbert Blythe?? This is a series that whenever I would read them, I would find myself in a “reading fog”. I would stop reading and have to remember that I wasn’t on Prince Edward Island with Anne and Diana. It always seemed like such a magical place and I wished for those books to be real. A friend said it best when she told me “there’s always a Anne book for every stage of life.” I think that’s what makes them timeless. – Sarah (Green Bean Teen Queen)
Anne took this skinny, awkward, mousy-haired suburban lass from the age of bell bottoms and sunset-print polyester shirts and dropped her into a world of Victorian charm. A world of puffed sleeves, bosom friends, strolls down wooded lanes, and unbridled imagination. I must have reread Gilbert rescuing Anne from under the bridge a million times. Oh, the transforming power of literature on a young romantic soul. Anne, how I dreamed of being you. – DaNae Leu
L. M. Montgomery’s books are the sort of books I reread every few years just to feel that life is good. – Sondra Eklund
L.M. Montgomery, to my mind, single-handedly destroys the notion that authors give themselves initials as their first names so as to throw off potential male readers who wouldn’t want a book penned by a woman.  Is there any book in this world girlier than Anne of Green Gables?  Or, for that matter, any other of Ms. Montgomery’s works?  Be that as it may be, tis a fine novel for both the boy and girl set.  Aside from Pippi Longstocking, there’s no other literary redhead of quite the same tomboyish aspects as our Anne.
How it came to be:  In 100 Best Books for Children by Anita Silvey we learn that when Ms. Montgomery began writing the book she, “first intended the story to be a mere seven chapters long, ideal for a serial treatment in a Sunday school paper.”  That plan quickly fell by the wayside and so she submitted it to several publishers.  It was rejected multiple times, and according to What Katy Read, after she got four rejections in a row, “Montgomery put the manuscript in an old hat-box, intending at some later date to cut it back to its original proportions. But she changed her mind when she rediscovered the forgotten work in the winter of 1906, and decided to try it out once more.”  So it reached L.C. Page and Company.  They offered her “either an outright fee of $500 or a royalty of 9 cents a book.”  Thank the heavens above she went with the royalty.  Her first royalty check = $1730.  The book was an instant hit.
Obviously the publisher wanted sequels and she obliged, though she would say that the, “freshness of the idea was gone . . . I simply built it. Anne, grown-up, couldn’t be made as quaint and unexpected as the child Anne.” Seven books would follow, but they never quite lived up to the first.
Book #1 remains hugely beloved.  Indeed in December 2009 a first edition of this book sold at auction for $37,500.  This smashed the previous child vintage children’s novel record of a mere $24,000.  Sotheby’s also auctioned off the book in 2005, but that sale was marred slightly by the fact that they referred to the title as “a beloved American children’s book.” One must assume that the Canadians were NOT pleased.
There haven’t been any sequels by other folks, partly because Montgomery was clever enough to write them herself.  There was, however, a relatively recent prequel.  In conjunction with Anne’s 100th birthday, Budge Wilson wrote Before Green Gables.  It met with mixed reviews, though many folks liked it.  It has, however, largely been forgotten since its publication.

  • I do believe you can visit Lucy Maud Montgomery’s house if you like.

The longer a perennially popular book has been around, the more difficult it is to find all the covers.  This is just a small selection of what I found.  For a complete collection of covers, go to The Green Gables Project.  In this tiny sample you’ll find:






























Periodically the book gets filmed.  Not as often as Little Women or anything, but continually just the same.  First there was the 1919 version.  Not on YouTube, obviously, but you can listen to the theme if you really want to.  Back in 1934 there was this version, directed by George Nichols Jr.:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lw499WSH7aM&feature=embed
Then came a 1956 version, but that’s probably best left forgotten.  No, the Anne that is undeniably the best there is, bar none, came in 1985.  It was produced for television, brilliantly cast, and when people of my generation think of the book it’s hard not to conjure up Megan Follows’ face.

And, of course, there was the inevitable Japanese animated series.  One of the stranger openings of a television show I’ve seen, though kind of nice (and, stranger still, translated into Italian)P
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vOObTgsfRKM&feature=embed

Top 100 Picture Books #8: Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day by Judith Viorst, illustrated by Ray Cruz

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#8 Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day by Judith Viorst, illustrated by Ray Cruz (1972)
120 points

