THE STOLEN MIRROR

by Lidia Postma ‧ RELEASE DATE: April 26, 1976

After all the flashy picture book splashes from Europe, this Amsterdam artist's muted tones and delicate details promise relief. However, the echoes of Rackham in her dragon, ragged elves, mysterious women, etc., considerably diminish the impact, and the different but always overcharged moods of other pictures soon confirm the impression of gratuitous virtuosity. The same problems are compounded in Postma's text, which seems based more on a superficial reading of fairy tales than on any sense of story or psychology. In it contemporary Michael, who plays with elves in his garden and is unhappy about a coming sibling, finds a gloomy bunch of people slumping in a cave because a dragon has stolen the mirror without which they don't know who they are. But why they all up and follow Michael (now in medieval attire) in an attack on the dragon's cave is no clearer than is the mirror's symbolic significance--or, for that matter, the connection among the elves, the quest and the new baby. In the end so many familiar images are arbitrarily (and dimly) reflected here that Postma's title might stand as a description of her book.

Pub Date: April 26, 1976

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: -

Publisher: McGraw-Hill

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 1976

Categories: CHILDREN'S