LULLABY

by Elizabeth Swados ‧ RELEASE DATE: April 2, 1980

Adapted from Faith Hubley's film Step by Step--created for the International Year of the Child--this comes with a recording of the text by Elizabeth Swados attached to the back cover. As a book it's artsy and vacuous: pictures of mothers-and-children (or fathers-and-children) in different cultures, drawn in the styles thereof, accompanied by words and abstract syllables that have no resonance on the printed page (""Flutes are birds/ Birds are flutes/ A KA KIKI A KA KIKI/ A ROOH A ROOH""), and no thematic continuity or rhythmic flow from one page to the next. Some of the images, moreover, are decidedly off-base (a Japanese boy of seven or so clutching his mother's bare breast to the words ""Hungry and safe""; a father and babe--whom we must take by his skull cap to be Jewish--pictured with a distant flight of planes to the words ""Save me!""). Better any time a stray copy of The Family of Man.

Pub Date: April 2, 1980

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: -

Publisher: Harper & Row

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 1980

Categories: CHILDREN'S