Three Golden Keys, The [Hardcover]

Peter Sis (Author)

Book Description

Age Level: 7 and up

The incomparable range and imagination of Czech artist Peter Sis is known the world over through his animated films, paintings, and best-selling children's books such asKomodo!, The Dragons Are Singing, and Follow The Dream. Now, with The Three Golden Keys, he gives us his most heartfelt and autobiographical work to date: the reworking of three classic Czechoslovakian fairy tales into a haunting illustrated fable of his lost childhood in Prague that is also a deeply felt allegory of the reclamation of a Czech cultural identity after forty-five years of Communist rule. A man returns to his home in the ancient city of his childhood. Three large rusty locks bar his entry. He knows he must somehow find the three golden keys that will let him in. Suddenly a black cat leaps off the gate; seeming to invite him to follow. Together they search through Prague's monuments and landmarks. With each key they find, a different aspect of the city comes to life and recounts for them a classic Czech fairy tale. The man runs back to his childhood home and excitedly opens the three rusty locks. Inside the front door, back turned to him, is his mother. She glances up, and as she recognizes him and comes to life, so does the city. Utterly magical on every level, The Three Golden Keys is destined to become a classic of children's literature. It truly is a "book for children of all ages."

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

With his stunning artwork and resonant, enigmatic prose, Sis (Komodo; Follow the Dream) fashions an entrancing, mystical allegory about the complicated history of his native Prague. After a "wild and turbulent storm" blows him "far off course," a balloonist find himself "floating toward the spires of a big city." Realizing he has returned to Prague, the city of his childhood, the narrator locates his family's home. But three rusty padlocks encrust the door. Guided by a black cat ("Can it really be my cat after all these years?"), the man searches for the three keys. Each is contained in a Czech legend he learned as a child; all three stories are incorporated here on self-contained spreads. A single wash of color enhances the detailed, pen-and-ink illustrations, and each picture is framed in gold against parchment-like paper. Ghostly faces and figures emanate from buildings, plants and other everyday objects, echoing the ethereal quality of the tale, and suggesting the continued existence of what the author terms "hobgoblins." Sis dedicates the story to his American-born daughter in a heartfelt letter that encapsulates the depth of his feelings about the importance of a sense of place and a sense of home. A treasure. All ages.
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From School Library Journal

Grade 2-4-When a storm blows a man's hot-air balloon off-course, he lands in a city where everything recalls his childhood in Prague. He finds the family house but it is locked with three rusty padlocks. He follows the family cat through the empty streets to the library, the Emperor's garden, and the famous town-square clock. In each place, figures from the past emerge from the walls and unroll a scroll that holds a key and relates the traditional Czech legends of Prince Bruncvik and his magic sword, the Golem, and Hanus the clockmaker. With the three keys in hand, he returns home where he recollects voices, sounds, and pictures. From the foreword to his daughter to the first-person voice, Sis has created a personal journey that is multilayered with images, memories, and symbols. The art itself is layered with felines, faces, and ghostly figures imposed over backgrounds, camouflaged in streets and structures, and emerging from misty reflections. With tiny, delicate lines and meshlike textures, the artist's distinctive style is evocative. The scroll stories are handscripted in numbered sequences with a pictogram bordering the two-page spreads. The tiny handwriting is so intricate it requires close focus. Overall the book is intriguing, with visual and textual subtleties interconnecting with cultural and historical ties. Older picture book readers should appreciate the beauty of the illustrations and the symbolism.
Julie Cummins, New York Public Library
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Reading level: Ages 7 and up
  
• Hardcover: 58 pages
• Publisher: Doubleday; 1st edition (October 1, 1994)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0385472927
• ISBN-13: 978-0385472920
• Product Dimensions: 11.9 x 10.1 x 0.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.4 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (8 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #946,076 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

42 of 42 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars An Excellent Awakening to Prague!, April 17, 2000

By 

Rebecca M. Sellars (Las Cruces, NM) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Three Golden Keys, The (Hardcover)

This dark and intricately illustrated book is simply excellent. The art work in it is fantastic and it gives a magically haunting overview of growing up in Prague. It has a magic cat with glowing eyes that walks the young traveler through the streets of his homeland. The drawings are rich with story and intricate with legend. It is an intense book, and some of the legends are dark and spooky. I wouldn't recommend it for children under the age of six, but for children who are just awakening to legend, history, and fairy tale, this is a must. I personally think it is a must for adults as well - I keep my copy on the coffee table because, really, the art as well as the story is of that caliber and it makes a great coversation piece. The book also has a fascinating development story, as well. Peter Sis was apparently encouraged and motivated by Jackie Onasis, working at Double Day at the time, to produce this wonderful book for his young daughter. Sis wanted to produce a piece for his daughter so that she would always know where her daddy came from. Jackie O. helped make Sis' dream a reality. It really is a fine piece of art, history, and story.

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars this book opened new doors to children's literature for my family, November 20, 2005

By 

Inkling (St. Paul, MN) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Three Golden Keys (Hardcover)

I bought this book for my daughter when she was only three. Yes, way too young in some ways, but it immediately became her favorite book because it can be read on so many levels and the pictures carried her imagination to new places. It's the story of a man who somehow magically goes back in time to his home in Prague when he was a child. This introduced a sense of history, of other places defined by their unique history, even a sense of old Europe, to my daughter. You can read the book on many levels because it has small, detailed stored written in boxes and these can be saved for when a child gets older. It's really a magical book for any age. We've gone on to be Peter Sis fans and enjoy all of his stories. Some of them are little masterpieces.

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Peter Sis takes a magical visit back to Prague, the city of his childhood, August 31, 2005

By 

Lawrance M. Bernabo (The Zenith City, Duluth, Minnesota) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: The Three Golden Keys (Hardcover)

Peter Sis, who has written and illustrated the Caldecott Honor books "Tibet Through the Red Box" and "Starry Messenger: Galileo Galilei," wrote "The Three Golden Keys" for his daughter, Madeline. The book begins with a handwritten letter to Madeline, explaining that while she was born in New York, in the New World, he wants to share with her the mystery of Prague, the city in which he was raised. So he spins the story of how his hot-air balloon was blown off course in a violent storm and landed in the Prague of his childhood. There he finds his wa yto his old home, only to find the house dark and three rusty padlocks on the door. He knows that he must find the keys to unlock the locks to get inside. Fortunately his old black cat shows up and as the man follows her through the winter streets of his childhood, they are filled with memories.

Three times in this story, as the seasons change, the man comes to a special place from his childhood, and in each place an old Czech legend is revealed to the man and his cat. The first is the legend of the night Bruncvik, the second the story of the Golem, and the third the story of Mast Hanus and his astronomical clock. Attached to each legend is a golden key, and once the man has collected them the city comes alive and he goes to open the door to his house and see what magical things await him there. Just be forewarned that when you kids read this book that they might be disappointed that their parents were not born in a distant land (fortunately I am safe on that score, although I have never been back to the city of my birth, but I would like to go, although by something other than a hot-air balloon).

The cover illustration for "The Three Golden Keys" does not give you any real indication of the visual delights inside. My only real issue with this book is that the three legends are each told in a single double-page spread, with twenty-four illustrations (approximately one-inch by one-and-a-half-inches each) surrounding the text section, which has captions for each (unnumbered) drawing after an introduction, surrounding a giant drawing of a key. Given that the rest of the book consists of full-page or double-page illustrations rich in detail and full of color, the little comic strip versions of the legends suffer a bit in comparison, although they are as finely detailed as the rest of the art work. Besides, it would not bother me if this book was two or three times longer to work everything in because you are not going to get tired of Sis's artwork.