Who’s in charge of the story?

Who gets to decide?
Has anyone asked the pigs?

A book I introduced my grandchildren to, after we had acted out the story of the Three Little Pigs, was the wonderful The Three Pigs by David Wiesner. An American book published in 2001, it’s a book like no other and it delighted and intrigued the three girls, as much as it delighted and intrigued me when I first came across it.

Once upon a time there were three pigs who went out into the world . . .

The book starts the well-known story in a conventional way, but very soon strange things begin to happen. The pigs are blown or walk out of the story, escaping the wolf and taking charge of what happens next. This picture shows the bit where the pigs have used a page of the book to make an aeroplane with which to zoom off on an adventure. They soon find themselves involved with other stories and, whilst running in and out of pages, they rescue a dragon.

Then they return home (after smoothing out the creases of the page they used for the aeroplane!). . . but on their terms. They end the story in their own way.

The illustrations are fascinating and the reader often has to work out what is going on. A book like this requires much more involvement on the part of the reader than so many of the ‘closed’ books that are bought for children today. The three children and I shared this book and, listening to the two older ones discussing why on one page there were words and letters scattered all over, whilst the youngest talked about whether the cat was going to be allowed in the house, was a joy.

Picture books that involve the reader. I could wax lyrical about this topic for a long while. I will return to it soon.