Today, a couple of the classmates had some arguments over the pages in the book the three pigs being completely blank. Some argued that the blank pages were a waste of space and paper; some argued that it is part of the art work. And I was one of those who liked to pages and was thinking of it from an art perspective. Growing up liking art, art works tend to get my attention more than almost anything else. When I was clipping through the pages of the Three Pigs, I thought this was just going to be another typical children’s book. However, while reading the story, started to realized that there were actually two different kinds of drawing in the book. And for how amazingly the illustrator had link the relationship between the two kinds to the story, I was very pleased by the mind of the art. To me, it is a new way of thinking. Even just having the characters jumping and playing around with the book pages made me think out side of the box.
The second part I like the art work of this book was because of the blank pages and the use of negative space. When I flipped through those pages, I really felt that I was somehow being pulled into the story, with them, flying around in the paper plane. And I felt like that the blank page really created the feeling of free and sky being unlimited. To some extend, I felt like, my emotion were being drag into the free space along with how the paper plane were going, which may also represent how I was somehow feeling released from the old fashion the three little pigs story. Personally, I think that the art work in this book really did a good job of drawing audiences into the story with them.
Another point that was being brought up during the discussion was the conversation bubbles. I personally think that even though reader should probably be able to figure the story line without many of the conversation bubbles, I still think that the bubble did a significant job of building the relationship between the characters in the book and the audiences. Because words in the bubbles, like a couple classmates had pointed out, perhaps spoke for audiences’ mind as they read through the story. Especially with the page where the pig mention about there being a person out there reading them. I thought that the author really did a good job using every little possible detail to create the atmosphere of the story line and mood of this book.
I agree with Katherine in that I think the artwork in The Three Pigs helped pull out elements of the story that were not introduced in the text. While the illustrations had fairly bland colors at times, I think the blank pages and realistic portrayal of the pigs took the story to a different level. The purpose of post-modern texts is to challenge the reader to think outside of what the text is saying and what better way to throw a curve ball than to put two whole, blank white pages in the middle of the book. Without the blank pages, I think the story would have felt crammed and the journey the pigs took would not have seemed so believable. I also agree that by showing the pigs flying away toward to corner of the page is symbolic of readers saying goodbye to the original story as David Weisner prepares to lead them into a new fairytale. Instead of just simply telling his audience that the story was about to take a change, he was able to let the readers explore the illustrations on their own to find out where the story was going.
ReplyDeleteThe blank pages didn't really bother me, I think they added to the element of making it feel like the pigs were traveling through time. The blank pages were like the barriers between worlds. I thought it was neat when the pigs were almost flying off the pages. I think the artwork was the most important element of the story. Like I wrote in my paper, the story would have had almost the same affect without any words. You would still be able to tell what is happening because you know the basic story of the three pigs and several of the pages didn't have words anyway. It seems like one of those stories that you need to make up your own words to when you read it to a child anyway. As for the word bubbles, they didn't serve much purpose for me. I could have deducted what the pigs were thinking just by the other things that were happening on the page.
ReplyDeleteI personally disagree with what Katherine said about the blank pages. While I understand that the author could have intended them to enhance the story, I saw them as a way for the creators of the book to make more money. By adding in those blank pages, they could charge people more for the book without wasting ink and increasing their expenses very much. I believe that they could have easily gotten the point across without putting in a completely blank page.
ReplyDeleteI do agree with Katherine’s point about the conversation bubbles. I believe that the bubbles enhanced the story and, at times, helped the reader understand what was going on. For example, when the wolf blows down the house of the first little pig the text says that the wolf ate the pig, but the illustrations contradict that. In the conversation bubble, the pig says that the wolf blew him out of the story. Without this bubble, the reader would be confused as to how the pig was in the later parts of the story when the text said that he was eaten.