{"id":18221,"date":"2012-10-24T16:04:09","date_gmt":"2012-10-24T20:04:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/bookdragon.si.edu\/?p=18221"},"modified":"2014-05-11T22:08:15","modified_gmt":"2014-05-12T02:08:15","slug":"stories-1-%e2%80%a2-2-%e2%80%a2-3-%e2%80%a2-4-by-eugene-ionesco-illustrated-and-translated-by-etienne-delessert","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/stories-1-%e2%80%a2-2-%e2%80%a2-3-%e2%80%a2-4-by-eugene-ionesco-illustrated-and-translated-by-etienne-delessert\/","title":{"rendered":"Stories 1 \u2022 2 \u2022 3 \u2022 4 by Eug\u00e8ne Ionesco, illustrated and translated by Etienne Delessert"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/10\/2012\/10\/Stories-1-2-3-4.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft size-full wp-image-27000\" src=\"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/10\/2012\/10\/Stories-1-2-3-4.jpg\" alt=\"Stories 1 2 3 4\" width=\"776\" height=\"1000\" srcset=\"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/10\/2012\/10\/Stories-1-2-3-4.jpg 776w, https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/10\/2012\/10\/Stories-1-2-3-4-620x800.jpg 620w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 776px) 100vw, 776px\" \/><\/a>How strange to admit that\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.mcsweeneys.net\/pages\/about-dave-eggers\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow\">Dave Eggers<\/a>\u00a0taught me <a href=\"http:\/\/www.ionesco.de\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow\">Eug\u00e8ne Ionesco<\/a> \u2013 Mr. <a href=\"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Theatre_of_the_Absurd\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow\">Theatre of the Absurd<\/a> himself \u2013 wrote kiddie stories in addition to his dozens of plays (<i>Rhinoceros, The Chairs, The Bald Soprano,<\/i> being some of his signature pieces). Eggers founded <a href=\"http:\/\/www.mcsweeneys.net\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow\">McSweeney&#8217;s<\/a> which recently debuted\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/store.mcsweeneys.net\/t\/categories\/books\/mcmullens\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow\">McMullens<\/a>, their new imprint just for children&#8217;s titles, which published\u00a0<em>Stories 1 \u2022 2 \u2022 3 \u2022 4\u00a0<\/em>last month. Being a product of Eggers\/McSweeney&#8217;s\/McMullens&#8217; collective imaginations\u00a0\u2013 and, of course, the source material being Ionescoean (is that a word?)\u00a0\u2013 this is no ordinary kiddie book!<\/p>\n<p>Let&#8217;s start with the delightfully ingenious cover: that&#8217;s not just a jacket flap to protect the book &#8230; it folds out to a spectacular poster (pages 74 and 75, gorgeously magnified) on one side, while the other side captures &#8220;Story 3&#8221; around the four edges of the oversized square with the book&#8217;s actual front and back cover in the middle. Not quite getting the unique picture? Really, this you need to see\u00a0\u2013 and appreciate, fold by fold \u2013 for yourself!<\/p>\n<p>Inside, the four stories follow the winsome adventures of a &#8220;thirty-three months old&#8221; girl named Josette. In &#8220;Story 1,&#8221; while Mama rests, Papa tells Josette a story so silly that the maid seems to need to wear a ring bearing the name and image of philosopher\/mathematician\u00a0Ren\u00e9 Descartes to ward off Papa&#8217;s utter nonsense. In &#8220;Story 2,&#8221; while Mama is out, &#8220;Papa teaches Josette the real meaning of words&#8221; \u2013 the telephone is cheese, cheese is a music box, a music box is a rug &#8230; and so on. While Mama bathes, Papa takes Josette on a fabulous flying machine in &#8220;Story 3,&#8221; without ever leaving his cozy warm bed. In the final &#8220;Story 4,&#8221; Papa stays behind the safety of the closed bathroom door while he sends adventurous Josette on a search near and far, just until Mama returns.<\/p>\n<p>Artist <a href=\"http:\/\/www.etiennedelessert.com\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow\">Etienne Delessert<\/a>, who has written and illustrated over 80 books (!), matches Ionesco&#8217;s stories with irresistible art on every page. From fantastical creatures (a walking fish named Darwin, of course) to clever details (the grocer&#8217;s shop in &#8220;Story 1&#8221; is named &#8220;E. Ionesco I,&#8221; while the building&#8217;s number &#8220;69-09&#8221; seemingly refers to the tale&#8217;s original French publication), Delessert colorful efforts superbly enhance Ionesco&#8217;s bewitching stories that celebrate the unfettered imagination. Most\u00a0importantly,\u00a0in wink-wink homage to Ionesco&#8217;s drama, Delessert never lets the rhinoceros wander far from the page &#8230;<\/p>\n<p><strong>Readers<\/strong>: Children, Middle Grade<\/p>\n<p><strong>Published<\/strong>: 1969-1976, 2012 (United States)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>How strange to admit that\u00a0Dave Eggers\u00a0taught me Eug\u00e8ne Ionesco \u2013 Mr. Theatre of the Absurd himself \u2013 wrote kiddie stories in addition to his dozens of plays (Rhinoceros, The Chairs, The Bald Soprano, being some of his signature pieces). Eggers founded McSweeney&#8217;s which recently debuted\u00a0McMullens,&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":27000,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[62,23,6,30,7,66],"tags":[32,89,6608,1673,1674,160,39,1675],"class_list":["post-18221","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-children-picture-books","category-european","category-fiction","category-middle-grade-readers","category-short-stories","category-translation","tag-adventure","tag-anthology-collection","tag-bookdragon","tag-etienne-delessert","tag-eugene-ionesco","tag-kiddie-fun","tag-parent-child-relationship","tag-stories-1--2--3--4"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v19.14 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Stories 1 \u2022 2 \u2022 3 \u2022 4 by Eug\u00e8ne Ionesco, illustrated and translated by Etienne Delessert - BookDragon<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/stories-1-\u2022-2-\u2022-3-\u2022-4-by-eugene-ionesco-illustrated-and-translated-by-etienne-delessert\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Stories 1 \u2022 2 \u2022 3 \u2022 4 by Eug\u00e8ne Ionesco, illustrated and translated by Etienne Delessert - BookDragon\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"How strange to admit that\u00a0Dave Eggers\u00a0taught me Eug\u00e8ne Ionesco \u2013 Mr. Theatre of the Absurd himself \u2013 wrote kiddie stories in addition to his dozens of plays (Rhinoceros, The Chairs, The Bald Soprano, being some of his signature pieces). 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