Customer Reviews

Rotten Island

5 star:		(9)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

When I was six, I love this book like crazy, so I am happy to see it back; however, I'm disappointed to find that at least half the text has been cut out, and what is left has been rewritten, apparently to make it easier to read or less intense.
Since Steig's fierce, colorful prose contributed as much to the impact of "The Bad Island" as his fierce, colorful pictures (which, by the way, look a little faded in the new Godine version), I'm still hoping for a definitive edition!
Compare the wreckage in the first edition: "It went on and on and on and one day it was finally over. Everyone had succeeded in killing everyone else off. The last ugly ogre had given his last gasp and the last serpent breathed its last flame, and the island was a gigantic heap of dead, scaly, thorny, fanged, horned, bug-eyed, barbed, bristling, saw-toothed carcasses, lying in ashes and embers, burning and giving off a dark, horrible smoke. And then there was nothing but hot ashes."
This is replaced in the Godine version by: "It went on and on and on, and one day it was all over. There was nothing left but smoke and smouldering ashes."
Big difference, eh? William Steig is one of our greatest writer/illustrators and this is his masterpiece. Five stars for the first edition; three stars for this new one.

This is a great book, and there is nothing else like it -- certainly not by anyone else, but it is also unique in the Steig canon. The comparison to Sendak's *Where the Wild Things Are* below is apt; both books deal with economies of human destructiveness, but Steig's wonderfully imagined, very funny, full-blooded account of unbridled cruelty burning itself out makes Sendak's book (fine as it is) seem timid and stagey in comparison. I first bought this book over ten years ago as a single, childless adult; I have never tired of it, and now my two boys -- age 5 & 7 -- haven't either. Buy it.

William Steig, now 93, made his foray into children's literature late, in 1968. By then, he had already been drawing cartoons and illustrations for the New Yorker for 38 years. And it was by no means certain that his launch into children's books, where large numbers of titles die each year, would succeed.

The late great New Yorker illustrator Arthur Getz, who in 50 years produced 213 of the magazine's covers, for example, created only four children's books, all of them now sadly out of print. But Steig became as prolific at children's books as he had been with adult humor.

This book exemplifies the praise that critic James E. Higgins lavished on Steig in Children's Literature and Education. He compared Steig to Isaac Bashevis Singer, E. B. White and select others whose work "reaches beyond the specific confines of a child audience." Steig, he wrote, shows an unusual childlike capacity to present incidents of wonder as if they happened every day--and an "essence of childhood which no adult can afford to give up or to deny."

The color and imagination in this 1969 volume places it at the pinnacle of Steig's children's collection. It reappeared in 1984 and again more recently. Unlike most of his children's books, the story offers no characters. Set in a boiling sea, the vile landscape that dominates it spouts fire, smoke, poison arrows, double-headed toads and hot lava. Even the plant life here sprouts horrible thorns and twisted spines. It thrives in an environment of hourly earthquakes, black tornadoes, lightening sprees, cyclones and dust storms, which freezes at night.

The creatures inhabiting this place appear equally grotesque. The serpents, sharp-clawed crabs, stingrays, high-voltage electric eels and other scaly, wart-covered denizens sport talons, tentacles, fangs, extra arms and eyes, armor, rusty nails and wheels for legs. The insects appear bug-eyed and hairy, covered in grit and petrified sauerkraut. No two are alike--except for their equal vanity, jealousy and delight in greeting one another with spit or shooting flames. Others' pain induces them to shake with laughter. Cruelty tickles them. They live in hatred--hissing, screaming, caterwauling and otherwise venting their hideous feelings.

Aside from showing children the hyperbolic worst likely to come of ill will and a venomous temper, what makes this book wonderful is the way in which this Paradise of hatred disintegrates and transforms into something beautiful. Alyssa A. Lappen

I am so glad to see this book back in print. I've checked it out of the library so many times I'm afraid one of these days they won't let me check it out again. Even though my children are beyond the "picture book" years, William Steig's books remain on our shelves to read and enjoy again and again. They are smart,amusing and never condesceding. Rotten Island is a treasure!

Here's how this book begins:

"There once was a very unbeautiful, very rocky, rotten island. It had acres of sharp gravel and volcanoes that belched fire and smoke, spewed hot lava, and spat poison arrows and double headed toads".

Think about double headed toads flying through the air. Let your imagination run wild. Trust me, nothing you can conjure up will prepare you for what you will encounter in reading this masterpiece by William Steig.

For instance, "The insects there could get as big as barracudas - goggle-eyed with chopping mandibles, bug-eyed and hairy, with stinging tails and clacking shells covered with grit and petrified sauerkraut". And there they are; illustrated in grotesque and intricate detail, in psychedelic colors (the book was originally published in 1969). And yes, there is one perched precariously on a prickly cactus, whose body is indeed encrusted with what appears to be petrified sauerkraut.

Or, "The denizens of this sizzling-hot, freezing-cold, rocky rotten island were monsters - huge or miserably stunted, fat or scraggly, dry or slimy, with scales , warts, pimples, tentacles, talons, fangs, extra arms, eyes, legs, tails, and even heads, all in ridiculous arrangements". And there it is - a bristling menagerie all decked out and endlessly interesting to examine close up.

