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Friday May 27, 2005

Angelic pictures

Illustrations rescue overwritten children’s book

by liz harris
staff writer

“Before You Were Born,” a lovely picture book by folklorist Howard Schwartz, is short on text but generously illustrated.

And that’s to its advantage, as the appealing artwork by Kristina Swarner is imaginative, full of color and large enough to grab the attention of even the youngest child.

The writing, on the other hand, sometimes seems more for adults than children.

“Before You Were Born” recounts an ancient tale from the Midrash Tanhuma.

The short story tells how the guardian angel Lailah watches over an unborn child in the womb, revealing “all the secrets in the world” — about past and future, the languages of animals, the history of the soul. But the moment the child is born, Lailah puts her finger to the infant’s lips — swearing her to secrecy. Thus is the genesis of the indentation on the upper lip.

In the afterward, Schwartz — an English professor at the University of Missouri-St. Louis and the author of nine other children’s books — notes that as a child, he was delighted by the Jewish folktale. “I remember running my finger over my lip and thinking about it,” he writes. “Of course, I had no idea where the story came from.”

The book is pitched as ideal for “new moms, new dads, new babies.” Conceptually, it is an enchanting story.

However, Schwartz’s storytelling is sometimes obtuse, due to language beyond the grasp of the average young child. A baby — or even starting reader, for that matter — would be hard-pressed to comprehend some of wording. This bogs down the storybook.

Take the only sentence on page 2: “Before you were born, I said, your soul made its home in the highest heaven, in the Treasury of Souls.”

And elsewhere, the words “womb” and “heavenly,” for example, would certainly require some explanation for children.

Would it not have been better to simplify the wording?

Swarner’s pictures, on the other hand, appear almost as though they were created by a child, yet they are rich in meaning. One can see the angel, the child, the heavens; no explanations needed. The illustrations are so vivid one could easily envision them as large-scale paintings hanging on exhibit (indeed, her work has been shown in San Francisco, Boston and other major U.S. cities.)

“Before You Were Born” is pitched as “the perfect book for bedtime — and all the time.” No question about the former; the latter can be debated.

“Before You Were Born” by Howard Schwartz (30 pages, Roaring Brook Press, $16.95).

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