Children's books

Fairy Tale in E Minor, Op. 34, No. 2; Nikolai Medtner, composer; Geoffrey Tozer, piano

We had a little library at the end of the hallway near the bedrooms of my sisters and me. I can’t stress the word little enough. Our books took up only two shelves and consisted mostly of Charlie Brown and Laura Ingalls Wilder books. At some point, Mom introduced each one of us to the magic of our local public library. The fantastic shenanigans enshrouded within the story called “Morris the Moose Goes to School” will retain for time immemorial the status of legend.

We did, however, have some books of our own that all three of us came back to at various periods of our childhoods. These were books that possibly established the scope of life, that might have laid the ground work for a sense of humor, an awareness of virtue, a discernment of whimsy or a detection of melancholy. Books that perhaps even defined the natures through which each of us would spend our time on this Earth.

I would pour over the book “Go, Dog, Go!” for hours. Who can forget all of the dogs on the bed sleeping in the dark of night – except for one little dog with eyes big as the moon? And then all of the dogs up at the break of dawn – except for the little dog who didn’t sleep all night … dead to the world by the pillow. How about the girl dog to the boy dog? “Do you like my hat?” “No, I do not.” “Good day.” “Good day.” But the highlight of the entire adventure – the two pages that defined the penultimate moment of literary childhood playfulness – was the birthday party up in the tree. There were cakes, hats, whistles, tents, swings, masks, balls, dolls, bikes, toys, presents; more life than any young person could possibly collect within the purview of childhood reality. That specific image represented the quintessential notion of fun. Any fun beyond what that portrait portrayed just isn’t necessary.

Deere & Company published “Johnny Tractor and His Pals” in 1958. The book was distributed to farm families throughout the country by John Deere farm equipment dealerships. Louise Price Bell wrote the story and Roy Bostrom, a retired Deer & Company staff artist, illustrated Johnny and his pals. Johnny bragged to the other implements on Farmer Fowler’s farm that he was more important than all of the other farm machines. The lesson here, of course, is that none of us is more important than any other. We all perform the job given to us in order to serve a bigger need, or maybe even, a master.

I remember when Mom bought “Richard Scarry’s Best Storybook Ever”. At the time, I couldn’t imagine that a book this big could possibly fulfill the literary wants and essentials of ones so small like my sisters and me. What did I get from this book? Warmth. Optimism. Buoyancy. Effervescence. Confidence in the overall general good humor of my fellow earth beings. Mr. Hedgehog gave Mrs. Hedgehog an apple for Christmas, who returned the gift to her family by baking an apple dumpling. Schtoompah balanced his tuba on his head while he bicycled to his orchestra gig. Brave Pierre Bear, who lived way up north, hunted moose to supply his winter wardrobe and his pantry with “moose pie, moose cakes and thirteen jars of minced moose meat.” Pip-pip went to London and ending driving his whole car into a fountain into which people threw coins for luck.

In August of 2009, I purchased a book that contained the sheet music of numerous Russian composers: Rachmaninoff, Scriabin, Glinka, Borodin, Balakirev and many others. A piece by composer Nikolai Medtner called Fairy Tale in E Minor, Op. 34, No. 2, caught my attention. It is quite beautiful. The more I played through it, the more I liked it. But the music didn’t indicate a tempo. I had no idea how fast or how slow to play it. So I downloaded a recording of Australian classical pianist Geoffrey Tozer, only to find that the maestro plays it VERY fast.

Mr. Medtner seems to have invented the Russian word “Skazki” which he attached to thirty-eight of his original compositions. The word translates best as “tales”, but the word “Fairy” has fastened itself to the front of the term and “Fairy Tales” forever they most likely will remain.

I don’t recall books in our little library that told the famous stories of Cinderella, Sleeping Beauty, The Ugly Duckling, Thumbellina and the like. We must have heard them somewhere along the line. Disney, I suppose. But I find it telling that Mom didn’t pad our library with this type of story. Instead the foundation of our worldviews stands on the shoulders of a cat who wore a hat, a fish who is fed too much fish food and an inquisitive monkey who rides a bike.

Credits: To the authors of children’s books everywhere and for all time, who shape and pave the road of humanity through the imagination and welfare of hopefulness of tomorrow’s mothers and fathers. Bravo to P.D. Eastman, Louise Price Bell and Richard Scarry. Thank you for keeping your childhood alive. It lives in me.