The Story of Little Black Sambo || Yes . . ._that_ Sambo...
Written: Sep 09 '09 (Updated Sep 19 '09)
Product Rating:
Pros: Artwork.
Cons: It is Little Black Sambo after all...
The Bottom Line: Creative and beautiful retelling and re-illustration with none of the cultural detritus normally present. How much of this same cultural bias the reader brings to the story is another question.
sleeper54's Full Review: Helen Bannerman - The Story of Little Black Sambo
... Perhaps no other published story carries as much racially-charged baggage as does The Story of Little Black Sambo. Especially for a children's story..!!
Written in the British Imperial India of the 1890s and published in London in 1899, Helen Bannerman intended Little Black Sambo to be a pleasant diversion for her children. It paints the picture of a resourceful young Indian boy out in the jungle who survives numerous encounters with powerful and dangerous who each demand an article of bright clothing for safe passage. Later he finds the tigers quarrelling over which was "the grandest Tiger in the Jungle." He reclaims his surrendered belongings as they battle to a 'buttery' demise. As told it is not particularly empowering for children or celebratory of great courage or wily skills of deception.
Indeed, the final image of eating butter 'churned' from four tigers has always been a little nauseating to me.
This edition is the long-term project and life-long dream of illustrator Christopher Bing. He relates, in notes in the book, of being fascinated by this story read to him by his grandfather when Bing was a young boy.
He labored for twenty years to complete the illustrations for his cherished tale. Instead of the small book, easily held by child, of the original, he opts for a large format picture book. He designs and colors the pages as if they are water-stained, with small tears in the edges, dog-eared, pulling away from the binding.
The illustrations themselves are rich and bright, using an interesting technique of parallel lines filling in all the broad areas of color and design. (I am sure there is a name for it; any art experts reading..??) The tigers are particularly spectacular when shown close-up. It really is a sumptuous and elegant presentation.
The Bottom Line Is this rejuvenated and born-again Sambo worth reading, worth treasuring..?? You will have to answer your own questions about the level of racial equanimity present in the story and whether your own personal biases and cultural sensitivities make it acceptable to you.
It is odd that Bing desperately wants to rejuvenate The Story of Little Black Sambo but he does so by strongly casting "his Sambo (as) a glorious and unabashedly African child" all the while in an obviously Indian jungle. He seems more devoted to his image and memories of the story than to "wrench(ing) the story out of the cultural context in which it had been understood by an American readership for over a century." Perhaps he should have said: 'the cultural context in which it had been misunderstood by an American readership for over a century.'
That said, this is a creative and beautiful retelling and re-illustration of the story with none of the cultural detritus present in this book. How much of this same cultural bias the reader brings to the story is another question.
Champions of civil liberties and those who support the idea of open access to all thoughts have a particularly noisome knot to unravel when considering The Story of Little Black Sambo. It is not really the story itself that is so challenging. But the bastardization and corruption of the story and its images by others over the last one hundred years that have created this literary Gordian knot.
It seems clear, from a significant amount of online research (see links below) that Bannerman had no racially derogatory motives in naming the story or choosing the illustrations for it. Yet her innocent story was misappropriated by those who made a racist caricature of little black Sambo to serve their own purposes.
There are numerous anecdotal and first-person reports of black youth having their psyche and school life damaged by being labeled as 'Sambo'. Obviously any school using this text should and must take great care in choosing a proper printing/edition to use and ensuring all young readers/listeners are guided in interpreting both the story and the illustrations. Rather than censorship and 'banning the book' careful use and guided understanding are needed.
I urge you to check out the URLs below to see some of the images and presentations of The Story of Little Black Sambo available on the web. Exercise some care in viewing because some of the images are . . .'troubling' to say the least.
I especially recommend the website tagged ** as an excellent historical analysis of the evolution of the 'Sambo' story in America.
I also urge you to check out the link above (the title of this section) to see the other Epinions reviews submitted as entries to this marking of Banned Books Week, 2009.
http://www.sterlingtimes.co.uk/sambo.htm Story and illustrations, cited as a 1923 edition by Amazon, USA.
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=1567555 A 2003 interview with the author on National Public Radio.
** http://bit.ly/sambopdf A 1976 study by Phyllis Yuill, published by Racism and Sexism Resource Center for Educators. Title: Little Black Sambo: A Closer Look. A History of Helen Bannerman's The Story of Little Black Sambo and its Popularity/Controversy in the United States.
After 15 years of rediscovering the joy and energy of Bannerman s original story, Caldecott Honor-winning artist Bing offers this new version that cel...More at Buy.com Marketplaces
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