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Summary
Summary
What would you be if you were green? Or red? Or blue? Or yellow? Would you still be you?
Author Notes
Karla Kuskin was born in Manhattan on July 17, 1932. She received a bachelor of fine arts degree from Yale University in 1955. Her first book, Roar and More (1956), was the result of her senior graphic-arts project, for which she had to design and print a book on a small press. She was the author or illustrator of more than 50 children's books during her lifetime including In the Middle of the Trees (1958); The Rose on My Cake (1964); The Philharmonic Gets Dressed (1982); The Dallas Titans Get Ready for Bed (1986); Jerusalem, Shining Still (1987); City Dog (1994); The Upstairs Cat (1997); Moon, Have You Met My Mother? (2003); and Traces (2008). She died of cortical basal ganglionic degeneration on August 20, 2009 at the age of 77.
(Bowker Author Biography)
Reviews (6)
School Library Journal Review
PreS-Gr 2-"If you could be...?" is an often-asked question by a child. What would you be if you were something other than yourself? And if you were that other thing, would you still be you? Kuskin poses these questions throughout this playfully thoughtful book. In delicious rhythmic language, readers are asked what they might be if they were the color green or a square shape, soft or loud, small, red, or fierce, and more. Possible answers are considered after each question, answers as familiar as "the sound of thunder at night" and as quirky as "an acrobat's tights with a hole in the knee." Children will enjoy considering the many possibilities prompted by each question and will most certainly be eager to add their own responses to the list. The warm illustrations have a soft, smudged, crayonlike effect that renders the most impossible query and response accessible. Portions of the text were published previously in 1960. Such an engaging invitation to explore the world and tickle the imagination is most definitely worth a second visit.-Susan Moorhead, New Rochelle Public Library, NY (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Publisher's Weekly Review
Kuskin's 1960 text, Square as a House, gets a new title and, thanks to Iwai's (B Is for Bulldozer) velvety, fanciful pictures, a new lease on life. With a bespectacled, wide-eyed boy serving as a pretend tour guide, the book unfolds in a series of rhyming "What if" musings. Instead of riffing on the usual sort of role-playing, Kuskin asks readers to think in more abstract, thought-provoking arenas-such as colors and textures, sounds and sizes-and consider the array of possibilities this opens up to them. "If you could be green/ would you be a lawn/ or a lean green bean/ and the stalk it's on?/ ... / Tell me, lean green one,/ what would you be?" A few pages later she wonders, "If you could be loud/ would you be the sound/ of thunder at night/ or the howl of a hound/ as he bays at the moon/ or the pound of the sea?/ Tell me, proud loud one,/ what would you be?" Iwai smoothes out the lines between reality and fantasy in her lushly colored vignettes, depicting a full moon smiling at the boy's pooch as he sets sail over a swirling sea. Kuskin's internal rhymes and highly visual examples set the stage for Iwai's solid, simple shapes. The recurring refrain ("Tell me...") subtly conveys to readers that while imagination is a powerful tool, they are fully in control of it. Ages 3-8. (Feb.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Horn Book Review
If you could be green..."" or soft, or fierce, what would you be? A leaf, a breeze, or a dragon? The lilting verse encourages readers to imagine a variety of answers. Cheerful illustrations expand on these ideas and add a humorous dimension to the final stanza that brings the child back to being him- or herself. (c) Copyright 2010. The Horn Book, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted. All rights reserved.
