Finland's Saga

Heroes of the Kalevala: Finland’s Saga (1940), by Babette Deutsch. Illustrations by Fritz Eichenberg. (My Edition: Sixth Printing 1954. Not this cover.)

Much to my surprise, while I was trying to make a list of my Eichenberg books, I found that I had not cataloged this volume on the blog. Here is what I said about it on my other site:

“Heroes of the Kalevala, Finland's Saga, by Babette Deutsch, a simplified adaptation of the Kalevala for young people. Fritz Eichenberg is a rather famous artist better known for his work on heavy religious and social themes, but during his career he also illustrated and wrote many "children's books." Considering that the Kalevala was one of Tolkien's major influences, I sometimes can see these pictures as a sort of transposition of themes, a kind of "Silmarillion-Lite," especially images of two trees with the Sun and Moon at their tops.”

I looked up Babette Deutsch (1895-1982) this time and found out she was “an American poet, critic, translator, and novelist“ who was famed in her time for having made some of the best translations of Boris Pasternak’s poetry among the other 35 books to her credit. This sort of work for children seems to have been her amusement.

 

Among My Peers

Peer Gynt (1941), Retold by E. V. Sandys [from the Play by Henrik Ibsen, with musical passages by Edvard Grieg]. Illustrated by Fritz Eichenberg. Printed by The Thomas Y. Crowell Company. [Inscribed with the Former Owner’s Name and Address: Miss Helen Rapp/ New Harmony/ Indiana]

I have always had a strange relationship with Peer Gynt, the man who goes to marry the Troll King's Daughter. Drawn by its folkloric elements, repelled by its bitter social satire, and intrigued by the bits of familiar music in it (like “In the Hall of the Mountain King”, or especially “Morning Mood” – which there are probably millions familiar with it who have no idea where it comes from), I’ve always felt it was something I should like. I found it to be a slippery beast hard to get a grasp on.

Well. While I was looking for books illustrated by Fritz Eichenberg I ran across this volume of Peer Gynt ‘retold’, no doubt for younger readers (say 11-16) as an easy introduction. It lacked a cover (though the cover illustrations are included inside) and was under $10. It runs to 115 pages and has at least a dozen Eichenberg illustrations.

It is a shame (considering that I bought the volume for the artwork) that I cannot find any good examples of the pictures to show here. Eichenberg has basically two styles: a grim woodblock that he uses for social commentary art, and a lighter style he uses for illustrating children’s books (rather like a simplified Frank C. Pape). Books I have illustrated by him are Mistress Masham’s Repose, Padre Porko, Tyll Ulenspiegel’s Merry Pranks, Till We Have Faces(!), Heroes of the Kalevala, and my Annotated Gulliver’s Travels includes some of his work. I am happy to welcome Peer Gynt into their number.

Birthday Books: Padre Porko, the Gentlemanly Pig

Padre Porko the Gentlemanly Pig, by Robert Davis. Illustrated by Fritz Eichenberg.

I love this little book already, though I’ve scarcely read into it yet. It belongs to a rare category of experience that I call my ‘Alternate Childhood’; that is, it is a book of the kind that I would almost surely have enjoyed if I had run across it as a child but which I had the ill-luck to miss.

This edition dates from 1948 (Sixth Printing) and the last check-out date stamped inside says Nov. 18, 1978, and hails from Ontario, California. It has been rebound in a plain, sturdy library binding that is so familiar to me from my elementary school years. To open it up and smell the pages wafts me back on a wave of nostalgia.

“Padre Porko” purports to be the retelling of folktales from the south of Spain. Whether this is true (a quick search on Google finds no corroborating evidence) or Davis just uses it as a framing device, I cannot tell. Padre Porko seems to straddle the human and the animal world himself, a sort of tutelary figure that can only be found by people in trouble, but much more accessible to animals. His main goal is to keep everything peaceful and happy, and that includes reining in violent beasts. Although a magical figure himself, he does not use magic, but rather cunning, reason, and good-heartedness.

The fact that it is illustrated by Fritz Eichenberg, one of my favorite artists (Mistress Masham’s Repose, The Heroes of the Kalevala), cements my nostalgic fondness for this little volume.

Can you be nostalgic about something you only discovered about a year ago? As it turns out, yes, yes you can.