Monday, November 21, 2011

Stark Naked, 1 of 4

Another library fair find. I've only included the illustrations by Arnold Roth in this book. It was “a panoramic odyssey” written by Norton Juster and published by Random House in 1969. I'll just let the introduction explain the book:

“Have you ever met a musically oriented Spanish patriot named José Canusee?--or a lady midget named Minna Scule? --or a Welsh after-dinner speaker named Dai Gression? Is Irving Renewal the City Planning Commissioner in your town? Did you know a pregnant woman of twelve named Yetta Nother? Could that sweet old bigot be Aunty Semitic?

“I don't know where you were bought up, but on my block all the kids were convinced that the garbage man's name was, or should be, Hugh Stink. My mother actually had a lady friend she dutifully introduced as Miss Shapen. And, there were those forbidden characters such as I.P. Daily and Seymour Hair who were often the cause of uncontrolled and mystifying hilarity at our house.

“Almost everyone I know has a few treasured examples, by try to imagine a whole town full of them—sort of a panoramistic parade. It is, of course, what follows. (These introductions are never entirely pointless.) They may not be everyone's dish of tea, but like the sole surviving full-blooded Indian in town, Lester D. Mohicans, we present them without reservation”











continued on Thursday.

2 comments:

  1. Nice. Juster & Roth together...how did i ever miss at least hearing about this one?

    Is there actual text or are the captions everything...? (Is there a
    "Norton Jester"?)

    ReplyDelete
  2. There are some pages with only lists of names like this and no illustrations.

    ReplyDelete