We all have bad days—even in Australia. – Heather Christensen
Of all the books out there that deal with schadenfreude, none do it quite so well as Alexander.  Now there’s a kid who just cannot win.  He’s the Charlie Brown of picture books.  If he isn’t losing his cash in Alexander, Who Used to Be Rich Last Sunday then he’s protesting a new living situation (not in Australia) in Alexander, Who’s Not (Do You Hear Me? I Mean It!) Going to Move. Of course he started life in this book where everything that could possibly go wrong does.  The perfect antidote to any adult that claims that childhood is one sweet, blissful, stress free ride of innocence and carefree days.
The plot synopsis from the publisher reads, “He could tell it was going to be a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day. He went to sleep with gum in his mouth and woke up with gum in his hair. When he got out of bed, he tripped over his skateboard and by mistake dropped his sweater in the sink while the water was running. He could tell it was going to be a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day. It was a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day. Nothing at all was right. Everything went wrong, right down to lima beans for supper and kissing on TV. What do you do on a day like that? Well, you may think about going to Australia. You may also be glad to find that some days are like that for other people too.”
I know little about the creation of this book but I do like that in her bio Ms. Viorst (who is still publishing to this day with such titles as the upcoming September title Lulu Walks the Dogs) writes that she has been writing, “at least since I was seven or eight, when I composed an ode to my dead parents, both of whom were alive and well and, when they read my poem, extremely annoyed.”  She has three sons, one of whom is named “Alexander”.  And so yet another child of an author goes on to become a cultural phenomenon.
I feel like illustrator Ray Cruz never gets enough credit for this book.  I mean, half the time you hear this title mentioned it’s alongside the name “Judith Viorst”.  Not Ray Cruz.  And certainly the case could be made that unlike some other books it’s the writing and concept of this story that sticks in the mind the best.  But I also feel that there’s a reason that this 1972 publication has never been republished with a different artist.  The sole biography I was able to track down of the man reads, “Ray Cruz grew up in New York City and has been drawing since he was five years old. In addition to his work as an illustrator, he has had extensive experience in textile design and graphic art.”  As for his art, the de Grummond Children’s Literature Collection in Minnesota may yield some answers there. “The Ray Cruz Papers contain original illustrations, color separations, layouts, and book dummies for nine books illustrated by Cruz between 1971 and 1987.”  Yet the Alexander book about moving was actually done by future Fancy Nancy artist Robin Preiss Glasser.  Why the switch?
As 100 Best Books for Children points out so accurately, “Bibliotherapy rarely produces a classic, but this book describes perfectly a simple childhood and adult phenomenon – a day when things just don’t go your way.”  So true.  And true about the bibliotherapy part as well.  On this Top 100 list you will not find books to help kids deal with death, divorce, bad grades, bullies, or new little brothers and sisters.  But you will find one book that talks about horrible days and the escapism of Australia (Alexander’s continual line throughout this book is, “I think I’ll move to Australia”).  The Aussie travel bureau should use him as their cover boy.  Possible slogan for subway cars: “Having a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day?  Why not go to Australia?”  Oh, it would work.
Kirkus approved saying, “If Alexander’s mother is smart to offer casual sympathy without phoney consolation, Cruz and Viorst accord readers the same respect.”
Seems like it wouldn’t make for a particularly upbeat musical, but what do I know?

This one gets points for the song.  Sort of meant to be, I suppose.

This is my favorite of the three, though.

Finally, in 1990 the following occurred:

Top 100 Children's Novels #9: The Westing Game by Ellen Raskin

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#9 The Westing Game by Ellen Raskin (1978)
169 points
It seems smarter and funnier, and altogether more perfect every time I reread it. – Jenne Abramowitz

