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THE GREAT BLUENESS AND OTHER PREDICAMENTS by Arnold Lobel

THE GREAT BLUENESS AND OTHER PREDICAMENTS

illustrated by Arnold Lobel

Pub Date: Oct. 9th, 1968
ISBN: 0064433161
Publisher: Harper & Row

Color wheel and dealing. The Great Blueness follows The Great Greyness, the beginning when there were no colors and the world was grey. A stroke of luck on the wizard's part, he inadvertently mixes some good-looking stuff, calls it blue, and his drab-looking neighbors clamor for more. "After a short time everything in the world was blue." But it begins to make people sad so the wizard has another go, comes up with yellow. The first time 'round it has a cheering effect, but when all around its brightness leads to headaches. Back to the dark cellar for another try, he paints the town red until Redness generates bad tempers. When his color pots overflow and mix up, the terrible mess turns into a wonderful spectrum: everyone raises a hue and cry about variety—a real sight for sore eyes. The text has rhythm, and the associative properties of the colors are matched in the experience—favorable on the first two-page spread, less pleasing on the second. Primarily coloring the world in shades of meaning that show and tell at the same time.