Young, Ed and Lily Koponen. 2011. The House Baba Built: An Artist's Childhood in China. New York: Little, Brown and Company. ISBN 978-0-316-07628-9
SUMMARY
Baba is worried that when the war comes to Shanghai, his family will not be safe. So he makes a deal with a landowner to build a big house with a courtyard, gardens and a swimming pool on his expensive land in a safe neighborhood. If the family can live there for 20 years - enough time for the war to end, Baba will leave it all to the landowner. With the war raging outside, other relatives and friends come to stay in the house which is a comfort to all who live there. In this autobiographical storybook, author/illustrator, Ed Young reminisces about his childhood in China during World War II and how safe he felt in "the house Baba built."
CRITICAL ANALYSIS
The prolific illustrator of more than eighty books, Ed Young pays homage to his father with The House Baba Built. Young's father, Baba, built a house where friends and family could live and feel safe during WWII. As a young child, Young and his cousins and friends roller-skated, swam, danced and day-dreamed and "...knew nothing could happen to us within those walls." When his Uncle Sonny is able to draw a cowboy that a frustrated Ed wasn't able to create on paper, he inspires Ed to realize the ideas he "sees so clearly in [his] head."
Ed, and his sister Fifi, returned to China in 1990 - a trip which "triggered long-forgotten memories" and he put into a journal all the images those memories created. Koponen captures Young's love for his family and home by creating a story with a poetic style of stream of consciousness. Young repeats the phrase "the house that Baba built" so often, and in such a way, that it tells the reader he knew nothing could go wrong in that house - a beautiful show of faith that the young have in their parents.
This book is a work of art. Young uses multimedia such as collage, chalk, photographs, cut paper and watercolors. Each illustration creates a family picture in which multiple events are occurring at the same time - one can almost see the flood of images Young had going through his mind when creating the book. It's almost like a scrapbook with each carefully chosen item on the page having meaningful representation. He likens a swarm of black birds to military airplanes flying overhead, while in another illustration, his family's clothes are in the colors of the rainbow while on a happy picnic.
In the back, there are photographs of Young's daughters standing in front of the gate to the house - the same gate shown on the front of the book. For Young, walking through those gates were a refuge - for us they are the entry to a book of love and beauty.
REVIEW EXCERPTS
With vibrant collages comprised of drawings, cutouts and manipulated photographs, Young…dreamily reconstructs his childhood…The House Baba Built is as intricately constructed as his father's house, with pages that extend and open to reveal additional detail and memories.—The New York Times Book Review
Flashes of multi-media brilliance illuminate this darkly colored, leisurely paced memoir...The episodic text rambles; some illustrations are casual and chaotic. Others are magnificent... Those wanting historical or cultural background will need supplements. Sophisticated, inventive art invites close viewings for patient readers in this unusual family story. --Kirkus Reviews
Young brings his exquisite sense of design, expressive brushwork, and mastery of a variety of mediums to the story...A note explains how Koponen helped shape the stream-of-consciousness text...This tale of filial devotion provides a fascinating contrast to Allen Say's Drawing from Memory (Scholastic, 2011)...--School Library Journal
...Young’s creation, shaped with help from author Libby Koponen, is as complex and labyrinthine as Baba’s house, with foldout pages that open to reveal drawings, photos, maps, and memories. Tender portraits of his siblings, torn-paper collages showing tiny figures at play, and old photos of stylish adults intermingle, as if they’d been found forgotten in a drawer. Young’s fans will savor stories of his East-West childhood...It’s history at its most personal. --Publishers Weekly
CONNECTIONS
-Ed Young has created a website for this book. Students may appreciate the "extras" he offers such as information on WWII and China. http://thehousebababuilt.com/
- The following connections require an account with TeachingBooks.net
-In this 3 minute video, you'll hear Ed Young talk about the back story for creating The House Baba Built. http://www.teachingbooks.net/book_reading.cgi?id=7298&a=1
-Watch an interview with Ed Young.
http://www.teachingbooks.net/author_collection.cgi?id=51&a=1
-For students who enjoyed Ed Young's book, here are some other beautiful books he's created.
-Seven blind mice. ISBN 0698118952
-Lon Po Po. ISBN 9780698113824
-Yeh-Shen: A Cinderella Story from China. ISBN 9780698113886
-The Lost Horse: A Chinese Folktale. ISBN 9780152050238
-For students who would like to explore biographical picture books, here are some popular books.
-Say, Allen. Drawing from memory. ISBN 9780545176866
-Martin, Jacqueline Briggs. Snowflake Bentley. ISBN 9780547248295
-Anholt, Laurence. Picasso and the girl with a ponytail. ISBN 9780764138539
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