Side by Side: Five Favorite Picture-Book Teams Go to Work - Softcover

Marcus, Leonard S.

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0802796168 ISBN 13: 9780802796165

Publisher: Walker Childrens, 2007

Synopsis

Have you ever wondered how a picture book is made? The process is similar to the way we play a team sport, put on a play, or build a sandcastle-through collaboration. Writers and illustrators collaborate in a variety of ways. Sometimes they start as friends who choose to work together. Sometimes they become friends through the work they do. And sometimes they find that their feelings and styles change to the point where they can no longer work together. Each collaborative team and venture is unique.

Side by Side focuses on five famous author/illustrator teams and favorite books they have published: - Arthur Yorinks/Richard Egielski & Louis the Fish - Alice Provensen/Martin Provensen & The Glorious Flight- Jon Scieszka/Lane Smith/Molly Leach & The Stinky Cheese Man and Other Fairly Stupid Tales - Julius Lester/Jerry Pinkney & Sam and the Tigers - Joanna Cole/Bruce Degen & The Magic School Bus Explores the Senses

Personal anecdotes, edited manuscripts, sketches, and dummy book pages show the give-and-take that goes on between authors, illustrators, editors, and designers as they are working on projects they feel passionate about. By taking readers behind the scenes of these works in progress, Marcus gives us insight into how teamwork, cooperation, and friendship play a role in shaping the creative process, and will inspire readers to view their own team effort in fresh new ways.

About this title

About the Author

LEONARD S. MARCUS was born Mount Vernon, New York. He holds degrees in history from Yale and poetry from the University of Iowa Graduate Writers' Workshop, and is the author of the best-selling book, Dear Genius. He lives with his wife and son in Brooklyn, New York. www.leonardmarcus.com

From Publishers Weekly

Marcus (A Caldecott Celebration; Author Talk) describes the creative collaborations of five author-artist teams whose processes prove as varied as their books. Though, for most projects, author and illustrator never meet, Marcus focuses on collaborators who "prefer or need to be in the thick of a freewheeling give-and-take with their partners." For each collaboration, he zooms in on one book in particular, and the pairs range from Arthur Yorinks and Richard Egielski, who struggled early on to get the attention of a publisher and broke through with their second book, Louis the Fish, to the fluid work style of husband-and-wife team Alice and Martin Provensen (using the Caldecott Medal-winning The Glorious Flight as the central example) who for 40 years shared both the writing and illustrating; in Alice Provensen's words, "Martin and I really were one artist." Although Julius Lester and Jerry Pinkney had worked together for years, a more complicated, intensive discussion was required for Sam and the Tigers, a retelling of the racially stereotyped Little Black Sambo. Early thumbnail sketches, snapshots of dummies and finished artwork help capture the evolving process. Readers snared by their interest in the teams behind favorites such as the Magic School Bus series and The Stinky Cheese Man will appreciate the insights into the inner workings of bookmaking, and may well end up appreciating the books more for the energy and ingenuity it takes to create them. Ages 8-up.

Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

About this edition

• Publisher: Walker Childrens
• Publication date: 2007
• ISBN 10: 0802796168
• ISBN 13: 9780802796165
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 64