Lynd Ward (1905–1985)

The Biggest Bear by Lynd Ward (1952; 1980 ed.) 85 pages.

READING LEVEL: 3.9 AR POINTS: 0.5
Preschool (ages 4-7)

A classic children's story published in 1952...and how cute! I read to two of my grandboys this morning. The youngest, age 5, and the oldest, age 7, and both loved it. The youngest gave it a hundred stars and actually stayed interested in the story the whole time, which is a hard thing for him to do. Their daddy is a hunter and they are learning the ropes, so killing a few bears on the first pages didn't phaze them in the least and they could relate. But, they didn't want big bear to be killed. Thank God there was an alternative plan with a happy ending.… (més)

Is this the ultimate graphic novel? It's billed as "A Novel in Woodcuts" and is the final such book Lynd Ward produced. Published in 1937, it was preceded by five other stories told in woodcuts, the first published in 1930. [Vertigo] is apparently considered Ward's best example of the genre. It has 230 woodcuts, which took Ward two years to make. The book was out of print nearly 70 years before Dover reissued it in 2009. For someone exploring graphic stories, [Vertigo] is certainly significant .

The presentation is not wordless. Ward included headings to organize the images and direct the story. Too, quite a number of the woodcuts show newspaper headlines, advertising, and business signs, conveying important information. Viewers are going to derive different interpretations of individual woodcuts as well as the aggregate. Despite being printed in only black, subtleties abound: body language, facial expressions, settings and props, point-of-view, lighting, texture. Every picture tells a story.

Against the plans and dreams of a couple of kids, graduating from high school, looking for their first jobs, intending to marry, the storyline sets the harsh reality of the stock market crash and the ruthless response of business and industry to falling profits. Page through the novel, scanning the images, and the story plays out. Study the individual images and experience the emotions that elate, trouble, and ultimately devastate the mass of Americans depicted.

According to the book's introduction, Ward chose to title the book [Vertigo] The title Vertigo, Ward later explained, "was meant to suggest that the illogic of what we saw happening all around us in the thirties was enough to set the mind spinning through space and the emotions hurtling from great hope to the depths of despair."

It is quite unfortunate that images can't be shown in the reviews, for this is a GRAPHIC edition. Images are so important for anyone to get a satisfactory understanding of the book. Here's what I posted to my thread: https://www.librarything.com/topic/337746#7730247… (més)