Margaret Wise Brown: Awakened By the Moon [Paperback]

Leonard S. Marcus (Author)

Book Description

Margaret Wise Brown, the author of Goodnight Moon and dozens of other children's classics, all but invented the picture book as we know it today. Combining poetic instinct with a profound empathy for small children, she knew of a child's need for security, love, and a sense of being at home in the worldand she brought that unique tenderness to the page.

Yet these were comforts that eluded her. Brown's youthful presence and professional successas an editor, bestselling author, and self-styled impresariomasked an insecurity that left her restless and vulnerable. In this moving biography, Marcus portrays Brown's complex character and her tragic, seesaw life. Her literary achievement and groundbreaking discoveries about small children's emotional needs were offset by tormented romances including a passionate relationship with Michael Strange, the celebrity socialite once married to John Barrymore.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Brown (1910-1952) wrote some 100 children's books informed by her acute insights into their world. Among her classics, Goodnight Moon excited deep curiosity in Marcus, children's book reviewer for Parenting magazine, when he first read the "concrete yet mystifying" book. Thus motivated, he spent nearly 10 years researching Brown's life to produce this not altogether satisfying biography of an author who helped raise children's book writing to an art form. But those in the field will be interested, nevertheless, for a host of major figures are met here, including children's book editors Ursula Nordstrom and Charlotte Zolotow, illustrators Clement Hurd, Garth Williams and H. A. Rey. And there's much valuable background material on those who influenced Brown's writing, including Lucy Sprague Mitchell of Manhattan's Bank Street School and Anne Carroll Moore of the New York Public Library. Brown, however, remains in essence unknown: Why, for example, did she allow herself to be demeaned in a long relationship--a lesbian affair?--with self-promoting, overbearing socialite Michael Strange, former wife of actor John Barrymore? After that relationship ended, Brown fell happily in love with and became engaged to James Rockefeller, but she died of an embolism before they wed. Photos not seen by PW.
Copyright 1991 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Kirkus Reviews

She was, in the words of former Kirkus editor Barbara Bader- -whose American Picturebooks Marcus quotes--''the first to make the writing of picturebooks an art.'' As founding editor of the innovative William R. Scott children's book line, as well as the author of about 100 picture books during her 15-year career, Brown (1910-52) was also, as Marcus (who reviews children's books for Parenting Magazine) sums up, as responsible as anyone for making the field of children's picture books ``a vital creative enterprise in her time.'' Brown's two enduring classics, The Runaway Bunny (inspired by a medieval Proven‡al love ballad) and the ``hypnotic'' Goodnight Moon (still going strong after 45 years and four million copies), were ignored by The Horn Book and the New York Public Library but helped win her a 1947 celebrity profile in Life. Marcus recounts how Brown found her calling while an intern at the experimental Bank Street School for child-development study and teacher training--and how, by Bank Street policy, the books she wrote and edited were approved or revised according to the responses of ``the threes'' or ``the fives'' (or other appropriate age groups) enrolled at the school. From published reports, Brown's considerable correspondence, and interviews with those who knew her, Marcus pieces together a picture of his subject's doubts and achievements and ambition to write for grown-ups; her offbeat homes and quirky persona; and her friend-filled but lonely life punctuated by a few short affairs and engagements, then an unhappy relationship with a difficult woman who called herself Michael Strange, and, finally, love and imminent marriage to a younger man, Pebbles Rockefeller--only to die after surgery at age 42. If Marcus doesn't bring Brown to scintillating life, he does give an honest and informative account, including intriguing sketches of Bank Street and of developments and personages in the children's book world of the time. And he does it without the sanctimonious reverence so endemic in his field. (Sixteen b&w photographs.) -- Copyright ©1991, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 352 pages
• Publisher: William Morrow Paperbacks (September 22, 1999)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0688171885
• ISBN-13: 978-0688171889
• Product Dimensions: 8.8 x 5.5 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12.6 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (9 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #865,705 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

13 of 14 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars An excellent read:, November 17, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: Margaret Wise Brown: Awakened By the Moon (Paperback)

An absorbing book that provides a fascinating, respectful biography of Brown, as well as an intriguing history of the Golden Age of children's publishing. Finely written and well documented.

6 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Awakened by the Moon, March 6, 2000

By 

Saundra Rudd (Madras Oregon) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Margaret Wise Brown: Awakened By the Moon (Paperback)

A fascinating account of a pioneer of children's literature. This book provides a great deal of insight into the personal and professional dealings of children's book publishing in the earliest days. Margaret seems to have been a woman ahead of her time in many ways and quite a character herself. A very entertaining and well researched book.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars This is the antithesis of breezy bios, September 11, 2007

By 

Bachelier ""1004"" (Ile de France) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Margaret Wise Brown: Awakened By the Moon (Paperback)

The bizarre bohemian-preppy life of Margaret Wise Brown captured by Leonard Marcus in "Awakened by the Moon" is an excellent enjoyable read comparable to Andrew Wilson's "Beautiful Shadow" biography of Patricia Highsmith. The only flaw is Marcus did not interview Albert Clark, the chief beneficiary of Brown's will and the inheritor of the royalties of "Goodnight Moon."

This is a highly detailed book, and so it is more "by a writer, for writers" than a general or curious audience.