And then again, "This rotten, horrible island was set in a boiling sea seething with serpents, sharp-clawed crabs, stingrays, electric eels of high voltage, and eerie fish with pointed teeth, barbed fins and scales, and fluorescent lights that glimmered in the bubbling deep".

By now you're beginning to get the idea...

All these assorted nasties dine on one another and engage in unending acts of vainglorious cruelty, interrupted only by the onset of night when everything freezes and the combatants are entombed in ice till morning comes again. Given their nature, and knowing nothing else they are happy: "They loved their rotten life. They loved hating and hissing at one another, taking revenge, tearing and breaking things, screaming, roaring, caterwauling, venting their hideous feelings. It tickled them to be cruel and to give each other bad dreams. Rotten Island was their paradise".

Then one day everything changes. A beautiful and mysterious flower is discovered. Something like this has never been seen before and the inhabitants of Rotten Island find it scary and repulsive. More flowers appear in spite of the frustrated efforts of a hairy grapling to discover their origin.

Ultimately the beauty that has invaded the island via the flowers drives the indigenous creatures mad and they destroy one another in a furious final battle.

Rain begins to fall, washing the island and making all things new.

In the morning everything is covered with beautiful flowers, the sea is calm and a rainbow fills the sky. Exotic shrubbery bursts from the peaks of the volcanoes that once spewed double headed toads. A flock of birds swoops in to populate what has now truly become a paradise.

This book is indeed a zany masterpiece - the product of an exuberant and unfettered imagination.

Last year this was the only thing my six year old wanted for Christmas. The book is a delight to read and the illustrations are rich enough to entertain for many readings (if my son's experience is typical for many, many readings). The funny thing was that I enjoyed the book so much I din't mind. I discovered the book at the library and I've never seen it for sale at a book store. The subject is unusual in that it is about a "very unbeautful, very rocky, rotten island" where the creatures who dwell there "loved hating and hissing at one another, taking revenge, tearing and breaking things, screaming, roaring, caterwauling, venting their hideous feelings." I'm sorry to see that this book is not often mentioned with Steigs other classics. It is a treasure.

I was read this book (in its original form) as a child and loved it. I bought it in the 1980s in a UK (Kestral) edition which had the new text as it appears in the current US edition and loved that too, though it is quite different. The earlier text is much wordier to the point in some places of being arguably undisciplined. It is nonetheless true that the first edition has an earthiness that the newer edition does not, for all its polish. On the other hand, the newer text being tighter it has more concentrated effect, especially in the use of alliteration and onomatopoeia. I think it can be called a masterpiece in either edition, especially when considering the fabulous illustrations. I admit that when I read the new edition to my own young children I put back in some of my favorite turns of phrase from the first edition.

As to the theme of the book, I've given it a lot of thought. At first blush you think, "this is a horrible book, with all the killing and meanness, what redeeming message could it possibly have?" But when you take the book in its context (first published in 1969) it should be easily recognizable as a parable, like Dr. Strangelove, about the hawks in both the U.S. and U.S.S.R. paradisaical world was filled with suspicion, hate, and fighting. Nothing is more feared to the hawks than an outbreak of beauty and love. Again, think 1969.

I am a substitute teacher, and this book is part of my bag of tricks. Misplaced my own, so went on Amazon and got a spare, sweet! I try to read this to kids every chance I can make. The art is inspiring, just the thing to get kids to want to design monsters of their own. The language is riveting, full of a litany of monster violence, and the story itself is a metaphor for the violent history of earth, with its extensive dinosaur/volcanic past, which is now in a relatively peaceful phase. William Steig's other stories are original and wonderful, I would recommend them all, and also ISH is great for inspiring kids to just make art, don't worry about perfection, do it for the joy of creating. Best way is to furnish white copy paper so kids can doodle while they listen.

When I was a child (back then, it was "The Bad Island"), I would have my dad read this book to me over and over and over. I never tired of it, and I don't think he ever tired of reading it to me. Now I read it to my son, and I still love it.

This is not a book for little kids. I found this book by accident in the public library in the little kids picture book section. My 4 year old was in the library with me picking out books. We get our books in the "picture book" section geared for very young children. The shelves are placed at their height so they can learn to pick their own books. I have been used to taking the books he wants to read and just put them in the bookbag to check-out. On the higher shelves and the adult section I would be more selective on what I would allow my son to read. For some crazy reason, I am under the impression that the books placed lower would be screened a little better than they were.
To my surprise, when I started reading this book, I realized I was reading one of the most hateful stories ever!!! The monsters are consumed with anger and rage. They deliberately kill each other...violently! The only time you see any "peace" is on the final 2 pages. There is no "clear" lesson...at least in a 4 year old's eyes. As an adult, I can see what the author is trying to accomplish. But I can now recognize archetypal images. All my child sees is these monsters killing and hating each other!
This book does not so much as deserve one star. But that is the least you can give with these opinions.