100 Picture Books

[osprey_archer]

Mad with the power of list-making, I've made yet another list, this one focused on picture books. We've reached a slow time at work and I simply must keep myself occupied somehow!

For obvious reasons, this list leans heavily on books that were available when I was young, but I've included as many newer favorites as I can, as well.

Comments

[genarti]

28! This one was hard, though, because so many of them I encountered young enough that I don't 100% remember them from the cover and title; I'd have to actually flip through to see how familiar it felt. So there's some margin for error here... Several ones sparked immediate recognition of books I'd entirely forgotten, though. The Ox-Cart Man! I don't remember anything that happened but the cover evoked immediate memory!

One I can tell you for sure I read is The Owl and the Pussycat, because there's family lore on this one: I loved it so much when I was 3 that I memorized it, which my parents discovered when my mom found me "reading" it aloud to myself before I had actually learned to read. Thereafter I would recite it as a party trick if prompted to do so. I can still mostly recite it, though I think I'd have to get occasional next-line prompting.

[osprey_archer]

The other danger with picture books is that sometimes they'll get re-illustrated down the line, like Mary Stolz's Belling the Tiger, which was originally illustrated by Beni Montresor and then re-illustrated in the 2000somethings by... I forget who, someone less striking than Beni Montresor, but I guess they wanted to reissue the book with full-color illustrations.

I first read it with the new illustrations and then was MOST put out when I happened upon an earlier copy and realized I could have had Beni Montresor all along.