Claude Clement (1)Besprekingen

This is a story of a family of groundhogs who are trying to get their baby to sleep. They employ a number of animals to help with this task. It shows how if a community works together, that anything can be accomplished. This book is a great show of illustrations. It uses colored pencils and different tactics to show the weather. For example, colored pencil dashes that make it look like the wind is actually blowing. It makes the animals look soft and fuzzy and the night look cold and dry. It does a great job, and the images are well drawn. Children's Lit and Illustrations.

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One night a stranger comes to a village. He says that it is his job to light the stars. Non of the people believe him except for one boy. The boy follows and trusts the stranger. Because of the boy's faith in him, the star lighter takes the boy with him to light the stars forever. This story shows that when people have faith in others, even when no one else does, they will be rewarded.

This book was very informative for young readers. The age range for readers I think should be higher than their targeted age range. The illustrations were helpful to guide the reader through the text. I liked how the book went through multiple animals and not just ducklings on their living habitat and what they eat. The end of the book has a great informative section on just ducks and their characteristics. I didn't like amount of text per page. I think that would be too much for a K-2nd grade reader even though that seems to be their targeted age.

This is a story of a cave man and a young cave boy who are both somewhat loners. As the rest of the cave men head out to hunt, a young boy follows behind with "the man with the sky blue eyes". The the man with the sky blue eyes makes a flute and plays bird sounds which enables the hunters to kill the birds. Once the the man with the sky blue eyes realizes that his flute gets the birds killed, he refuses to keep playing it. The hunters desert him and leave him on his own for the night. Although he is scared, the man with the sky blue eyes starts to play his flute again and he and the boy realize they are no longer scared of the dark.
John Howe's illustrations are beautiful and Claude Clément's story is truly magical.

This book was extremely interesting to me. I would love to read this to students, I think it would really help kids use their imagination. John Howe's illustrations are also very beautiful, I was entranced by the detailed artworks, especially of the character's facial expressions.
A stranger with no money and no belongings comes to a small town and asks money to polish the starts. The townspeople immediately laugh at him and call him a fool, but a young, lonely boy is curious about his apparent job. The stranger climbs a large latter all the way to the moon and starts and begins to light them up. The young boy follows him up the latter and they both fly off in the distance on a star.

Mini Raton a reçu ce livre pour son anniversaire il y a quelques mois. Le livre a été lu, puis mis de côté, puis ressorti et relu…
L’histoire est un peu complexe, toute dans l’onirisme et la métaphore, mais ce livre est d’une immense douceur et c’est le texte plein de poésie et les images aux contours ronds et aux couleurs chaudes qui accompagnent l’enfant sur le chemin de cette lecture, et sur la compréhension progressive.
Il est étrange ce petit bonhomme tout rond avec ses cheveux roux. Il arrive alors que personne ne l’attendait, il repartira sans que personne s’en aperçoive, mais il aura mis des couleurs partout, parce qu’il est un sculpteur de rêves et parce qu’il sait, mine de RIEN, faire s’arrêter les gens pourtant si « soucieux, pressés » pour leur faire prendre conscience de ce rêve enfoui auquel on a renoncé trop vite.
J’aime ces rêves divers et accessibles. Bien sûr, il y a celui qui veut devenir musicien ou poète, mais il y a aussi celui qui veut faire un grand gâteau, ou un théâtre en bois, ou encore devenir couturière. Il y en a pour tous, et j’espère que cela permet aux petits lecteurs de comprendre qu’il n’y a pas de sot rêve, et qu’il est important de ne pas perdre ses rêves de vue, car c’est vivre la vie comme on la rêve (ou tout du moins essayer et ne jamais baisser les bras) qui permet d’être heureux.
Un très beau livre qui nous accompagnera au long cours, pour en comprendre le message petit à petit, au fil des lectures du soir. Un livre qui fonctionne sur le même mode que ce petit bonhomme dont on ne connaîtra pas même le nom, on passe devant une fois, deux fois, on s’interroge, on écoute, et ce n’est qu’au bout de quelque lectures que ma graine de lecteur commence à en comprendre le joli message si simple à dire, parfois si difficile à vivre. Et c’est une bonne façon de finir la journée sur une note de douceur, sur une note d’espoir en des lendemains fleuris si l’on prend le temps d’ouvrir son petit balluchon dans lequel il n’y a RIEN et d’en faire le meilleur usage possible.

French author-illustrator team Claude Clément and Frédéric Clément (no relation) - who subsequently collaborated on the breathtakingly beautiful The Voice of the Wood (Le luthier de Venise) - took the work of Japanese photographer Teiji Saga, specifically, his photographs of swans in winter, as an inspiration for this lovely picture-book, originally released as Le Peintre et les Cygnes sauvages. The tale of a celebrated painter named Teiji, who, when he sees a flock of swans flying overhead, is so enraptured by their beauty that he sells all his worldly goods, and sets off to follow them to their winter home, it has immense visual and narrative appeal.

I'm not sure, really, why my library catalogues The Painter and the Wild Swans as a folktale, as it is an entirely original creation, but I am glad to have run across it, as I greatly admire Monsieur Clément's art (I own a copy of The Voice of the Wood, as well as Hélène Tersac's somewhat surreal picture-book, The Animals' Ball, which he illustrated), and found the story serenely engaging. Really though (and this is no disparagement of Claude Clément), I'd enjoy a laundrey list, if Frédéric Clément had illustrated it! Obviously inspired by Japanese art here, he delivers winter vistas of astounding beauty, some of them with the little surreal details - the series of mountain scenes, for instance, in which the two peaks eventually become the robe of an old man - I have come to expect. All in all, this was a delight - well worth the time of any picture-book lover with a taste for beauty!

