Johnny Appleseed

From Publishers Weekly
Armed with a deerskin bag full of apple seeds and wearing a tin pan for a hat, John Chapman better known as Johnny Appleseed is one of the more colorful characters in American history. His saga is succinctly and stylishly recounted in the Ben‚ts' classic poem, first published in 1933, and here burnished with Schindler's detail-rich colored pencil illustrations. Crafted from quatrains as sturdy as the branches of the trees Chapman tends ("For fifty years over/ Of harvest and dew,/ He planted his apples/ Where no apples grew"), the verses trace how the hero traveled the Ohio River Valley sowing seeds for posterity. The poem's simple structure, pulsing cadence and clever thematic imagery ("At seventy-odd/ He was gnarled as could be,/ But ruddy and sound/ As a good apple tree") boost its impact as a read-aloud. Schindler (Don't Fidget a Feather) enhances a succession of realistic pastoral vistas with vivid characters and critters, from the jaunty Johnny himself, with his long white beard and weathered clothes, to the curious possum family dangling above the branch where he sleeps. The artist adheres to an earthy palette and sets his drawings against a parchment-like background, which adds a timeless air. An afterword from the Ben‚ts' son puts the poem and its references in context. Ages 4-8. Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

From School Library Journal
reS-Gr 2-Schindler's whimsical, colored-pencil details and scrawny, homely caricatures provide a welcome counterpoint to a somewhat singsongy rhyme scheme. An apple-juggling Johnny's bent knee (poking out of his tattered gray pants) echoes the curve of the nearby, similarly colored tree branches. This scene accompanies the verse: "At seventy odd/He was gnarled as could be,/But ruddy and sound/As a good apple tree." While the book celebrates John Chapman's gentle nature and his horticultural accomplishments, it also offers clear and appealing spreads of two important growing cycles. The first features an underground cross section of a sequence of tree stages from the seed to harvest. A complementary scene appears on the endpapers as a luscious apple becomes a shriveled core. An endnote from the authors' son describes his parents' purpose and places the poem in historical context, explaining, in particular, the single reference to the "stalking Indian." This slice of Americana deserves a spot in most collections.Wendy Lukehart, Harrisburg School District, PACopyright 2001 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

From Booklist
Ages 4-7. The Benets' poem first appeared in A Book of Americans in 1933. Here it is resurrected and set against Schindler's carefully drawn yet exuberant colored-pencil illustrations. There's an efficient simplicity to the words--"Of Jonathan Chapman / Two things are known / That he loved apples, / That he walked alone." Also, a bit of political incorrectness in reference to "The stalking Indian, the beast in its lair / Did no hurt / While he was there." In a note, son Thomas Benet declares that the Indian "was not stalking a person," only game, "probably," and the reference was meant as an atmospheric touch. The pictures display soft textures and warm color that is restrained yet vibrant. Fine lines highlight judicious detail, and the whole is suffused in a golden glow. Denise Wilms
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

Book Description
Rosemary and Stephen Vincent Benét wrote the poem Johnny Appleseed in 1933 as a tribute to the American pioneer, John Chapman. Born in the 1770s in Massachusetts, Chapman drifted down the Ohio River with two canoes lashed together and loaded with apple seeds. For more than forty years, he wandered the Ohio River valley preaching from the Bible and distributing apple seeds, saplings, and medicines to the settlers in the valley as well as to the local native Indian tribes. It is said that Chapman's ragged clothes, religious fervor, and tireless enthusiasm are what contributed to making him the legendary folk hero known as Johnny Appleseed. S. D. Schindler's magnificent interpretation of the Benéts' poem, filled with humor and beautiful details, brings to life the story of the man we know as Johnny Appleseed, an independent spirit who followed his dreams.

Card catalog description
A poem describing Johnny Appleseed's appearance and actions.

About the Author
One of America's best-loved poets, Pulitzer Prize-winning Stephen Vincent Benét was born on July 22, 1898, in Fountain Hill, Pennsylvania. He grew up in California and Georgia and attended Yale University. Shortly after his graduation in 1919, he met and married a fellow writer, Rosemary Carr. In 1928, Benét wrote John Brown's Body, a long, narrative poem on the Civil War, for which he won the Pulitzer Prize. His short story The Devil and Daniel Webster was adapted into a folk opera in 1939 and made into a movie in 1941. In 1933 Rosemary and Stephen Benét together wrote A Book of Americans, from which Johnny Appleseed is taken. Benét was awarded the Roosevelt Medal and the O. Henry Prize, and in 1938 he was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Letters. Benét died unexpectedly at the age of forty-four on March 13, 1943, and in 1944 he was awarded his second Pulitzer Prize for Western Star, an unfinished narrative poem. On the anniversary of Stephen Benét's one-hundredth birthday, the U.S. Postal Service released a Stephen Vincent Benét postage stamp.


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Schindler (Hog Music, 2000, etc.) beautifully illustrates a poem from the Benéts' Book of Americans (1933) with spacious scenes of a cheerful, bearded, apple-cheeked wanderer, sometimes seen in youth, sometimes in old age, juggling apples and tending both gnarled fruit trees and slender saplings in sunny, sparsely settled landscapes. Shades of soft greens and rosy apple come from extraordinary use of colored pencils in details that manage to convey the spirit as well as the humor of the legend. The strongly rhythmic verses still roll out grandly—"He has no statue. / He has no tomb. / He has his apple trees / Still in bloom." And if a Benét seedling, Thomas, has to add an afterword acknowledging that a reference to Indians as "wild things" carries "overtones of a less enlightened period in history," this brief tribute still makes a stirring companion to more detailed accounts of John Chapman's history and legend, such as Steven Kellogg's Johnny Appleseed (1988) or Andrew Glass's Folks Call Me Appleseed John (1998). (Picture book/poetry. 5-8)


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