From the author of Piggybook (1986), another powerful exploration
of the family scene with a similar family of four: massive, boorish
Dad, riding roughshod over everyone; quiet little Mum, a pained but
helpless observer; the narrator and his younger brother, endlessly
squabbling instead of looking at the caged animals they've come to
see. The surreal touches here are minimal - the odd reptilian foot
on a child or an animal head above a pin-striped suit suggest that
humans, too, are animals - but the extraordinary visual emphases
are telling: a faraway elephant is blocked by a rail; a rhino is
dwarfed by his glass-and-concrete enclosure; and while Dad looms,
huge and belligerent, the gorilla he resembles looks back with a
sad, far more intelligent gaze, and Mum and the quarreling boys are
seen through bars, as if caged. The simple, childlike narration
rings painfully true; the one note of hope is a query suggesting
that the zoo visit has aroused curiosity, if not sensitivity: "Do
you think animals have dreams?" It's a bleak portrait: these boys,
as trapped in their family as the animals are in the zoo, are well
on their way to growing up to be just like Dad. As usual, Browne's
elegant, sharply satirical art is exquisitely designed and painted.
A provocative look at the darker side of family dynamics. (Kirkus
Reviews)
Two brothers and their parents spend a day at the zoo, looking at the animals in the cages - or is it that the animals are watching the visitors? This winner of the 1993 Kate Greenaway Medal is a teasing examination of the relationship between man and animals, and the role of zoos.
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