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The Popuplady's Top Ten "Favorites"
By Ellen Rubin
Visit Ellen Rubin's Website: www.popuplady.com
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Oy vey! How does one do this? (While this is not Sophie's Choice , selecting the
favorite items from my collection seems impossible.) So here I am taking a mental tour of my bookshelves.
While the challenge is to list my three favorite books, no one before me has been able to name just three of
theirs. I will follow the precedent and use the 'wiggle room' to give my top ten choices.
Let me first state my criteria for what a pop-up or movable book must have to 'tickle my fancy'.
I measure the 'success' of a book by whether or not the movable enhances the illustration or story line. As a take-off on the Chinese proverb "A picture is worth a thousand words," I say, "a movable illustration is worth a million words". If the movables are there gratuitously, my reaction is, "Ho hum, I'll pass" unlessÉ..
the book is a long-lost title from my childhood or one I missed. (There are woefully many). Even if the movables are simple, I will include it in my collection.
I love those books which are on a topic I would never have thought could be translated into a pop-up book, for example, Lest We Forget The Passage from Africa to Slavery & Emancipation, Meno-pop, and the Pop-up Book of Phobias. Not all books selected this way are 'successful' but they get a spot on my shelf.
Has the paper engineer devised a unique movable? Admittedly, that's very hard to do. Whose 'fancy' wouldn't be tickled by that accomplishment?
Time to fess up. I'm a sucker for gimmicks. Mirrors, stereoptic or 3D glasses, holograms, Braille-text, removable parts, and the like-bring'em on.
What I mostly love about movable books is that they require my participation. The more the book approaches a toy, the better I like it. I remember 'clearly' in 1st or 2nd grade having to decide whether or not to reorder the children's magazine, Humpty Dumpty or 'graduate' to Children's Digest as most of my friends did. Withstanding the embarrassment of staying with the 'baby' periodical, I opted for Humpty Dumpty. Why? Because Humpty Dumpty featured 'stuff' to color, cut-out, paste and put together. The interactive quality of the magazine was what I loved best, and I didn't want to give it up for a magazine with more sophisticated stories. I was already a steady customer at the local library.
So, with your indulgence, here is |
| The Popuplady's Ten Favorite Movable books |
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1. Vojtech Kubasta.
Forgive me-I cannot choose. After poring over my collection, there is no way for me to select one book, pop-up,
illustration, or piece of ephemera. It's no cop-out. This exercise has taught me that it is the gestalt of Kubasta's
work which makes him my favorite. Yes, the "Wow! Effect" certainly is there for the end-pops in the Panascopic series,
and I love his ingenious yet simple movables. Yet, what captivates me is the loving innocence radiated by his people and
animals-even devils, dragons and statues!-illustrated in saturated but bright colors. While his use of the deceptively
simple concertina design coupled with the savvy cuts and folds attests to his genius, I think his overall
joie de vivre draws me into a magical world.
2. The Working Camera.
By John Hedgecoe.
Ron van der Meer and ark Kiner, paper engineers; Harmony Books, Crown Publ., NY; 1986.
This was one of the first books I bought when I started to collect and I come back to it often. Excitement is still
generated when the camera (Photography is a hobby of mine.)pops-up in all its intricate detail. Using my fingertips,
I reach into a pocket on one spread to retrieve the various paper 'photographic lights'. After placing them on selected
spots on the base page, I pull out from the spread's edge text and images which allow one to see the projected results
of the lights' effects on a virtual photograph. It's all like some kind of adult 'dollhouse' with my large hands moving
small figures.
3. Monkey Theatre (Grand Theatre de Animaux Savants)
Lothar Meggendorfer; Nouvelle Librairie de la Jeunesse, Paris; 1893
Why this one of all the others? Because of the spread with the monkey family at the dinner table. Move the tab and then
stand back and yell, "FOOD FIGHT!!!" I laugh out loud each time I see it.
