Children - Poetry

Will Moses Mother Goose

Name: Will Moses Mother Goose
Author: Will Moses
ISBN: 9780399237447

by Will Moses

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Overview

From world-renowned folk artist Will Moses comes one of the most original and enchanting Mother Goose books ever. Featuring over sixty of childhood's best-loved nursery rhymes, in Where's Waldo-like fashion, children can search magical full-spreads of Will's unmistakable paintings to find their favorite characters.

Young and old alike will discover new reasons to love this beautiful book and the winning art of Will Moses every time they open it.

Folk art paintings accompany this compilation of over sixty of the best-loved Mother Goose rhymes.

Synopsis

Young and old alike will discover new reasons to love this beautiful book and the winning art of Will Moses every time they open it.

Publishers Weekly

In a marvelous match of style and content, Moses's (The Legend of Sleepy Hollow) sprightly folk-art oil paintings make this a "must have" Mother Goose volume. The book's tempo is set from the first page, which intersperses thumbnail vignettes with individual rhymes, all of them set off against a crisp white backdrop. A turn of the page then blends the vignettes into a full-bleed panorama of busy village life, where Humpty Dumpty, for example, sits on a wall watching over the man from St. Ives with his seven wives and all their cats; in the distance Little Bo Peep looks for her sheep, and so on. The effect is captivating, and the conceit promises great fun for youngest readers, who will be able to identify the characters on the quieter pages, then scour the pleasingly cluttered spreads to search for them all over again. The 60-plus entries include everyone from Wee Willie Winkie to Old Mother Hubbard, and Moses tucks in some lesser-known rhymes ("A thatcher of Thatchwood," for instance) among all the old favorites. The book concludes with a selection of riddles, along with an afterword about Mother Goose's origins. Ages 3-up. (Sept.) Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information.

About the Author, Will Moses

It is no wonder Will Moses has found great success as a folk artist-he grew up around some of the best. At the age of only four years, Will began painting with his grandfather, Forrest K. Moses, a folk artist who learned to paint from his mother, Anna Mary Robertson, better known as Grandma Moses. Will, however, has received worldwide recognition for his own individual style, and his colorful and exuberant picture books have become favorites with today's children and their parents.

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Editorials

Publishers Weekly

Children's Literature

If the name Moses sounds familiar, it is because the illustrator learned to paint from his grandfather, Forrest K. Moses, son of Anna Mary Robertson, the famous folk artist known as Grandma Moses. This Moses has selected rhymes and riddles that he remembers with affection from his childhood and has illustrated them in his own distinctive naive style. Pages of short Mother Goose verses are interspersed with double-page spreads depicting village streets, country crossroads, fields, and farms, each scene containing incidents from the directly preceding text. Meticulously done in oil on paper, the spreading landscapes abound with details of rustic characters and animals, thatched houses and country inns, covered bridges and flowing streams. It will surely be absorbing for young listeners to pore over the illustrations to find Peter's pumpkin house, the Old Lady's enormous shoe, Dr. Foster sinking into a waist-high puddle, and dozens of others from Humpty Dumpty on his wall to Sulky Sue in the garret of a wintry three-story house. One objection-the tale of the spider and the fly included here is not a Mother Goose rhyme, but the beginning of a poem by Mary Howitt, written in 1829, as children who have read Tony DiTerlizzi's dazzling interpretation (Simon, 2002) will know. For those who wonder about who Mother Goose may have been, the editors have supplied an informative page, as well as a short bibliography and a useful index of first lines for the generous selection of seventy rollicking rhymes. 2003, Philomel, Ages 3 up.
— Barbara L. Talcroft

School Library Journal

PreS-Gr 1-A winsome collection of 60 nursery rhymes and a few riddles. Most of the selections are commonly known, but an interesting sprinkling is less familiar. What will capture readers' attention is the format. Alternating spreads present six rhymes with accompanying spot art. The following double-page painting shows a bustling land- or streetscape, which children will pore over as they search for the characters introduced on the previous page. Moses's bucolic scenes are filled with picturesque cottages, meandering streams, cobblestone streets, and, of course, the occasional castle. Each detailed oil painting depicts a miniature antique world peopled with nursery-rhyme characters and a few from nursery tales (e.g., the three pigs). The paintings, done in the artist's recognizable folk-art style, sparkle with color and humor (the three little kittens' cottage has a "no dogs" sign at the gate). As Moses states in his introduction, most children who have heard the Mother Goose rhymes can envision the illustrations years later. Those lucky enough to read this collection will long remember the quaint world he creates. Back matter includes an editors' note on Mother Goose, a brief bibliography, and an index of first lines.-Kate McClelland, Perrot Memorial Library, Old Greenwich, CT Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information.