Tag Archives: exhibit

Once Upon New Times

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Come see tales transformed at “Once Upon New Times: Reimagining Children’s Classics,” currently on display at the Cotsen Children’s Library! Curated as a companion to the larger exhibit in the Milberg Gallery of Firestone Library, each item offers a different perspective on a cherished classic. From highly imaginative physical transformations to diverse adaptations, we hope you enjoy these selections from the Cotsen collections, curated by Andrea Immel, Dana Sheridan, and Katie Zondlo. We have a few items to share below…

Katie and I were especially delighted that LEGO’s “Once Upon a Brick” Pop-Up Book made it in the exhibit! Originally posted on the blog here, this set not only renders “Jack and the Beanstalk” in 3D, the pop-up mechanism delights visitors both young and young-at-heart.

LEGO. Once Upon A Brick: Pop-Up Books. Ideas No. 21315 (The LEGO Group, 2018). Jason Allemann and Grant Davis (LEGO Ideas member submitters), Wesley Talbott and Crystal Marie Fontan (LEGO designers/graphics).

Visitors can also take a look at a kamishibai version of Alice in Wonderland, which includes a red-dressed Alice and a white rabbit in snappy pinstriped trousers. Those unfamiliar with the Japanese performance art of kamishibai can learn more here.

Takahashi Gozan, adaptor. Fushigi no kuni no Arisu-chan. Illustrated by Seiichi Yuno. (Tokyo: Nihon Kamishibai Gento Kabushiki Kaisha, Shōwa 27, 1952). Cotsen Children’s Library, Department of Special Collections, Princeton University Library

Also featured is the gorgeous book The Singing Bones by multiple award winning, and New York Times bestselling, author, illustrator, artist, and filmmaker, Shaun Tan. Masterfully rendered, the book distills classic fairy tales down to a single page (or sometimes a paragraph!) and represents it with a powerfully elemental sculpture. You can hear Tan discuss it, as well as his other books, here.

Shaun Tan, reteller/illustrator. The Singing Bones: Inspired by Grimms’ Fairy Tales. (New York: Arthur A. Levine Books, 2016). Cotsen Children’s Library, Department of Special Collections, Princeton University Library

I’ll also share this humorous 1939 pamphlet from General Electric Company titled “Mrs. Cinderella.” Here the story of Cinderella is retold using General Electric products (while also thwarting goblins messing with getting dinner prepared for her happily ever after). You can read more about this particular item in Andrea Immel’s excellent post on Cotsen’s Curatorial blog.

Mrs. Cinderella. Illustrated by Corydon Bell. (New York: General Electric Co., 1939). Cotsen Children’s Library, Department of Special Collections, Princeton University Library

“Once Upon New Times: Reimagining Children’s Classics” runs through March 2024. If you’re in the area, please come and visit! You will find directions and hours to Cotsen Children’s Library here, and we have some fun community programs and events coming up in connection with the exhibit (hint: think gingerbread architecture)!

In The Company of Good Books

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Keep company with literary luminaries this fall! The Department of Special Collections at Princeton University Library invites you to “In the Company of Good Books: Shakespeare to Morrison,” currently on display in the Milberg Gallery of Firestone Library through December 10th.

In honor of the 400th anniversary of William Shakespeare’s First Folio of 1623, the exhibit showcases Princeton’s collection of English literature, and the readers and writers who celebrated English literature around the world. Curators Jennifer Garcon, Librarian for Modern and Contemporary Special Collections, Gabriel Swift, Librarian for American Collections, and Eric White, Scheide Librarian & Assistant University Librarian for Special Collections, Rare Books & Manuscripts, have selected some true treasures.

In addition to William Shakespeare and Toni Morrison, you will find Maya Angelou, Sylvia Beach, George Lamming, James Baldwin, Gwendolyn Brooks, Carlos Bolusan, Lorraine Hansberry, Chinua Achebe, Virginia Woolf, and others! Visitors can peruse working manuscripts, archives, original cover art, portraits, and charming inscriptions, including James Baldwin’s personal copy of Maya Angelou’s I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings, signed by the author.

Maya Angelou (1928–2014). I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings. New York: Random House, 1969.

We at the Cotsen Children’s Library are always on the lookout for children’s literary connections, and we found a couple amazing ones in this exhibit! First is one of three tiny manuscripts by Charlotte Bronte. Written when she was a youth, these juvenalia concern the fictional African kingdom of Angria, and are penned on pages bound with blue Epsom salt wrappers. To give you an idea of size, and how minuscule Bronte’s handwriting is, the bound volume on the left is only about 3.5″ tall!

Also in the exhibit are the manuscript notes, sketchbooks, and original storage case of Maria Edgeworth, a prolific novelist for both adults and young readers.

An early edition of Jane Austen’s Sense and Sensibility is displayed, which reminded me of this very interesting fact. When she was only twelve or thirteen, Austen penned The Beautifull Cassandra: A Novel in Twelve Chapters, a tiny work of 465 words total. The Princeton University Press offers a delightful version, with an afterword by Princeton faculty Claudia L. Johnson and artwork by Leon Steinmetz.

Readers might not be aware that Morrison made significant contributions to children’s literature as well. Collaborating with Slade Morrison, mother and son authored nine books for children. These delightful tales were displayed in Cotsen’s previous exhibit, “They’ve Got Game: The Children’s Books of Toni & Slade Morrison.”

montage round 2 If you are interested in learning more about the exhibit, you will find a digital companion  here, and a fantastic Zoom panel with the book’s illustrators here. We also hosted a connected community gallery event this spring, which you can find here.

