Trina Schart Hyman

Today would have been Trina Schart Hyman's 75th birthday. She won the Caldecott Medal in 1985 for Saint George and the Dragon, retold (from Spenser's Faerie Queene) by Margaret Hodges (Little, Brown; 1984; the cover image here is from the 25th anniversary edition, featuring the dragon. TSH did magnificent dragons), and three Honors as well: for Little Red Riding Hood, Hershel and the Hanukkah Goblins, and A Child's Calendar. She illustrated over 150 books, not to mention countless covers (including Ronia, the Robber's Daughter by Astrid Lindgren) and black-and-white interior illustrations.

I could go on, but this post isn't meant to be an encyclopedia entry. I simply wanted to say that in my imagination, the landscape of fairy tales is illustrated by Trina Schart Hyman. And thanks to her, that landscape is also peopled by a racially diverse cast of characters. It's a notable quality, especially of her later work, and one that is still too scarce today.

[Image from Bearskin by Howard Pyle, illustrated by Trina Schart Hyman (HarperCollins, 1997).]

Warwick Hutton

I've just rediscovered the work of Warwick Hutton, a British author and illustrator of retellings--mythological, biblical, folk and fairy tales of all sorts. Hutton's illustrations are rendered in delicate pen-and-ink and watercolor wash and characterized by spacious sea and landscapes; oversized yet oddly graceful figures, of both people and animals; and lots of interesting compositional elements. We own only one of his books, a retelling by Susan Cooper of The Silver Cow: A Welsh Tale (Atheneum, 1985), in which the Tylwyth Teg reward a farmer's son for his playing of the harp with a beautiful, bountiful silver cow--until the greedy farmer goes a bit too far, and loses her and all the silver cows that had been born to her: the treasures of his herd. (Hutton also illustrated Cooper's retelling of The Selkie Girl; I don't like selkie stories, so I haven't read that one.)

I especially like Hutton's own retellings of Greek myths, though; these include Theseus and the Minotaur (my favorite), Perseus, and Persephone, as well as the Homeric stories of The Trojan Horse and Odysseus and the Cyclops. All of these are, sadly, out of print. Hutton himself, who was also a painter and, like his father John, a glass engraver, died in 1994 at the age of 45. I've added his books to my "must buy if I see them at the used book sale" list. They are really lovely.

Wayland by Tony Mitton and John Lawrence

Out of the lands in the chill, far North come legends from long ago. This is the story of Wayland Smith, the strangest of all I know.

Those are the opening lines of Wayland: The Tale of the Smith from the Far North, retold by Tony Mitton and illustrated with vinyl engravings by master engraver John Lawrence (David Fickling Books, 2013). Wayland (according to the author's note, which I read using Amazon UK's Look inside! feature) was a legendary smith who took a swan-maiden for a wife. When she leaves him, he dedicates himself to his work, hoping to win her back. Instead, he is captured by a greedy king and imprisoned on a sunless island, where he must hide the treasures he makes in an intricate maze. Ultimately, Wayland makes himself a pair of wings and flies off in search of his wife--and in Mitton's retelling, at least, they are reunited.

The cover of Wayland, with its checkerboard pattern of red flames and white feathers, only hints at the boldness and beauty of Lawrence's expressive engravings. Some of them are available to view online at Illustration Cupboard, which held an exhibition of Lawrence's work on this and other books (including Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials and T.H. White's The Once and Future King). And some of those are available for purchase, although I would be happy enough to have only the book.

Captain Cat and the Count of Monte Cristo

There are lots of cats at sea this year, many of them on board the Carlotta in Captain Cat by Inga Moore (Candlewick, 2013). This is a rambling retelling (I mean that in the best possible way--I like a little rambling) of an Italian tale about a trader who arrives on an island overrun by rats only to be richly rewarded for his cargo of cats. Other traders follow, expecting more of the same, but in turn they are rewarded...with kittens! Moore's illustrations of captain and cats of all colors are charming, although I could have done without the neat rows of rat corpses lined up on the Royal Palace floor.

This is one of my favorite folktales: I first ran across it in The Thread of Life: Twelve Old Italian Tales retold by Domenico Vittorini and illustrated by Mary GrandPre (Running Press Kids, 1995). I was working on my own retelling, since abandoned, when Martha Hamilton and Mitch Weiss retold it as Priceless Gifts (illustrated by John Kanzler; August House, 2007). I wish everyone had better source notes for it, though (Hamilton and Weiss cite Vittorini, and Moore doesn't cite anyone at all). Apparently, islands overrun by rats are quite common in folktales.

And in real life, too: recently the island of Montecristo (see: Count of), in the Tuscan Archipelago, attempted to eradicate its population of black rats. Only now they use rat poison.

 It looks a lot like the rocky, remote island in Captain Cat, actually!