Nursery Tales Around the World

Who doesn't know the stories "The Gingerbread Man" or "The Lady Who Swallowed a Fly"? But, have you heard of "The Pancake" or "The Cat and the Parrot"? Sierra organizes eighteen folktales from around the world into a collection focused around six themes. This combination of mostly unfamiliar folktales from India, Jamaica, and Zaire (to name a few) and more familiar ones from the United States and England are easily accessible through a well organized contents page. Sierra commendably includes a detailed introduction and thematic background information in addition to extensive source notes which include tale origin information and detailed explanations for changes to the tales. In one instance Sierra explains her rationale behind the name changes she made in "The Pancake". In order to preserve the rhyme scheme present in the original version, she changed the characters' manes to "goody-poody", "many-panny", and "henny-penny". This attention to detail helps both young listeners and more capable readers adore and accept the unfamiliar fables in this collection. Vitale completes this book with exquisite illustrations of the tales through his use of repetitive, culturally-based boarders as well as text-based illustrations. For the tale of "Odon the Giant", Vitale depicts Odon as a huge beast with sharp teeth who is creating havoc for those people beneath him. Vitale combines both sharp and subdued colors to create an illusion of ancientness in his illustrations. The reader feels that they aren't opening just another book, but one passed down through the generations.