Paul Revere's Ride: The Landlord's Tale

Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth

ISBN 10: 0066237475 ISBN 13: 9780066237473

Publisher: HarperCollins, 2003

Synopsis

Listen, my children, and you shall hear
Of the midnight ride of Paul Revere....

So begins Henry Wadsworth Longfellow's stirring tale of Paul Revere's ride and the first battle cry for American independence. Written over a century ago, the words still resonate today.

Now acclaimed artist Charles Santore has turned his attention to this historic event, immortalized in Longfellow's poem. Paul Revere, his horse, the Old North Church, the lantern, Lexington and Concord -- all spring from these pages, and make that famous race against time live once again.

About this title

About the Author:

On April 5, 1860, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882) climbed to the belfry of Boston's Old North Church, where almost a century earlier bells tolled the warning that the British were coming. The visit inspired him to write his classic poem that immortalized Paul Revere and the beginning of America's War of Independence.

From Booklist:

Reviewed with Paul Revere's Ride, illustrated by Monica Vachula.

Gr. 2-5. Maybe it's the swelling tide of patriotism or just coincidence, but the spring publishing season has brought two new picture-book editions of Longfellow's "Paul Revere's Ride." Both are colorful, attractive, and well researched, and either book will make a good companion to Stephen Krensky's historically accurate prose version of the same events, Paul Revere's Midnight Ride (2002). Of the two new books, Vachula's version offers more decorative artwork--bordered paintings that place historical events within the context of a broader setting. The pictures, full-page and smaller on the verso, depict quiet scenes--a cat stalking through a churchyard; a picture of sheep and cattle in the farmyard with the small figure of Paul Revere riding by in the background. Figures in motion seem somehow arrested for a moment in time. In contrast, Santore's more dynamic paintings seem barely contained within the edges of the pages. They thrust the viewer right into the action, with cinematic close-ups of characters as well as broader scenes in which Revere urgently rides to spread the alarm and his countrymen rise up to battle the British. Even a relatively quiet churchyard scene is full of motion, with curving, crisscrossing paths that draw the eye precipitously down to the town and the river below. In the tradition of N. C. Wyeth and Howard Pyle, these dramatic pictures have great appeal. If there's money in the budget and room on the shelf next to the excellent editions of Longfellow's poem illustrated by Christopher Bing (2001) and Ted Rand (1990), consider both books, which provide new, yet traditional, visions of this classic American poem. Carolyn Phelan
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

About this edition

• Publisher: HarperCollins
• Publication date: 2003
• ISBN 10: 0066237475
• ISBN 13: 9780066237473
• Binding: Library Binding
• Number of pages: 40
• Illustrator: Santore Charles