From now to December 10th, please plan to visit “In the Company of Good Books” in Princeton! It is truly monumental. Not able to visit in person? No problem! Virtual guests can find the exhibit here.

Dear Mr. Morrison…

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Letter from June Volk to Slade Morrison; Toni Morrison Papers, Manuscripts Division, Department of Special Collections, Princeton University Library.

This is the story of how one teacher’s letter of thanks made its way from a New Jersey classroom to the landmark archives of the Toni Morrison Papers at Princeton University Library. It was discovered during our research for our current exhibit titled “They’ve Got Game: The Children’s Books of Toni & Slade Morrison.”

The author of the letter is June Volk, who at that time was student teaching at Upper Bradford School in Upper Montclair, New Jersey. She reached out to Slade Morrison after her students connected with the books in the Who’s Got Game? book series he co-wrote with his mother. She enclosed letters and drawings from the students, including these hilarious ones from David, both of which are proudly featured in the exhibit:

Letter from David to Slade Morrison; Toni Morrison Papers, Manuscripts Division, Department of Special Collections, Princeton University Library.

Original illustration of Poppy and Snake by David; Toni Morrison Papers, Manuscripts Division, Department of Special Collections, Princeton University Library.

Slade sent the letters to Toni, who was delighted. She in turn shared them with her editor, along with this lovely little note:

Note from Toni Morrison to Nan Graham; Toni Morrison Papers, Manuscripts Division, Department of Special Collections, Princeton University Library.

As Katie and I finished the exhibit, we were struck with a thought…was June Volk still in New Jersey? Was she still teaching? Would she be interested to know that her letter from decades ago was in a special place in the Morrison archive?

It took a little searching, but we finally found her! Today, we are delighted to share an interview with this award-winning educator.

Image courtesy of June Volk

Please take us back to 2004, and tell us a little about yourself as a student teacher!

After a career in retailing as a department manager for a major retailer and then as a buyer, I took time off to raise my two children. In the 1980s and 1990s, childcare options were difficult to secure and extremely unreliable for a working mother. To make matters worse, my position required many work hours plus a lot of travel time. I was fortunate to be able to make the choice to stay at home until my children were in middle school, substitute teach, and I decided to pursue a Master of Arts in Teaching at Montclair State University. During the last year of a teaching program, student teachers are placed in classrooms to practice teaching and I was lucky enough to be placed in a Montclair elementary school.

I was assigned to a third-grade classroom as a newly minted student teacher and the memory of that group of students brings a broad smile to my face. Maybe because it was my first real classroom experience or more likely because they were a very bright and engaged group of students, I believe I gained more from these children than they did from me. Teaching mathematics was an easy task for me at the time and perhaps that is why I eventually became a teacher of mathematics. On the other hand, Language Arts lessons were more of a challenge. The children were not engaged or excited with the available and assigned reading materials. I believe it was because the students came from diverse backgrounds, but the stories did not.

After searching booklists and reviews, I discovered the relatively new versions (this was 2004) of Aesop’s Fables by Toni and Slade Morrison. The students were hooked! They begged for read-aloud time and some of them memorized Kid A’s and Foxy G’s lines. The children loved the lyrical rhythm and rhyme of the stories that Toni and Slade created. When I asked them to respond to questions about the theme or the characters, everyone had an opinion, and no one objected to a writing prompt. As their teacher, I learned an important lesson that I retained for my teaching career: well-written, authentic, and relatable reading material was the key to engaging students in reading and writing.

Who’s Got Game? Poppy or the Snake? by Toni & Slade Morrison, illustrations by Pascal Lemaître. Simon & Schuster, 2003.

Can you tell us about your educational journey since then?

I landed my first teaching position in the Livingston Public Schools as a fifth-grade teacher. All teachers taught language arts in their ‘homeroom’ class and then specialized in either mathematics, science, or social studies. Being the new teacher, I was assigned to teach mathematics which I tackled head-on. I eventually earned a degree and certification in mathematics for middle school students. Although I still love teaching language arts, mathematics became my specialty.

I left Livingston after ten magnificent years and moved to Utah where I continued to teach middle school math for several years until my retirement. I now tutor students privately, which became very popular during the pandemic.

The letter you wrote to Slade Morrison was so wonderful. What prompted you to write it?

The students were so attached to the stories and when they saw Slade’s photo on the back jacket of the book, the students thought he looked really ‘cool’ and wanted to contact him.

Were you surprised to hear back from him?

We were very surprised to hear back from him! I never thought he would have the time to respond to our little classroom. Yet he did and the children were thrilled. They loved his signature and tried to copy his cursive!

Letter from Slade Morrison to June Volk. Courtesy of June Volk.

Toni Morrison kept your letter, your students’ artwork, and she even shared everything with her editor at Simon & Schuster. You definitely made an impact are officially immortalized in the Toni Morrison Papers at Princeton University Library. Do you mind sharing how that feels?

I am deeply overwhelmed. As a retired teacher this news brings me full circle. From the moment I decided to become a teacher (I was an older student and in my second career) I really wanted to make a difference for my students. I wanted to connect them to the subject matter in any way possible and get them excited about learning. Those connections are difficult to find now, especially when teachers are competing with mobile phones, online gaming, and lightning-speed technology. The Morrisons’ books were a hook for my students, and I am forever indebted to them for their creation.

Do you have any advice for all the student teachers out there, just starting on their paths?

Get to know your students really well! What excites them? What interests them? How can you as their teacher create lessons from the required curriculum that will fully engage your students? I know it’s not always possible to do this, but if you can create a lesson or two in a unit of study that really gets your students excited about learning it will become contagious in your classroom and they will trust you and follow you in their learning journey.