by Sam Juliano
What ultimately foiled Big Anthony in Tomie di Paola’s classic Caldecott Honor book Strega Nona was his failure to notice the story’s benevolent witch blowing three kisses after a magical recitation aimed at ceasing the production of pasta in her magic pot. The same basic measure of smug overconfidence initially impedes a determined young girl aiming to solve the “forms” in martial arts without the vital tutelage of an experienced teacher. Unlike the inveterate boaster in the medieval story set in Italy, a young girl stays the proverbial course in a contemporary setting, where mastery follows a baptism under fire. The unidentified central protagonist in Barbara McClintock’s exquisite The Five Forms needs to thoroughly experience the power of mystical forces before committed will power can harness and humanize undisciplined temperament in achieving consummate success in the martial arts.
After opening end papers featuring mammals who later come alive in the narrative and some attractive brown and beige matching calligraphy, the frontispiece spotlights a young pony-tailed girl wearing a pink coat, one whom in the Barbara McClintock universe affectionately recalls Maria from the charming domestic drama Where’s Mommy? Armed only with a knapsack and an inquisitive spirit she spots what appears to be a thick, loose-leaf holed scrapbook sitting on top of a blue tin book-drop outside a library. Young readers previously exposed to Bill Thomson’s wildly popular 2010 wordless picture book Chalk, and the opening scenes of three children on a rainy day finding a bag of colored chalk hanging on the teeth of a toy dinosaur in a playground, may suspect there is magic in the air again, even if the ground rules this time clearing state that this mysterious portfolio can only enter a “good home.” Taking the bait out intrepid protagonist, having hung up her coat, taken off her boots and laid down her knapsack is busy investigating her surprising find in a room where cuddly stuffed animals, doll house and a jack-in-the-box sit lifelike aside two shelves of books. McClintock suddenly intrudes with the book’s title, which is the same as this 2017 release, and the challenge has officially been taken and accepted.
The author explains that there are movements known as forms in the ancient Chinese tradition of martial arts, and that some of these “mimic the postures and temperaments of animals.” A proper practice will invariably lead to the “release of the power of the animals they represent.” Anyone lower than a ranking master however will not get the desired results, in fact all kinds of chaos will ensue. McClintock depicts a young girl brimming with confidence and in a series of poses commences to take up all the associated aerobics associated with this complex skill. A few successful twist and turns are followed by a tumble, and a rally. The first form is CRANE. As the girl proclaims “Got it!” a sketched brownish apparition of a crane appears in the room and then materializes as mayhem ensues in a portrait of this long legged and long neck bird that drastically contradicts the one Arnold Lobel showcased in his 1980 Caldecott Medal winner Fables, where the most perfect of hosts absorbs the rude and rambunctious behavior of a gluttonous Pelican. McClintock’s feathered mischief-maker sets out to spin the girls’ room into disarray. Books are strewn about and the girl in a funny four-panel canvas orders this quickly unwelcome intruder to Leave my stuff alone! as stork-like creatures has fun using its beak to clasp her coat, shoes, doll and knapsack. The shambolic scene concludes with this turbulent interloper grabbing the girls’ pony tail as she furiously tries to sort out the second form, which specifies that a leopard will overpower a crane.
As the tenacious girl again tries to employ the correct formula a leopard appears the same manner as the crane did in first nebulous incarnation, with the shadowed appearance stretching to the girl’s shoes. The full fleshed crane is none too happy at the latest development. Yet this is a feisty bird, and with Rodan-like fury it initially holds it own against the full-bodied leopard in a quite a confrontational tapestry that shows the girl aghast. With her room under siege she again refers to the book, evoking another transformation: Third, SNAKE. Snake overpowers Leopard. Faced with unremitting pandemonium the flustered girl Oh no! again tries to make sense of the mysterious volume as the power of the two summoned creatures -seen to the reader and felt by the girl- continues to crowd the room with representational moxie.
Two words, Take that! delivered with assurance, and a green snake projecting the same lethal aplomb as Kaa from The Jungle Book is now present to set the record straight as to who is now in charge, as an interwoven pictorial medley plays out in an unparalleled bedroom hullabaloo, where nearly every article in the room airborne. The canvas is then nearly replicated, but shot down to show the widescreen rumpus that will be delight readers in the tradition of Maurice Sendak’s beloved Caldecott Medal winner Where the Wild Things Are. Leopard peruses crane as snake hounds leopard in a show of what creature rules over the other. McClintock’s funniest tapestry has to be the one showing the three martial arts creations looking on with wide-eyed consternation as the girl summons up a power seemingly second to none. The snake has a lamp shade around his curling anatomy with light bulb in mouth, leopard propped up against a couch with claws bared looking back at the new mystical order, and crane, looking like the kid caught with his hand in the cookie jar holding a pillow in a pose resembling that of a stork delivering a baby. The new force enters through the curving door, engulfing the room.
This leads to the artist’s illustrative piece de resistance, a phantasmagorical confection showcasing the full power of the book’s pages, and McClintock’s own artistic mastery of Far East patterns, which her previous book, Lost and Found: Adele & Simon in China examined beautifully and comprehensively. The dragon, a definitive symbol of mythological power over real-life creatures, brings spectacular chaos, with power that leaves all it its trail vanquished. The follow-up panel maintains the bedlam with the topsy-turvy of home furnishings as the girl is as awestruck as she’d be if she were gazing at a fireworks displays just yards from her perch. McClintock’s reds and yellows hint at the cultural source, before the following sketch art pictorially complements the final and telling coda:
The final form returns everything to the way it was. It is to be performed only by a Grand Master!
