Jon Scieszka |
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"Deconstructionist", "surreal" and "iconoclastic" are a few of the adjectives critics have reached for to describe Jon Scieszka's work. Well, it's all true! But as clever as he is, what really marks out this author is his sense of humour. Could he be more deadpan?! Check out The Stinky Cheese Man and Other Fairly Stupid Tales and we guarantee you'll never look at a children's book in the same way again.
THE BASICS
Born: Michigan, USA, September 8th 1954
Jobs: Teacher, Painter
Lives: Brooklyn, USA
First Book for Young People: The True Story of the 3 Little Pigs!, 1990
THE BOOKS
In college, Jon Scieszka was on course to become a doctor, but spent his spare time attempting to write the Great American Novel. He decided to shelve his medical ambitions and take a masters degree in Fiction Writing at Columbia University. Afterwards, he became a teacher in New York. Fans of Scieszka will not be surprised that he was a somewhat unorthodox teacher, who introduced his eight-year-old students to Kafka's Metamorphosis ("They loved it. You'd tell them about this guy who turns into a cockroach, and they'd go, 'No way, man, no way.'") Scieszka's teaching experience prompted him to try writing for children, viewing his new readers as "the same smart people I had been trying to reach... just a little shorter." In 1988, Jon took a year off from teaching and swapped material with the illustrator Lane Smith. The result of this collaboration was The True Story of the 3 Little Pigs!. The book was initially rejected by publishers on the grounds that it was too weird/sophisticated. But it was not long before the book made it into print. A decade after its first publication, the book has sold over 4 million copies, been translated into ten languages and been widely acclaimed as a classic picture book for all ages. The next Scieszka/Smith collaboration The Stinky Cheese Man and Other Fairly Stupid Tales goes even further to break all the rules - pages are printed upside down, the contents page appears well into the book and the narrators - Jack and the Little Red Hen - skip in and out of well-remembered stories. A few purists were offended but the book won the prestigious Caldecott Honor. With books like Maths Curse and Squids Will Be Squids, Scieszka and Smith continue to stretch our notions of what picture books can be, and what subjects they can address. Anyone picking up a picture book by Jon Scieszka and Lane Smith, can see that both author and artist trust the intelligence of the readers. The duo have also collaborated on a series of chapter books, which chronicle the adventures of The Time Warp Trio. These have been particularly welcomed as great books for reluctant boy readers.
WHAT HE SAYS...
"The important thing is to give kids a handle, a connection. Then you don't have to tell them reading is FUN. If you have to come out and say it, then you've missed out, and messed up, somewhere along the line."
"People don't give kids credit for how smart they are. And we don't give them enough ways to show how smart they are."
"I (used to suffer) from this delusion that because children's books are shorter, especially picture books in which there's little text, somehow they're easier to write. But the opposite is true. It's like poetry, where you don't have the luxury of any room. Everything you write has to be distilled."
"One critic said my books wouldn't be much use for putting children to sleep. I don't WANT to put kids to sleep. I see my books as a way to connect them with a whole body of literature."
"I think I came up with the idea for The True Story of the 3 Little Pigs! after rewriting fairytales with my second grade class. I took off a year from teaching and sat at a desk and wrote."
"Lane Smith and I were friends before we worked together. I knew he would do a great job because we like a lot of the same cartoons and books and ideas. And we laugh at each other's bad jokes all the time."
"I never know exactly how long it takes me to write a story. I read a lot of stuff, think about different stories all the time, scribble things down on paper, type them up, change them, type them up again, think some more, add things..."
"My favourite things to read are fairy tales of course, myths, legends, graphic novels, science books, picture books, short stories, newspapers, funny bits, codes, hieroglyphics, encyclopaedias, dictionaries, subway ads, sides of cereal packets, matchbox covers, mattress tags, and any little scraps of paper with writing on them."
WHAT THEY SAY ABOUT JON SCIESZKA...
"Ragingly iconoclastic storybooks... the dark verbal and visual humour of Scieszka and Smith seems to have hit a nerve with Generation X."
Los Angeles Times
"What makes Scieszka remarkable is that his books work on two levels - children laugh at them, but adults, too, buy them for their sophisticated wit" Daily Telegraph
"Great deconstructionist fun and a brilliant send up of the conventions of story and of books." Children's Books in Ireland on The Book That Jack Wrote
"The Frog Prince Continued hits just the right note for boys who are beginning to get cynical about fairy tales, but haven't really grown out of them."
Sunday Telegraph
"Well-conceived comedy can be very high art indeed."
The Horn Book Magazine on The Frog Prince Continued
"A big, whirling, dramatically illustrated book and great fun to read."
The Observer on Maths Curse
"A hilarious trip through the world of numbers... an unforgettable read that helps demystify maths." Sainsbury's The Magazine on Maths Curse
"A surreal delight, sure to get pupils interested in all things mathematical."
Junior Education on Maths Curse
"Highly original." The Bookseller on Squids Will Be Squids
"This crafty volume pays tribute to the original fables' economy and moral intent... beneath this duo's playful eccentricity readers will discover some powerful insights into human nature." Publishers Weekly on Squids Will Be Squids
"One of the best fiver's worth of literature you're likely to get hold of."