Little Squirrel's friends come to the rescue when she finds she has been robbed of her nest and winter supplies. Facts about squirrels on the last 2 pages of book.

The first snow is falling and animal families are snuggling together to sleep for the winter, but Little Groundhog cannot fall to sleep. Groundhog facts on the last 2 pages of book.

Kitty wants a job, so she goes to all the barnyard animals and tries to do what they do.

This is a tale about a man whose job it is to illuminate the heavens. He roams the lonely, windy countryside carrying a ladder. When he passes through one particular village, he runs into an orphan boy, who is fascinated by what he does and then decides to follows, him. Together, they travel throughout the countryside polishing the stars. But, one day some woodcutters came along and cut down the ladder, the man and the boy remain in the heavens, their only visible legacy a shooting star.
The tale represents modern fantasy at its best! The story is easily unfolded through the beautiful artwork. Unlike the traditional bright colors used in children books the author use dark earth tones to set the mood. I would recommend for ages 6 and up.
For this particularly book, I think it would be a good ideal for teachers to read aloud and have their class create an alternate ending. Also, it’s a good book to bring for show n tells to get away from the traditional children books.½

El lutier de Venècia viu d'esquena a la vida superficial dels seus habitants. El seu món es limita al seu taller, abocat a un canal i al petit jardí, de la mida d'una catifa estesa, on creix esponerós un vell arbre que al lutier li agrada contemplar quan acaba el seu treball, a l'hora en què les orenetes, les tórtores i els teuladins es posen a les seves rames. El so de les seves rames i fulles movent-se la ritme de la brisa que ve de l'albufera i el so dels ocells li omplen el cor de joia. Un hivern l'arbre es mort i el lutier només se n'adona la primavera següent quan de les seves rame sno broten noves fulles i els ocells ja no venen a posar-se-hi. El fa tallar amb tota la tristor i el guarda en un racó molt apartat del taller. Al cap dels anys, quan el lutier ja té molta fama com a artesà, retroba la fusta del seu estimat arbre i decideix construir un instrument perfecte, amb el millor so del món. Durant to un any treballa el lutier amb l'instrument i l'acaba just la vespra del carnaval. Els orquesteres i els veneciasn disfressats omplen places, carrers i canals. Un grup de joves, seguint un jove artista molt conegut entren al taller dle músic, indicant al músic que aquell és el millor lutier del mó. El jove músic s'enamora del violoncel i el lutier li adverteix que si no es desprén de totes les ambicions terrenals i toca amb el cor no li treurà una bona nota al seu instrument. Poc a poc, els acompanyants van marxant, el lutier puja a dormir i durant la nit, el músic posa tot el seu esforç en treure-li una bona melodia al violoncel. A la matinada, quan comença a sortir el sol, al lutier el desperta una música captivadora. Quan va a trobar al músic, se'l troba sol tocant amb naturalitat l'instrument. A l'extrem del mànec, hi ha crescut algunes branques on regitzells d'orenetes, tòrtores i teuladins es venien a posar.
A destacar: la sensibilitat de la història, el caràcter oníric de les seves il·lustracions pràcticament bicolors, barroques i molt adequades per a arrodonir la història i per a plasmar l'ambient decadent de Venècia.
L'obra, original del 1991, es va reeditar en francès el 2006.

Wonderful, haunting images. This could be perfect motivation for a young artist.

SPOILER: What starts out as a typical original fairy tale---an old, world-renowned craftsman who makes musical instruments makes his masterpiece (a cello) from a beloved tree that provides better music than anything man-made and, at the Grand Carnival, asks if anyone can play his new cello, at the same time warning that if the player is not "in tune with the voice of the wood" will only make noise.½

Very high dificulty level for madu, age 5. May try this one again in ayear.

Explores what motivates a great painter---portraying beauty and not fame and fortune---and his realization that seeing great beauty is more important than portraying it. Japanese calligraphy appears throughout the book, including the page at the end with a poem by Teiji. It's not clear to me if Teiji is the artist in the story or a real person; the book is dedicated to the photographer, Teiji Saga, and a painter, Rudo Krivos. The author and illustrator share a last name but are not related to each other.

SPOILER: Realizing this, he becomes the embodiment of that beauty---wild, white swans. Fortunately he buys the boat from the fisherman instead of insisting that the man row him to the island: the boat capsizes, the painter manages to swim ashore, and turns into a swan. A poem at the end of the book tells of a man become swan who looks back on his human life. Interesting art work, with swirls that are branches and swan outlines.½

I found these dull reading, but my children loved them because their great-grandmother gave them to them.

I didn't care for these stories, I thought they were dull, but my son loved them, possibly because his grandmother had given them to him.

Little Squirrel's Special Nest is about a squirrel who is getting ready for winter and everyone keeps trying to help but he refuses to let anyone help him until one day he gets robbed. The squirrel realizes how important friends are when they help him get food and a nice place to sleep for the winter.

I thought this book was really cute, it also had great pictures of different animals. I think this book really shows how hard animals have to work to get ready for the winter. I love how they show you how important it is to have good friends.

I think this would be a great book for teaching chldren not only about winter but about the importance of friendship. I could have books about winter and talk about how animals have to prepare for it and talk about how we have to prepare. I could also read books about friendship.

My cat Inde loved to be read to, and I bought this while he was at the vet's not knowing he would die a few days later, just before his 19th Birthday. So it was appropriate that I read it on his birthday.

tender, haunting, elegant art

I'd almost give this a 2.5.