With that revealing intonation, the young girl had entered the anointed pantheon of martial arts expertise, though she quickly needed to get things in order as she does in another irresistible bevy of vignettes. Her mother’s ironic announcement that she has “tickets for the zoo” after the girl’s own zoological immersion will have young readers guffawing, while keeping one eye peeled on the girl’s measure of concealment. The return to the library insures another customer will soon enough have the same opportunity, paralleling the denouement of the Thomson book after markedly disparate ground rules.
McClintock is a veteran children’s book luminary who has won wide acclaim for many sublime works, including Emma and Julie Love Ballet, Dahlia, the Adele & Simon books, Mary and the Mouse, the Mouse and Mary with Beverly Donofrio and a magnificent collaboration with Jim Aylesworth that resulted in one of the most resplendent children’s books of all-time, the much lauded My Grandfather’s Coat. Venerated in Japan, and widely translated, her prolific contributions to the form are varied and creative. In her afterward (and dedication) to The Five Forms, which was recently named one of the best picture books of the year by the New York Public Library Board, she glowingly pays tribute to her son Larson DiFiori, who has practiced martial arts since the age of fourteen. These studies have taken him to the martial arts academy in Xi’an, China and to the Wudang Daoist Traditional Kung Fu Academy in Hubei province. Currently a doctoral candidate in East Asian religious traditions at Brown University, Larson won two gold medals for sword form at the Hong Kong International Washu Championship, and has continued to practice qigong, kung fu and other forms of washu. Though he has not quite managed to bring any animals to life, he served as an incomparable adviser, research assistant and fact-and-form-checker in the making of the book.
A sure confidence builder The Five Forms, like virtually all of McClintock’s book is warm, spirited and vibrant, another master class work by this globe-trotting humanist, who has long brought an international slant into her stories. To say it is Caldecott worthy would be stating the obvious, but I’ll say it anyway. The Five Forms is worthy of serious scrutiny from this year’s committee.
Note: This is the twenty-second entry in the 2017 Caldecott Medal Contender series. The annual venture does not purport to predict what the committee will choose, rather it attempts to gauge what the writer feels should be in the running. In most instances the books that are featured in the series have been touted as contenders in various online round-ups, but for the ones that are not, the inclusions are a humble plea to the committee for consideration. It is anticipated the series will include in the neighborhood of around 30 titles; the order which they are being presented in is arbitrary, as every book in this series is a contender. Some of my top favorites of the lot will be done near the end. The awards will be announced in mid-February, hence the reviews will continue until around the end of January or through the first week of February.
Golly, up to #22 already! Another fine contribution, Sam. That first piece of a/w is truly splendid.
Thank you so much my great friend for your support, enthusiasm and commentary throughout. Yes 22 at this point with six weeks left is more than I thought I’d have published. Not yet sure how many more I’ll be adding, but it is a cinch that at least ten (10) more are certain.
Definitely a keeper, and a worthy choice for your series. As always beautifully written. Great that McClintock is so respected worldwide.
Indeed John! Thanks so much for the exceedingly kind words!
This is a real treat you,ve brought us, Sam! and spiced with picture-book tradition intent on showing possibilities beyond Kansas. So true, that the Big Picture hogs the spotlight while the real work takes years to find traction.
Could that have something to do with Three Billboards?
Thanks so very much my friend! As always your fabulous insights are a welcome enrichment for the series, as is this one! I LOVE that THREE BILLBOARDS comparison point! There is much to be learned from waiting, regardless of how well-received the final results turn out to be. nothing is ever handed out to us on a silver platter, that’s for sure!
Sam, I’ve put in a loan request for it, but was told none will be granted until next week or longer. Odd. Anyway, a masterful review. McClintock’s art is lovely, and she’s had quite a run of exception picture books over the past several years.
none will be granted until next week or longer
Are you in Passaic County, NJ? If so, the delay may be because the library service is shifting to a new inter-library delivery service. It’s a PITA.
Realthog, I live in Bergen County and just now found out that they are involved in maintenance and the borrowing will resume on January 11th. Thanks for investigating.
Thanks for investigating.
Ha! No investigation on my part, but thanks for the undeserved thanks! We’d just got back from the library, where we’d learned why none of our holds had yet arrived . . .
Peter and John, the Bergen/Hudson/Passaic/Essex library network involving 76 locations has indeed been temporarily put on hold but only until January 8th:
https://www.bccls.org/
According to the library director of my hometown Fairview Public Library where I serve as a Trustee this had to do with system changeover of sorts. But loans will again be processed in five days. Thanks for the kind words Peter!
Sam, I was so tickled to read this, and then again — out loud to Len when he got home from work. Why? Because both of us are practitioners of tai chi and the storyline (not to mention the luscious illustrations) of Barbara McClintock’s THE FIVE FORMS is near and dear!
Laurie, this is just so amazing! I remember you had made reference to this practice on previous TUESDAY WITH LAURIE posts but hadn’t quite recalled the extent of your involvement. Gotta love it! And so thrilled you broached all this with Len! Thank you so much my friend!
I love all Barbara McClintock’s books, and this one is no different. She is so versatile in subject and style.