Miss
Rumphius - Barbara Cooney
Puffin - 978-0140505399
M: Hello
Everyone! We have another awesome set of guest bloggers for you: Kathryn Holmes
(another fellow MFA in Writing for Children) and Justin Marshall (graphic
artist extraordinaire)!
Kathryn: MISS
RUMPHIUS, written and illustrated by Barbara Cooney, was one of my favorite
picture books as a child, yet as an adult I’ve been surprised by how few people
seem to have heard of it. It’s the straightforward but beautifully written
story of a woman, Alice Rumphius, who lives quite an exciting life. In the
book’s opening scenes, set at the turn of the 20th century, the young Alice tells her
grandfather that when she grows up, she will visit faraway lands and come home
to live by the sea. The middle third of the picture book shows her doing just
that, in a series of vignettes: She grows up, moves to the city, visits the Indies, climbs a snow-covered mountain and rides a camel
in the desert before settling in a small cottage on a rocky coast. But there is
one other thing her grandfather told her she must do in order to live a
worthwhile life: “You must do something to make the world more beautiful.” And
so the last section of the book is devoted to this third, most difficult task.
After Miss Rumphius falls ill and is cheered by flowers growing outside her
window, she has the idea to spread more seeds the following summer, and sure
enough the next spring her entire village – fields, hillsides, highways,
“around the schoolhouse and back of the church” – is covered in blue, purple
and pink flowers: lupines. Miss Rumphius becomes locally renowned as the Lupine
Lady, and as the book closes, she passes on her grandfather’s charge to her
great-niece Alice,
calling on her – and by extension, the reader – to make the world more
beautiful.
I wanted to share this book with my boyfriend,
Justin, in part because I loved it as a child. But before the saps among you
say “awww” and the cynics stop reading because of the gooiness of a couple
reviewing a picture book together, let me add that Justin is a graphic designer
and trained artist who spent a couple years in children’s publishing – so he
knows his stuff. So, Justin – first impressions?
Justin: First of
all, the story feels very personal, like something that happened to the author
or someone in her family. What furthers that for me is the literalness of the
illustrations – they seem to be referencing real places and real experiences.
The choices Cooney makes are very specific, almost like she’s drawing from
memory: the type of vase in the grandfather’s sitting room, the peacock
feathers on the mantle, the style of the furniture, the lighting, the
ornamentation in the architecture. She has an exquisite sense of architecture.
As a child reading this, I would feel grounded – I don’t have to imagine the
grandness of the “faraway lands” she’s talking about, because I can see it.
Stylistically, having the main large image on one side and then an isolated
image on the copy page makes for beautiful composition. Also, the images have
wonderful depth; she’s taken care to illustrate both the foreground and
background.
I will also say this: I have a real appreciation of
her ability to show the ethnicities of the characters properly and without
prejudice, especially since this book was probably written in the late ’70s. [MISS
RUMPHIUS was first published in
1982.] In some older books, you see prejudice in the way minorities are drawn –
people from “faraway lands” have their features exaggerated – but these visuals
feel very modern in that sense.
Kathryn: It’s
interesting that you bring that up. Reading this as a grown-up, I have a sense
that Miss Rumphius’s visit with the island natives, whose king introduces her
to his family and eventually sends her off with a hand-painted shell to remember
them by, is the only scene in the book that hasn’t aged as well. It feels dated
to me, this idea of the white person visiting the charming “savages” who are so
happy to meet her, whereas Miss Rumphius’s other adventures feel more timeless.
Justin: The reason
it doesn’t feel dated to me is how Cooney handled the imagery. She treated the
island people’s wardrobe and home with respect and seriousness. They aren’t
living in filth. When I see it, I think, this is not about the beautiful white
lady, but about the king saying to her, “you are a beautiful person doing a
beautiful thing. I sense that, and I am happy to know you.” Though – you could
say that because she is dressed all in white and is very clean, there’s still a
sense of the native savage meets the civilized white person. But I don’t feel
that’s hugely prominent.
Kathryn: Fair
enough. Okay, another thing that interests me about this story, reading it as
an adult, is that Miss Rumphius goes on adventures and makes the world more
beautiful without ever getting married or starting a family. That seems almost
ahead of its time to me, the idea that a woman can have a completely fulfilling
life without taking on traditional women’s roles.
Justin: True. I
guess she could have made the world a
more beautiful place by having beautiful children, but she chose to do it by
planting flowers instead. I hadn’t really thought about that angle.
Kathryn: I guess
what I like about it is that it’s presented as no big deal. Miss Rumphius lives
the life she wanted, and though she never marries, she ends up a happy old
woman surrounded by friends and family, including the narrator, her great-niece
(also named Alice).
It’s subtle, but to me it’s a really interesting choice for Cooney to have
made.
Now, changing gears, in your professional opinion,
how do the art and the words work together in this book? Is it all about the
sense of authenticity the art gives the story?
Justin: I feel
like you could talk a lot about metaphor in the words, but the images – though
they’re rendered beautifully – have a visual intent to show a real place that
takes the story out of the realm of poetry and the fantastic. Again, the
details Cooney chooses to invest the illustrations with, down to the texture
she uses to age the walls, keep the story feeling like something that actually
happened to someone. There’s less imagination involved on the part of the
reader. I think that’s what I love and
don’t love about the book: The illustrations, gorgeous as they are, are based
on reality, and perhaps that takes a little of the fantastic nature of this
woman out of it. Everything is explained, visually, in a literal sense. What do
you love about this book?
Kathryn: So many
things! But jumping off of your idea of authenticity, I love that the book
presents Miss Rumphius’s story as merely one way to make the world more
beautiful – this is how she did it.
Whereas the ending leaves things open for the narrator to find her own way:
“But I do not know yet what that can be,” young Alice finishes on the book’s last page. I
like the idea that each of us has a responsibility to make the world more
beautiful in whatever way makes sense to us. I’m not usually big on “message”
books, but this, to me, is a message anyone can get on board with. It’s a message
without any particular agenda: “Make the world a more beautiful place.” And
meanwhile, try to live life like Miss Rumphius does – on your own terms. So why
do I love this book? In 32 short pages, you get all of that, plus lovely
hand-drawn illustrations and a simple, poetic narrative. What’s not to love?
