The Sweet and Sour Animal Book (The ^AIona and Peter Opie Library of Children's Literature) - Softcover

Hughes, Langston; Students From The Harlem School Of The Arts

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0195120302 ISBN 13: 9780195120301

Publisher: Oxford University Press, 1997

Synopsis

In 26 never-before-published short and wonderfully clever poems, Langston Hughes takes children through both the alphabet and the animal world. From Ape to Zebra--with bees, camels, fish, and even a unicorn in between--he paints a picture of each animal with just a few simple, but telling, words.

About this title

About the Author

Langston Hughes (1902-1967) was one of the most versatile writers of the artistic movement known as the Harlem Renaissance. Though known primarily as a poet, he also wrote plays essays, novels, short stories, and books and poems for children.
Ben Vereen has left his mark on the Broadway stage, concert circuit, and in film and television. He has also been widely honored for his humanitarian activities and work with young people.
George P. Cunningham is Associate Professor of Africana Studies at Brooklyn College.
The Harlem School of the Arts provides instruction in music, dance, drama, and visual arts to more than 1,500 students every year. Many of the first, second, and third grade students who participated in this project are part ofOpportunities for Learning in the Arts, a program that offers arts instruction for public school students during the school day.

From Publishers Weekly

What could possibly add to the excitement of publishing a long-lost manuscript by one of the century's most important African American writers? The folks at Oxford offer an inspired answer: a classroom full of young creative talent. In this fresh, imaginative alphabet book, 26 newly discovered poems by Hughes are teamed with 3-D works by first-, second- and third-graders at the Harlem School of the Arts. The result is a marvelous union of graphics and text, alight with color and whimsy. Hughes's poems are models of brevity and wit ("There was a camel/ Who had two humps./ He thought in his youth/ They were wisdom bumps./ Then he learned/ They were nothing but humps-/ And ever since he's/ Been in the dumps"). Called forth from these words, the students' menagerie-created from clay, paper, paint and cardboard, and unfettered by artistic preconceptions-are laugh-out-loud wonderful, from the solemn, pop-eyed flock of owls to the bright explosion of fish that graces the front cover. A foreword by Ben Vereen (a friend of Hughes) and afterword by George Cunningham give the book additional heft. All ages.
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.

About this edition

• Publisher: Oxford University Press
• Publication date: 1997
• ISBN 10: 0195120302
• ISBN 13: 9780195120301
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 48