Mr. Pak Buys a Story [Library Binding]

Carol J. Farley (Author), Benrei Huang (Illustrator)

Book Description

Publication Date: March 1997 | Age Level: 6 and up

The unusual story that a wealthy couple's servant buys from a thief proves to be well worth the price.

Editorial Reviews

From School Library Journal

Grade 1-3?In this retelling of a Korean folktale, an elderly couple send their servant, Mr. Pak, to the city to buy a story, which he is to learn by heart and bring back so that they may entertain themselves. Mr. Pak is bamboozled by a thief, whose "story" is simply a recounting of the movements of a nearby stork. The man returns home; although mystified by the "story," his employer loudly retells it every night, hoping to understand it better. Some time later the same thief comes to rob the couple's house. When he overhears the story, elements of which mimic his movements, he believes that he has been discovered and flees. The author adds a nice tag in which the wife says, "The more I hear the tale, the more I wonder. And wonder is a very valuable thing." Huang's illustrations are comically distorted, with expressive faces, accurate traditional costumes, and details such as a white cat that appears in each scene with the couple. In a foreword, the author tells how she came to know the story, which she heard from her students while teaching at a university in Seoul and eventually found in Frances Carpenter's Tales of a Korean Grandmother (Tuttle, 1972). She has improved on it by making the seller of the fake story and the thief one and the same person, and by removing Carpenter's emphasis on the stupidity of country folk. An enjoyable addition.?Pam Gosner, formerly at Maplewood Memorial Library, NJ
Copyright 1997 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Booklist

Ages 5^-8. Bored with living in the country, a wealthy couple sends a faithful servant, Mr. Pak, to the city with 100 gold coins to buy a story. But a thief tricks Mr. Pak out of the gold by pretending to tell him a story in a nearby rice field. Although odd and obscure, the story turns out to be well worth its price, both for the night when its telling inadvertently scares off the thief who has come to rob the house and, even more so, for the many nights of wonder its retelling provides the couple. Some of the illustrations suffer from awkward composition, but Huang's paintings done in acrylics and colored pencil are sunny and soft and suited to the gentle wisdom of this Korean folktale, which celebrates the value and power of storytelling. Annie Ayres

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Reading level: Ages 6 and up
  
• Library Binding
• Publisher: Albert Whitman & Co (March 1997)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0807551783
• ISBN-13: 978-0807551783
• Product Dimensions: 10.1 x 8.1 x 0.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12.8 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 1.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #10,490,159 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

7 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Bad illustrations -- culturally incorrect illustrations, May 2, 1997

By A Customer

This review is from: Mr. Pak Buys a Story (Library Binding)

Thumbs Down!! This "Korean Folktale" book's illustrations does not represent Korean culture at all. For example, it showed Koreans sitting on chairs (Chinese style) at home in the old days when they should be sitting on the floor and even Korean dresses were wrong. Almost every illustrations were misrepresentation of Korean culture. I have written a note to the publisher but have not heard from them. Couldn't they consult Koreans for this book