Feb 22 2008
Book-Buying Tips for Parents in a Post-Potter World
There is hope on the horizon for parents of brainy youngsters with sophisticated reading tastes, even with a certain bespectacled boy wizard’s summer swan song. It’s arriving in the form of some classic tales getting an updated – or, in some cases, post-dated – treatment.
“Folk tales are wonderful reading,” says book expert Marie Bolchazy of Bolchazy-Carducci Publishers, a company that specializes in classical books. “They often have all the elements that have made the Potter series so successful: fantastical stories, relatable heroes, suspenseful plot twists and moral lessons.”
For parents looking to fill the void the end of the Potter series may have left on their child’s reading list, Bolchazy offers the following suggestions:
“Slovak Tales for Young and Old” collects some of the Slovak traditions best-loved folk tales, translates them into modern English, and presents them in a single beautifully illustrated, bound edition. The compilation is so popular in the original Slovak that miniature leather-bound copies of the book were presented to President George Bush and Vladimir Putin when they met in Slovakia last year, Bolchazy says.
Pavol Dobsinsky, considered by many to be Slovakia’s Homer, first compiled and wrote down these tales from Slovakia’s rich oral tradition in the 19th century. Translated into modern English by Fulbright Scholar Lucy Bednar, the tales are beautifully illustrated by Martin Benka. The tales included in the collection fall into three categories: traditional fairy tales complete with magic spells, wicked stepmothers, dragons and journeys; animal tales featuring barnyard or forest creatures with human traits, including the ability to talk; and folk tales in which an ordinary person outwits an enemy, human or otherwise. The volume features the English translations in the front of the book followed by the same tales in the original Slovak.
Children who enjoy experiencing something familiar in a new way, might be thrilled to find “Cattus Petasatus,” “Quomodo Invidiosulus Nomine Grinchus Christi Natalem Abrogaverit” “Vere, Virginia, Sanctus Nicolaus est” or “Arbor Alma.” These are the Latin translations of Dr. Suess classics “The Cat in the Hat” and “How the Grinch Stole Christmas,” “Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus” and Shel Silverstein’s beloved children’s book “The Giving Tree.”
Complete with original artwork and the characters generations have come to love, each volume lovingly translates the original English prose into the language of the classics, and includes a Latin-English glossary. “Readers may be surprised to discover just how much Latin they know,” says Bolchazy.
The translations of the Dr. Seuss favorites echo the love of word play and the rhythmic narrative of the world’s best-selling author. The translation of “Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus” puts into Latin New York Sun editor Francis Pharcellus Church’s famous response to a simple question posed by Virginia O’Hanlon in 1897. The keepsake volume features text in Latin and English, and is handsomely scripted and charmingly illustrated. Silverstein’s timeless parable about selflessness and devotion of “The Giving Tree” creates a marriage of original artwork and grand Latin prose that captures the spirit of the holiday season.
For those interested in the German language, Hoffmann’s “Der Struwwelpeter,” Germany’s historically most popular children’s book, has now been translated into English and Latin and published as “Shock-Headed Peter” in a version that also contains the original German text and illustrations.
To learn more, or to order, visit www.bolchazy.com. Books can also be purchased at Barnes & Noble, Borders, and Amazon.com.
Courtesy of ARAcontent
For a review copy of any of the books mentioned in this article, contact Marie Bolchazy at marie@bolchazy.com.
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