"Alligator, Beetle, Porcupine, Whale,
Bobolink, Panther, Drangonfly, Snail,
Crocodile, Monkey, Buffalo, Hare,
Dromedary, Leopard, Mud Turtle, Bear,..."
and so on. This book has the traditional Abecedarius from the Shaker Manifesto of 1882, illustrated winningly by the pair above. I took this book out of the library- I don't even own it! I want to take it, to gaze on it lovingly, and greedily, I know, but I won't. I will share it.
It first attracted me with the title- "A Peaceable Kingdom." If I wrote a children's book, this is the title I would like. And it has the word Abecedarius, which I had never seen before, but shall never for all my days forget it because it is a truly magnificent word, isn't it. Oh, gush, gush, gush.
Bowden likes the different animals, and does not mind that fictional animals, like the xanthos, are put with bears and moths. He doesn't know they're fictional, and why should he?
(Viking Press, 1978)
2 comments:
I bought this at a library book sale for Millie's birthday! I'd never seen it in the library before, but the cover was cool enough for me to immediatly snatch it up. I trust Millie's liking of it (her birthday's in August) will follow Bowden's.
I returned it today with great weeping and gnashing of teeth-by me.
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