Simply stated the best book ever. It stands the test of time, and I give it to kids every year. Turtle, while incredibly unlikeable, is loveable just the same, and the quirky characters have just the right amount of strange. Raskin also managed to do the “what-happened-in-the-future” part of it right (unlike some awful epilogues of late). I do wish that David Lynch would make this into a movie. – Stacy Dillon
Oh, Ellen, why did you die so young? – Susan Van Metre
I was once at a Books of Wonder Christmas party when Peter Glassman started popping some children’s literature trivia at me. I correctly answered his question about Evaline Ness, but then he asked a question that just baffled me. “What is the only Newbery winning jacket illustrated by someone who would later go on to win their own Newbery?” I was stumped. Couldn’t for the life of me figure it out. The answer? Ellen Raskin illustrated the original cover for Madeleine L’Engle’s A Wrinkle in Time then later would go on to win a Newbery for The Westing Game. Raskin originally intended to be a freelance commercial artist anyway, and she did about a thousand book jackets in her day. Not too surprising that L’Engle’s would have crossed her plate. Of course, according to Anita Silvey, “she had always hoped to win a Caldecott Medal for illustration.”  Instead she got a Newbery.
The plot description from the book reads, “Sixteen people were invited to the reading of the very strange will of the very rich Samuel W. Westing.  They could become millionaires, depending on how they played the game.  The not-quite-perfect heirs were paired, and each pair was given $10,000 and a set of clues (no two sets of clues were alike).  All they had to do was find the answer, but the answer to what?  The Westing game was tricky and dangerous, but the heirs played on, through blizzards and burlaries and bombs bursting in the air.  And one of them won!”  Oddly cheery recap, that.
American Writers for Children Since 1960: Fiction says that the book came about in this way: “It was begun in 1976, the Bicentennial year, which prompted the use of the words of ‘America the Beautiful’ as clues. The death of Howard Hughes was much in the news at the time, which inspired the strange will and multiple heirs. She [Raskin] intended the book to have a historical background and set it on the shores of Lake Michigan, where she grew up. Wisconsin had a history of labor disputes (perhaps she remembered the career of her Grandfather Raskin, a member of the Industrial Workers of the World who was murdered at age thirty-four), so she chose to write about a slain industrialist. Raskin said, though, that as she wrote, ‘My tribute to American labor history ended up a comedy in praise of capitalism.’ It was a true Bicentennial book.” Also, the working title was Eight Imperfect Pairs of Heirs.  Proof positive that working titles sometimes bite.
If she was any character in the book, it’s easy to guess which one. “Raskin was certainly Turtle Wexler, and The Westing Game as a tribute to capitalism is not surprising because she was a capitalist herself. She maintained a portfolio of stocks and played the market successfully. She was very proud that she was once asked to manage a mutual fund but felt it would take too much time.” I bet.  There is no other American children’s novel out there that has so effectively gotten kids interested in the stock market. Indeed, it’s probably their only encounter with it.
Sadly, The Westing Game would be the last children’s novel Raskin would ever write. She died in 1984 at the age of 56. American Writers for Children Since 1960: Fiction put her life this way. “Her first book was her best picture book, and her last book was her most praised novel.”  I suspect that the “first book” they’re referring to is Nothing Ever Happens on My Block which is rather remarkable.  I don’t know that everyone would agree with that assessment, though.
You can learn a lot about Ms. Raskin on the website dedicated to her at UW-Madison. I was particularly interested in the statement that said, “She once indicated that her attitude toward humor was influenced by the Preston Sturges film Sullivan’s Travels .” Good woman. My husband’s blog Cockeyed Caravan is actually based on a Sullivan’s Travels quote.
In fact, I would encourage you gigantic authors out there to take a page out of Ellen Raskin’s book. Her Westing Game wins itself a Newbery so what does she do? Does she hide said manuscript in the back of her closet? Does she hand it over to scholars who will put it in a safe zone where it will never be touched by oxygen or light again? Not a jot. She is a Wisconsin woman through and through and so she offers her manuscripts to UW-Madison for the students to look at. Twice. They say no. Twice. She offers it a third time and this time they say yes, though they worry that they can’t take proper care of it. She doesn’t mind. She just wants the students to see what the writing process is really like.  You can get the full story on the manuscript here at the CCBC site.
Honestly, that’s just for starters.  The site is remarkable because of all the different parcels of information you’re allowed to plow through.  Have you ever wanted to actually hear the voice of Ellen Raskin explaining about her drafts, final manuscript, working notes, and the book design?  Go here and you can hear her voice, originally recorded in 1978.  I think the working notes section is my own personal favorite.  Particularly the scanned sections where she tries to find the perfect name for each character.
In terms of the Newbery itself, it won the Award proper in 1979 beating out only one Honor Book. That book was The Great Gilly Hopkins by Katherine Paterson.
Which brings us to today.  Back in 2007, Publishers Weekly announced the following:
“Stephanie Owens Lurie and Mark McVeigh at Dutton have acquired five books by Newbery Award–winner and The Westing Game author Ellen Raskin in a major six-figure deal negotiated by Alex Glass and John Silbersack at Trident on behalf of the Raskin estate. The books include two new puzzle mystery novels: The Westing Quest, a sequel to The Westing Game, and A Murder for Macaroni and Cheese, a never-before-seen manuscript nearly completed at the author’s death in 1984. The deal also includes the reissue of three backlist novels, Figgs & Phantoms, The Mysterious Disappearance of Leon (I Mean Noel) and The Tattooed Potato.”
Years go by and not a peep is made about these books again.  Finally the three backlist titles are reissued in 2011.  More time passes.  The Westing Quest, I am sorry to report, seems to have sunk beneath the waves yet again.  But on a happier note, it looks like Dutton will be publishing a Kindle edition of A Murder for Macaroni and Cheese on August 15, 2013.  More information as I get it, guys.

  • Head on over to Collecting Children’s Books and you can see additional information on the book and the original favors from the 1979 Newbery/Caldecott Award dinner.
  • And insofar as I can tell, you are not a true Westing Game fan until you own this t-shirt:


Sadly, I don’t think she sells them anymore (but if you’re interested you might ask her).
Needless to say, that first Westing Game cover was one that Raskin illustrated herself. Since then, there have been a SLEW of others.  The original is still my personal favorite, though.







Alas, it was turned into a movie.  In 1997 Get a Clue, based on The Westing Game, came out.  I won’t torture you with the trailer, but you can see it here if you’re curious.  I don’t know how you could adapt the book and leave out Turtle’s braids, but apparently it’s possible.  Somehow, that seems worse that leaving out Harriet’s glasses in the various Harriet the Spy adaptations.
More amusing is this time lapse video of a staged production of The Westing Game.  I like the set and I like how they incorporate the background.