4. Cookie Count: A Tasty Pop-up
Robert Sabuda; Little Simon, Simon & Schuster, NY; 1997
Cookie Count is like the Seder chant from the Passover Haggadah, Dayeinu!-It would have sufficed. How's that
so, you ask? Dayeinu! is a song where each stanza builds on the one before it and goes something like,
"If G-d had brought us out of Egypt and not parted the Sea, Dayeinu!-It would have sufficed. But, of course,
G-d did much more. So it is with Cookie Count. If Robert had only made the most voluminous pop-up ever in the
gingerbread house, it would have sufficed. I show it to schoolchildren who gasp as I quote Robert saying "getting
a pop-up to stand up is one thing, but getting it to disappear into the book is quite another." Each pop-up is
more dazzling than the next. My favorite is "2 coconut kisses to share" where the mice just keep coming and coming.
Dayeinu!
5. The Seven Ages of Man: William Shakespeare
William Shakespeare; Maryline Poole Adams; Poole Press, Berkeley, CA; 1994 Limited edition of 45
Again, tiny fingers are needed to maneuver this artist and miniature (3"x3") book. Seven Ages comes housed in
a model of Shakespeare's Globe Theater. Open the doors to remove the tiny book and marvel at the realistic
theater interior lining the inside. With dainty fingers, the tiny tabs are pulled to enliven each spread which
shows our journey, in Shakespeare's words, from cradle to grave.
6. The Pop-up Book of Phobias
Gary Greenberg; Matthew Reinhart-PE; Balvis Rubess-illustrator; Rob Weisbach Books, William Morrow and Co., NY; 1999
This is the one I use as an example of a 'successful' book. The deceptively simple movables put the reader in the 'skin' of
the phobic. I wondered for months how a book about an emotion could be translated into a movable. Answer?
"Simply and exceptionally well."
7. Mirror, Mirror on the Wall-a Picture Story Book
Printed in the Netherlands, nd-1950s?
So simple. The only movable is a cardboard cut-out of the queen looking in a real mirror on the cover. Pull down the
vanity stool on which she sits and you can see her reflection in the mirror. Besides the wonderful watercolor illustrations,
I love the reality of it.
8. Tommy Tiger Who Was A Fraidy Cat-A Mother and Baby Book
Rozelle Ross; Charles E. Bracker, Paul Kaloda-Illustrators; Maxton Publications, NY; 1945
I always show this series of books with a kangaroo, bear, and gorilla, because I can't help myself. On the animal-shaped cover,
tucked into the crook of each sweet-faced mother's arm, is a removable baby animal with an easel back. I imagine a child being
read the book while the baby animal stands apart to be admired or cradled in the child's arms.
9. The Roly Poly series
Kees Moerbeek-PE; Child's Play, Swindon, England; 2000
I have not gotten over the excitement I first felt when I came upon these books. Talk about the element of surprise inherent in
its unfolding design and the sense of expanded time as it keeps unfolding. To think it took Kees 25 years to find an application
for this new format!
10. Wicked Willie Stand-up Comic
or Il Miglior Amico Dell'uomo (Italian for 'Man's Best Friend)
Peter Mayle; Gray Jolliffe-illustrator; Italian-Index
Kettering, England-1991; English-Pan Books, London-1996
There are snapshot moments you never forget. It was our last day in Positano, Italy, and I was about to go home with little in
the way of pop-up books. Walking through the winding streets, we came upon a man in front of a newspaper shop laughing while reading.
What else? It was Man's Best Friend. If you are unfamiliar with this book, let's say cartoon Willie is somewhat anatomically correct.
Unfortunately the paper engineer is not credited, but he had used the movable format to its best advantage. How different from the
insipid Kama Sutra! And how utterly hypocritical that it was never published in the puritanical USA.
Mea culpa! I have left out so many other 'favorites' but an assignment is an assignment. And part of that assignment is to challenge another collector.
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