When PaperTigers’ book reviewer Abigail Sawyer mentioned to me that she is going to be hosting a Blog Carnival about bilingualism over at Speaking in Tongues, she got me thinking. Again. I first started mulling over bilingual children’s books here in relation to Tulika Books, a publisher in India that produces bilingual books in many different Indian languages alongside English, and to former IBBY Preisdent and founder of Groundwood Books Patsy Aldana’s comments in an interview with PaperTigers, and I will quote them again here:

I have always been opposed to the use of bilingual books, however given that Spanish-only books hardly sell at all, I have had to accept that books in Spanish can only reach Latinos if they are bilingual. This goes against everything I believe and know to be true about language instruction, the joy of reading in your mother tongue…

I was surprised by Aldana’s dislike of bilingual books because I love them and my children love them, and I have found that they can be a joy for inquisitive children seeking to learn independently – but I do realise that our contexts are different. Aldana’s dislike of them seems to stem from their being a substitute for monolingual Spanish books in an English-biased market, and she has found a pragmatic way of providing books in their mother-tongue to the Latino community in North America.

We love reading bilingual books because, although our main vehicle is the English, having another language running alongside, often enhances the reading experience for us, especially where the setting of the story is culturally appropriate to the language. This is true even when we can’t read the script, because even without being able to understand it, we can sometimes pull out certain consistencies. Seeing the writing always provides a glimpse of that different culture.

One of my favorite books of the last few year’s (more…)

One of Australian illustrator Sally Rippin‘s recent children’s books (published in 2005 in Australia, 2007 in the U.S.) opens upwards rather than outwards. I asked Sally how she and author Whitney Stewart decided on the format for Becoming Buddha. Here’s her reply:

“Whitney suggested working together on a picture book, and I approached my publisher at the time with her ideas. They agreed to publish our book, and it was then left up to me to illustrate Whitney’s text. I decided to have Becoming Buddha open so the illustration reads vertically on the double page to represent an ancient manuscript, or a thangka. From what I know about Buddhism, I believe opening the book in this way makes you more conscious of your actions. Fortunately, the publisher agreed to this format.

“Painting the face of Siddhartha was quite challenging, because I knew there were certain rules about how the Buddha could be represented in art, and I also wanted to make the paintings my own representations of Siddhartha, the man, before he became enlightened. Again fortunately, Whitney was able to have a representative of the Dalai Lama approve the artwork before it went to press, so that gave me confidence.”

Melbourne poet and blogger Kris Helmsley had some interesting observations about the layout and Buddhism when he introduced Sally and Becoming Buddha at a book launch in June 2007; read his comments here.

Another vertically read book with an equally conscious layout is Caldecott Medal winner Ed Young’s Beyond the Great Mountains. Its cascading-style pages, illustrating Chinese characters and landscapes, also create a special physical awareness for young readers.

There’s been quite a bit about illustrated children’s books in the British press recently: first, back in April, I noticed this article from The Daily Telegraph about how research has shown that “very young children learn faster from picture books that contain colour photographs than from books with colour drawings” Aaaargh! Thank goodness it goes on to point out some of what’s special about artists’ illustrations. Then I noticed that Achockablog have highlighted another article from the Glasgow Herald in which Debi Gliori bemoans the currently perceived status of picture books. That made me really sad as Debi has been a firm favorite in our household since Baby Number One would only eat if Hello, Baby Bear was being read to him – every splodge of mush on a buzzy bee or a hooty owl belies the notion that he was too small to understand what the drawings meant…

Debi’s words have made me think about the role of illustration and how much good illustrations are inseparable from their story. The other day we were again reading Ed Young’s Beyond the Great Mountains, tracing the parallels between the pictures and the characters, reading the words over and over. It was a deeply satisfying read in the way only poetry can be – and a very calm way to end the day… which is quite amazing really, as we had also been doing mental gymnastics talking about how it all fitted together.

So how about you? What special picture books are you reading with your child at the moment? Do send in your comments and let us know.