Bear & Snowglobe [Hardcover]

Raymond Briggs (Author)

Book Description

There really is a bear in Tilly's house, and as Tilly is a practical child she sets about making that bear welcome. Illustrated throughout in full colour. First published in hardback in 1994.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

This oversized book's affecting art and characters and bittersweet ending strongly recall Briggs's contemporary classic, The Snowman; unfortunately, the story lacks Snowman's special magnetism. An opening sequence of tidy panel illustrations shows Tilly falling asleep with her teddy as a creature moves closer and closer to her window. The panels become huge as they reveal the face of an enormous polar bear, who then slips over the sill. Waking, Tilly invites the furry giant to share her bed. She spends the day playing with the bear, bathing and feeding him. She is quite disgusted when he "poos and wees" inside the house ("You are awful! I hate you"), and grows exasperated when he falls asleep during a "serious talk." Nevertheless, Tilly ends the day by declaring, "I love you, Bear, with all my heart." But Bear does not stay. On the final, wordless page, Bear makes his way across a polar landscape and dives into water whose chill one can almost feel-an indication of Briggs's power to draw readers into his pictorial storytelling. The text, however, takes the easy way out: "Bears can't live in houses with people, can they?... That sort of thing happens only in story books." Ages 3-up.
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From School Library Journal

Kindergarten-Grade 4?Soon after Tilly is tucked safely into bed, a large white paw pries open the bedroom window. As the girl sleeps, a polar bear maneuvers his massive body into her room, leaving lamps and curtains awry. He looms silently over Tilly, his snout only inches from her nose. She awakens, and expressing neither surprise nor fear, invites the bear into her bed. First thing in the morning, she describes him in full detail (his "enormous" teeth are "longer than my fingers" and his claws, "black and curved like hooks...could easily tear me to bits"). Her parents pay little attention, assuming that the creature is imaginary. As the day passes, the bossy child treats her guest much like a disobedient doll, giving him a bath and complaining when he shakes out his fur, and grimly cleaning up after him ("'Oh, you BEAST! You've weed on the floor! Horrible! Horrible! Horrible!'") That night, the bear follows the moon back to his home. While similar in plot and style to the author's more successful The Snowman (Random, 1978), this book has a great deal more text, most of which is dialogue, sometimes placed in word balloons. The language is repetitive and flat, with a distinctly British tone. The colored-pencil illustrations, with their cross-hatching and loose lines, have a scratchy, frenetic look. Some of the drawings are full page, while others are presented in comic-book frames, resulting in a choppy, unfinished presentation. While Tilly is very animated, alternately smiling or fuming, the bear's face remains expressionless and blank. This disappointing fantasy lacks the warmth and charm of its predecessor.?Joy Fleishhacker, New York Public Library
Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 1 pages
• Publisher: Jonathan Cape (October 5, 2000)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0224047086
• ISBN-13: 978-0224047081
• Product Dimensions: 10 x 8.6 x 2.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #3,188,619 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Magical wonderful stuff., April 11, 2001

By 

Sailoil - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Bear (Paperback)

Briggs has a knack for illustration that is simply awe inspiring. The bear in this book is just so big. Kids love to see such a big bear get into the house. He makes a mess of the bed and the bathroom, he dirties the floor which has to be cleaned up (good introduction to pets for children) and all the while the adults keep missing him. They just cannot manage to catch a glimpse of this huge bear wandering around their house.

This is a magical and imaginative book which my kids love. It takes a bit of reading at first, but once you get the gist of the story it is easy to lead the children from picture to picture, and it is very well illustrated. It reads almost like a TV programme.

Highly recommended by me. Suits from 2 year olds up to six or seven.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Big book, but a fun one!, July 15, 2010

By 

Kurt A. Johnson (North-Central Illinois, USA) - See all my reviews
(HALL OF FAME REVIEWER)    (VINE VOICE)    (TOP 100 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Bear (Hardcover)

Wow, big book (14.5"x10.5"!), but a fun one! In it, award-winning author and illustrator Raymond Redvers Briggs tells the story of a great big bear that comes to live in Tilly's house. Tilly tries to make it feel welcome, but taking care of a polar bear is a lot of work indeed!

Yeah, this is a funny, off-beat book. Is the bear real or just a figment of her imagination? My little reader was convinced that it was real, and it sounded like a lot of fun to her! It is interestingly illustrated, in a colored-pencil form that helps add to the dream-like quality of the story. Yeah, my little one and I both liked the book, and we think that you and your little one will like it as well.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars "It's a Lovely Smell...All Dark and Smoky...", March 25, 2006

By 

R. M. Fisher "Raye" (New Zealand = Middle Earth!) - See all my reviews
(TOP 500 REVIEWER)   

This review is from: Bear & Snowglobe (Hardcover)

Every child should have a Raymond Briggs book on their bookshelf. Perhaps best known for his wonderful picture book "The Snowman", which is a fantastic book for children, especially ones that cannot yet read (considering it is made up entirely of pictures) "The Bear" is a natural follow-on, once again featuring a young child's interactions with a creature of snowy lands that may or may not be real.

With misty, dreamy illustrations that range from small comic-book panels to full-page spreads, Briggs creates the warm domesticity of a typical family household and the mysterious alien presence of a massive polar bear that enters through young red-haired Tilly's bedroom window. Far from being afraid, or even particularly surprised, Tilly welcomes him into her home.

Typically enough her parents treat the entire proceedings as an imaginary game that their child is inventing (although they treat it with heart-warming indulgence rather than simply ignoring their daughter's claims), and it is sure to raise smiles that the two of them keep missing the massive presence of a bear in their midst. Briggs' skill as an illustrator shines as the bear hides behind doors, under beds, or simply out of the adults' line of vision within the reasonably small interior of Tilly's house. One particularly striking picture portrays Tilly and her father watching television, oblivious to the bear looming over them from behind.

Children have a special bond with animals, able to connect with them on a level that some adults no longer have; and like a favourite toy, they often think of them and treat them as human beings. Out of all the animal kingdom, the polar bear has a special mystery to it and so is an apt choice for the huge, ghostly presence that fills the pages of this book. Briggs' bear is certainly a strange presence, both in the reasons for its arrival at Tilly's house and its final destination - in between is the typical domestic messiness that comes from keeping a polar bear in the house. Though it is predominately an animal character, behaving as one would expect (including leaving several smelly surprises for Tilly that she cleans up in disgust), there are often the barest traces of interest, intelligence and smiles in its expression.

"The Bear" is designed for slightly older readers considering the among of dialogue throughout, and though it is not Briggs best book, (but only because his other works such as "The Snowman", "Fungus the Bogeyman", and "Father Christmas" and are so beloved), this is a memorable, mysterious reading experience.