Kirkus Review
Kuskin offers a charming set of metaphorical musings connecting various qualities or traits with related objects or images in this imaginative display of wordplay. Her poetic text, previously published in 1960 with a different title and illustrations, is well-complemented in this version by glowing, double-page spreads featuring a wide-eyed little boy in round glasses. Each stanza follows the pattern of offering a hypothetical condition (being fierce, for example) and then asking the little boy what he (and the reader) would choose to be as a result of that attribute (a tiger or a dragon). The brief, fanciful poem explores several colors and other qualities, such as being bright or soft or loud, amplified by Iwai's striking paintings in glowing jewel tones. Her illustrations show dragons in the clouds, dancing mice, roaring tigers and a final delicious view of the little boy reading the very same story, with his own image as the illustration. Preschoolers will enjoy this as a read-aloud, but it will also be used by teachers in the elementary grades for writing lessons on metaphor and imagery. (Picture book/poetry. 3-8) Copyright ©Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Booklist Review
Kuskin offers more winning poetry in this cheerful picture book that is sure to inspire loud crowd participation. The rhyming text is a game of hypothetical questions: If you could be soft / would you be the snow / or twenty-five pillows / or breezes that blow / the blossoms that fall from / the sassafras tree? / Tell me, sweet soft one, / what would you be? More questions follow, each representing a different quality--loud, fierce, small, green, blue, bright, and so on. Lines in expertly modulated rhyme and meter encourage children to imagine themselves as everything from a tiny mouse's house's front door key to the whole of the sky, and the parade of images, both profound and silly, are nicely extended in Iwai's bright, fanciful acrylic paintings. As in so much of Kuskin's work, the enjoyable, even hypnotic sounds and the meaning of the words reinforce each other beautifully; If you could be loud, for example, is followed by forceful lines that demand a strong, assertive voice: thunder at night, the howl of a hound, the pound of the sea. Sure to be a read-aloud favorite, this will also be an excellent choice for elementary poetry units; it may well inspire students to write their own verses about infinite possibilities. --Gillian Engberg Copyright 2006 Booklist
New York Review of Books Review
Fat Cat's sheepish grin is the running punch line in this cheerful, boldly designed picture book (in cartoony typefaces named Chaloops and Eatwell Chubby, according to the end-papers). Fun to read aloud, it would also make an effective early reader for preschoolers: "Will Fat Cat sit on ... the cow?" - here the cow emits a worried "Moo?" - "No! Fat Cat will not sit on the cow!" By the end, the cow, a pig, a dog and a chicken can be thankful to a mouse for providing a nice fat chair. GREEN AS A BEAN. By Karla Kuskin. Illustrated by Melissa Iwai. Laura Geringer/HarperCollins. $16.99. (Ages 3 to 8) "What would you be if you were green? ... Would you still be you?" Kuskin's more than 50 books of poetry and prose include many gems like that one. Originally published in 1960 under the title "Square as a House," "Green as a Bean" glows with inviting new drawings by Iwai and poses the same playful yet profound questions to get young readers thinking (and probably doodling): if you were green, square, loud or small, what would you be? JACK PLANK TELLS TALES. By Natalie Babbitt. Michael di Capua/Scholastic. $15.95. (Ages 8 and up) In her latest book, Babbitt takes an old-fashioned concept and gives it storytelling verve. Jack Plank is a sailor who loses his job on a pirate ship (he was bad at pillaging). While looking haplessly for a job in a Caribbean port town, he entertains his fellow guests at a rooming house with one tall tale after another: the mummy searching for its missing hand, the seaman who set off in search of a mermaid. There's even a story about a troll and a bridge. The earnestness of Jack's delivery adds to the charm, as do Babbitt's comical line drawings. THE WICKED NG TODDLAH. By Kevin Hawkes. Knopf. $16.99. (Ages 4 to 8) With booties as big as tractors, a giant baby lands in a small town in Maine - and quickly becomes the "wicked big toddlah" of the title. As huge as Gulliver, "Toddie" bawls in a mammoth cradle, has his diaper changed by heavy equipment and plays with the boats in the bay. The cheerful absurdity of this setup works best in the more slapstick scenes, as when Toddie helps his family during sugaring season, with a moose, an ax and Grandpa in his rocking chair all stuck to his coat with maple syrup. SOME DOG! By Mary Casanova. Illustrated by Ard Hoyt. Farrar, Straus & Giroux. $16. (Ages 3 to 6) George, a basset hound, has "a good life" - until a stray dog arrives, a top-speed, curly-haired showoff who takes over the house. Sleepy George can't compete. The new pooch, Zippity, rushes ahead to the grocery store and steals George's sleeping spot. When Zippity gets himself put out of the house in a storm, though, George proves his loyalty and big-heartedness, bringing a satisfying conclusion to his annoying predicament The parallels to an attention-grabbing younger sibling may reassure older and wiser members of the household that their places are secure. GUYAHOLIC. By Carolyn Mackler. Candlewick. $16.99. (Ages 14 and up) V lives with her grandparents in upstate New York, and as high school graduation looms she waits to see if her mother will let her down one more time. Sure enough, she does: Mom can't make it from Texas. So V begins a cross-country trip to see her, which leaves her plenty of time to ponder the meaningless relationships she's had with guys - and to realize that her boyfriend, Sam, may be something different In spite of the novel's familiar teenage trappings. Madder's unsentimental feel for how kids think and talk, and how they go about entering the grown-up world, makes V's Journey engrossing. JULIE JUST