Books For Keeps on The Stinky Cheese Man and Other Fairly Stupid Tales
"Brilliant."
Daily Telegraph on The Stinky Cheese Man and Other Fairly Stupid Tales
"Off the wall fairy stories... made even more anarchic by creatively used typography and lusciously surreal illustrations."
Independent on Sunday on The Stinky Cheese Man and Other Fairly Stupid Tales
"The stories in The Stinky Cheese Man and Other Fairly Stupid Tales are not merely gloriously irreverent deconstructions of everything sacred in the land of legend: they also mercilessly send up the hallowed conventions of book design and typographical practice." The Irish Times
"Great typography, illustrations and stories make The Stinky Cheese Man... a children's book for all. Much better than Madonna's Sex, which was only worth noting for packaging." Creative Review
"Pure creativity." Junior Bookshelf on The True Story of the 3 Little Pigs!
"An hilarious alternative version."
NATE News on The True Story of the 3 Little Pigs!
"One of the best books of the year, exuding vitality and energy."
The Bookseller on The True Story of the 3 Little Pigs!
"You say there's nothing in your library for boys to read? Can't find anything that mixes adventure, comedy, and a tad of hocus-pocus? Never fear, the Time Warp Trio has arrived." Booklist on The Time Warp Trio
"Tongue-in-cheek humour, laced with understatement and word play, makes for laugh-out-loud reading." School Library Journal on The Time Warp Trio
AWARDS (include)
The Publishers Weekly Cuffies award 1989 for The Funniest Book of the Year and Most Engaging Character in a Lead Role (non-bunny, non-dinosaur) for The True Story of the 3 Little Pigs!
The New York Times Best Books of the Year 1989 for The True Story of the 3 Little Pigs!
The Caldecott Honor 1992 for The Stinky Cheese Man and Other Fairly Stupid Tales
The New York Times Best Illustrated Books of the Year 1992 for
The Stinky Cheese Man and Other Fairly Stupid Tales
Publishers Weekly Best Books of 1995 for Maths Curse
Salon du Livre (Best Translated Book in France) for Maths Curse
DATE OF BIRTH
10 September 1954
Life Story
I was born full grown in the middle of a hurricane and an earthquake on 10 September 1954,
12.52 p.m. When I found out that I had missed lunch, I gave such a shout that the earth stopped and spun backwards two days. That's why I celebrate my birthday on 8 September. Nobody had ever seen a ring-tailed, rip-roaring wowser like me. When I was one day old, I learned how to read. When I was two days old I started to write. By the time I was three, I had finished 212 short stories, 38 novels, 730 poems, and one very funny limerick, all before breakfast.
As a kid, I was faster than a cheetah, smarter than Einstein, and nicer than a hundred grandmothers put together. I wrestled wild animals in the Michigan woods, read novels by moonlight, and climbed trees blindfolded for inspiration.
I didn't need to go to school because I could out-read, out-write, and out-fight any living teacher or student. I could rhyme any word in twenty-seven languages (including 'orange'), write haiku with my left hand, and spell 'flaccinaucinihilipilification' with my right.
I'm the oldest and the very best of six boys born to Louis and Shirley Scieszka. Every year I golf a lower score, bowl a higher score, and draw a better poker hand than the rest of the Scieszka brothers.
In 1977 I met a wildcat woman who had lassoed the moon. I took one look at her. She took one look at me. Then we howled and hooted for forty days and forty nights, each trying to get the best of each other. At the end of the fortieth night we had dug the Grand Canyon, built Mt Everest and opened the Panama Canal, but neither had given an inch. So we called it a draw, fell in love, and got married.
Our daughter Casey was born in 1984. And naturally enough, she is a better writer, piano player and basketball player than anyone except her mom and dad. Jake was born two years later. And if eleven-year-olds were allowed to play on MTV and skate in the NHL, Jake would be the first starting centre with a gold record.
We live on the best street in Brooklyn, New York, with our cat Potvin (named after the Toronto Maple Leafs' goalie, Felix 'The Cat' Potvin), where the sun always shines, the garden always flowers, and the neighbours are always friendly.
I taught elementary school and painted apartments for ten years. Now I write full-time and never have to change a thing I write. Every book comes to me in a flash of inspiration and takes me about two seconds to finish. The longer books, like the Time Warp Trio novels, take a little longer to write - more like four seconds. I give Lane Smith all of the ideas for paintings and then instruct him in the proper use of art materials.
Our first book, The True Story of the Three Little Pigs sold thirty bazillion copies in eight languages. The Stinky Cheese Man did the same. And Maths Curse has sold twice as many as both put together. There are six Time Warp Trio books that would take a page each to fully praise. And I just thought up twelve more while I was typing this sentence.
Lane and I have been on radio shows, TV shows, in movies and on bus ads. We know Michael Jordan and Madonna, we've flown the space shuttle and are two of the friendliest, most handsome, and most humble guys you'd ever want to meet.
If you are a Jon Scieszka fan, why not e-mail him and ask him some more questions about his brilliant books at stinkcurse@aol.com.
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