Books &Illustration &Peet 06 Mar 2009 09:01 am
So Dear #3
- Here is the third installment of Bill Peet‘s illustrations for this wonderful Little Golden Book (it’s not so little) adaptation of the Disney feature film, So Dear To My Heart.
The book, written by Helen Palmer, is quite a bit larger than any other Little Golden Book I’ve seen. It really was a large job for Bill Peet to undertake.
All illustrations are ink with light watercolor. They certainly foreshadow the look of Peet’s children’s books to come some 15 years later.
Looking at the book through the illustrations, alone, one gets the feel of a very innocent, bucolic setting. The problems of the child are front and center, but these aren’t very real problems. This makes for a light series of stories. (To be honest, I haven’t read the text, but there is an overwhelming feeling that comes over you when you spend a bit of time with the images.) The film wasn’t an extraordinary success. I don’t imagine it’d fare better today. In fact, I’d suspect it couldn’t get released by today’s Disney. Maybe if you switched the lamb to a talking chihuahua.
(Click any image to enlarge.)
Thanks to John Canemaker for the loan of the book.
on 06 Mar 2009 at 10:33 am 1.Jerry Edwards said …
Thanks, Michael, so much for posting Bill Peet’s art from this book. This film is one of my favorite Disney animation / live-action films and I’ve always considered it a generally unappreciated treasure. So I love your posts for the story book itself, but I also love the posts for the Bill Peet art. I own all the picture story books he did and his autobiography, so this art and story you are posting will be bookcased right next to his books. I look forward to future posts, when / if you are able to post them.
on 07 Mar 2009 at 5:56 pm 2.Ian Lumsden said …
I grew up on a farm and something of the innocence of my ’50s childhood is communicated in the illustrations save my grandpa wore a flat cap. Apart from the softness of colour, what I note is the movement conveyed in the figures, an animator’s delight. A bit cleaner than our old farm though and what’s wrong with talking chihuahuas?