Who Is the World For? - Hardcover

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0744567793 ISBN 13: 9780744567793

Publisher: Walker Childrens Hardbacks

Synopsis

All over the world - in deep roomy seas, on high, green trees, in ice and snow - baby animals ask their parents "who is the world for?" In a house in the city, a boy asks his father the same question, and the boy and the baby bear and the lion cub all recieve the reply, "the world is for you!".

About this title

About the Author

Tom Pow is one of Scotland's best-known poets. The winner of two Scottish Arts Council Book Awards for his poetry, he is also the author of three radio plays and a travel book about Peru. Who Is the World For? is his first picture book and was written for his own children, while he was travelling through Africa a couple of years ago. "I missed them desperately!" he says. "I had just visited the Masai Mara so animals were also very much on my mind." Robert Ingpen has published more than one hundred books in the past thirty years. In 1986 he was awarded the prestigious international illustration award, the Hans Christian Andersen Medal, and in 1989 he received the Dromkeen Medal for his contribution to illustration in his home country, Australia. Robert is married with four grown-up children and four grandchildren.

From Publishers Weekly

Delicately etched watercolor-and-pencil illustrations furnish an elegant counterpoint to Scottish poet Pow's children's book debut. In a succession of lyrical musings, various baby animals ask their respective parents, "Who is the world for?" Each receives the same reassuring response: "The world is for you!" but the parents embroider the reply with evidence uniquely tailored to their offsprings' experiences. A mother bear points out "deep dark caves/ for you to shelter in" and "spring rivers, shining in sunlight,/ shimmering with fish"; a father lion cites "high smooth rocks for you to bask on." The tale culminates with a boy asking his father the question, and the man incorporates the creatures that have preceded them, then responds with details all readers can relate to: a world with "parks for you to play in" and "hills for you to climb up high." Pow's glorious use of language evokes a familial intimacy: a baby whale moves at her mother's side "like a tugboat in the shadow of an ocean liner"; Arctic hares doze with their "slipper-soft babes in secret burrows of snow." The visual cadence of Ingpen's (The Dreamkeeper) artwork reflects the graceful nuances of the text. With the keen eye of a naturalist, the artist carefully avoids anthropomorphizing his subjects, while deftly communicating the parent-offspring bond. A lovely book with a subtle environmental message. Ages 4-up. (Nov.)
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Edition details

• Publisher: Walker Childrens Hardbacks
• ISBN 10: 0744567793
• ISBN 13: 9780744567793
• Binding: Hardcover
• Language: English