A review by nerfherder86
Randolph Caldecott: The Man Who Could Not Stop Drawing by Leonard S. Marcus

4.0

The story of the life of Randolph Caldecott, 1846-1886, the namesake of the ALA's picture book award. He drew from an early age, but became a banker's clerk and worked on his art on the side. After a few years he took his portfolio to London publishers and then got steady work illustrating for magazines and newspapers. Asked by another publisher to illustrate a children's book in a series, he became famous for that popular series. His style was new for the time, putting small sketches on some pages, loosening up the traditional picture book style, telling a separate story within the pictures with characters or information that wasn't given in the text. Lots of movement and humor, too. This book about him is heavily illustrated using only his artwork, reproduced from his books and early work, with a few historical illustrations to show the places he lived, the factory city of Manchester England, for example. Has source notes, a bibliography and a nice timeline that extends beyond Caldecott's lifetime to include the establishment of Randolph Caldecott Societies in the US and UK and the creation of the Caldecott Award. A fascinating look at this early art pioneer; even having studied him a little in children's literature classes I had never seen such an in depth look at his life before. The audience for this book would have to be older than the typical picture book audience, because it has so much information in it, but it certainly could be looked at by preschoolers who will be curious about the old-fashioned-looking art that still amuses today.