Juliet Townsend
Ever since the days of Aesop, storytel- lers have used animals to point a moral or underline a message, and the cunning fox, the cruel wolf and the foolish hen are familiar figures in the fairy tales of many countries. Children's literature has always been particularly rich in animal stories, but it was only when I began this review of a selection of books for Christmas, all of which feature animals in one way or another, that I really began to think about the different ways in which writers treat their animal characters. They are depicted in every stage of anthropomorphism, from the completely natural, usually in stories for older children like Tarka the Otter, where the creatures behave purely as animals, have no human characteristics and do not talk, even to each other, through every degree of realism, down to the animated stuffed toys of Winnie the Pooh. Between these two extremes we find the almost natural, where the animals behave in an appropriate though some- times over-clever way and talk to each other — The Jungle Book, Black Beauty; the semi-natural, where they still live in holes rather than houses and in moments of stress will run on all fours, but wear clothes and sleep in a bed — The Tale of Peter Rabbit, The Wind in the Willows; the completely humanised, where the animals wear clothes, live in houses, go to school and are, in all but appearance, people Little Grey Rabbit, Rupert Bear; and the mummified, where supposedly real anim- als are shown in the illustrations as stuffed dummies — the new Ladybird versions of The Tales of Peter Rabbit and Squirrel Nutkin.
To turn to these two little travesties first, (both are published by Ladybird Books at 85p), if you were thinking of slipping them into a stocking this Christmas, don't! The depressing modern passion for instant, effortless accessibility and the trivialisation of everything from the Bible downwards has now reached even into Mr McGregor's garden and Old Brown's island. It seems extraordinary that Frederick Warne, pub- fisher of all the Beatrix Potter books, should in the same year have gone to immense pains to reproduce the original versions of the stories with much improved colour, while authorising the Ladybird versions, with their flat text and photo- graphs of twee little toy animals, made of that peculiarly unattractive dung-coloured fur fabric which one struggles to avoid buying at school bazaars. Perhaps it is as well that the reference to Peter's father having been 'put in a pie by Mrs McGre- gor' was omitted. The most iron digestion might be excused for baulking at a meal consisting of baked terylene fur and kapok stuffing. And for only £2.75 one can buy Beatrix Potter's genuine article.
The Ladybird Peter Rabbit may gloss over the harsher side of life; not so A Frog He Would a-Wooing Go by William Stobbs (OUP, £5.95.) This belongs to the semi- natural group — dressed-up animals who are still vulnerable to the depredations of cats and a duck. The pictures are lively and bright, in fact the ham is a worrying shade of puce and one feels that if the kittens had not accounted for the rat and mouse, salmonella probably would have. The old nursery rhyme pulls no punches, the only concession to infant squeamishness being a post-mortem scene showing the rat, mouse and frog floating on a celestial cloud.
Angelina and Alice by Katherine Hola- bird, illustrated by Helen Craig (Aurum Press, £5.95), the latest in the Angelina series, is a beautifully produced book with delightful illustrations. Here the experi- ences of the mice Angelina and Alice at school are used to illustrate that perennial drama of early childhood, 'Nobody at school likes me, specially my best friend.' Children will identify with poor Angelina and girls between four and seven should particularly enjoy this book.
In All in One Piece by Jill Murphy (Walker Books, £5.95) the charming elephant family live and behave exactly like people. Mrs Large puts her few hairs in rollers and applies her makeup in preparation for the office party, Mr Large shaves and the baby wears disposable nappies. Mrs Large's plea to her children will strike a chord with many hard-pressed mothers. 'Can't I have just one night in the whole year to myself? One night when I am not covered in jam and poster-paint? One night when I can put on my new dress and walk through the front door all in one piece?' Children up to seven will find it very funny and enjoy the excellent pic- tures.
The Bertie books by Paddy Bouma (Bodley Head, £4.95) fall into the ani- mated toy category. Bertie is a stuffed hippo who causes his owner, Thomas, much embarrassment. In Bertie Visits Granny, Granny's pets get the blame for Bertie's misdemeanours. Luckily Granny keeps an antique shop, which gives Paddy Bouma the chance to do some attractive illustrations of Bertie looking ungainly among the Staffordshire figures. Children will particularly enjoy Bertie at the Den- tist's. There is plenty to look at in the clear detailed illustrations, including the rows of false teeth which Bertie can't resist trying on before tangling himself up in the dental floss.
For older readers Penelope Lively's A House Inside Out illustrated by David Parkins (Deutsch, £5.95) is a collection of short stories about the inhabitants of 54 Pavilion Road: 'Five humans, thirty-nine animals and several thousand insects,' more especially Willie the dog, Sam the mouse and Nat the Woodlouse. It takes a writer of Penelope Lively's calibre to enter into the mind of a woodlouse, but she does so effortlessly, ably assisted by David Parkins, whose drawing of a woodlouse- eye view of the climb up the waste pipe to the plug-hole I particularly enjoyed. As one would expect, this book is very well written with extremely amusing dialogue. Eight to 11-year-olds will enjoy it for themselves and the stories are just the right length for bedtime reading to slightly younger children.
In spite of their superior intelligence, rats are generally less popular as heroes than mice. Tor Seidler's A Rat's Tale, illustrated by Fred Marcellino (Gollancz, £8.95) is an American rat saga. Montague Mad-Rat is a sewer rat — regarded as an inferior being in New York rodent society by the upper-class wharf-rats, 'who are dedicated to collecting money, while Mon- tague spends his time doing exquisite paintings on seashells. It is all deeply symbolic of something — probably the triumph of art over commerce and true love over the class system. Montague loves the high-born wharf-rat Isabel. In spite of this it is a good story with some moving moments and well-drawn characters, espe- cially Montague's dissolute but talented Uncle Moony and the dashing Isabel, with her constant excited cry of 'Gad, that was different!' The book will be appreciated by 10 to 12-year-olds, and is also remarkable for its rat's view of New York and the evocative, rather sombre illustrations.
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