Selfish Giant

Enhanced descriptions from Syndetics:

The giant doesn't want to share his garden with the children. The garden remains cold and wintry. Will the giant change his mind and let the children and the spring into his garden?

Reviews provided by Syndetics

Publishers Weekly Review

Wilde's poignant tale of redemption deserves the renewed attention this volume gives it. In the story, a fierce giant who forbids little children to play in his garden is befriended by one small fellow. The giant's heart melts, and he allows the children to enter the garden, but the special child doesn't return for some time. At last the child appears, this time with holes in his hands and feet. ``You let me play once in your garden,'' he tells the giant. ``Today you shall come with me to my garden, which is Paradise.'' Mansell's illustrations combine a Tony Ross-like zaniness with a sense of the mysterious that perfectly underscores the story's spiritual theme. Ages 69. (April) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved

School Library Journal Review

Gr 2-6 Although the illustrations for this version of Wilde's classic parable are not as visually affecting as Lisbeth Zwerger's delicate watercolors (Picture Book Studio, 1984), children will be drawn to the color and humor of Mansell's drawings. Mansell (like Zwerger) leaves Wilde's enchanting text intact. Mansell's portrayal of the crochety giant is non-frightening and full of humorous detail. Young children might find the last part of the story frightening, and the crucifixion wounds might require an explanation that would be uncomfortable to some adults. This is a beautifully written tale, however, and Mansell's illustrations are not at all fearsomeeven the full-page illustration of the dead giant is gentle, and the stigmata might be missed by an untrained eye. With these cautionary notes, this version as well as Zwerger's complement Wilde's powerful, moving tale, although Zwerger's is still a first choice. Barbara McGinn, Oak Hill Elementary School, Severna Park, Md. (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

Booklist Review

Ages 6-8. The familiar Wilde tale is well served by Gallagher's illustrations, in which the clothing and the faces of the children who come into the blooming garden are in strong contrast to the costumes and figures of the people who rule the wintry landscape after the selfish giant has exiled the children. The giant's size is also well handled: it's clear that every adult looks like a giant to a child. The story's ending, which implies that the child has returned to take the giant to Paradise, should be noted as a departure from what some readers expect in the giant genre. --Mary Harris VeederAudiovisual Boxed reviews

Horn Book Review

Wilde's Victorian literary fairy tale about the giant whose wintry heart is thawed by love has been illustrated with impressive paintings. The children who bring spring to the giant's garden are a motley bunch, culturally diverse, serious and playful, curious and heedless; the giant is pictured as merely a very tall, gawky man. A handsome and sympathetic version of the famous story. From HORN BOOK 1995, (c) Copyright 2010. The Horn Book, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

Kirkus Book Review

Oscar Wilde wrote fairy tales for people of tender sensibility--those who find charm in the notion that birds would stop singing and trees forget to blossom because the children who used to play in their midst have been expelled. From that conceit the converse of course must follow: after winter has hung on and on in the giant's now-unfrequented garden, the children creep back in through a hole in the wall and climb up into the branches; and ""the trees were so glad to have the children back again that they. . . covered themselves with blossoms [while] the birds twittered in delight."" But if this strikes you as pathetic fallacy at its sappiest, you won't be touched to see the giant redeem himself by helping the tiniest of the children up into the one still-frosty, unoccupied tree--nor will you be moved to find him reunited with the child at last when the little one shows up, scarred with stigmata, to take the giant off to Paradise. Foreman's pale, tissue-soft fairyland is prettier by far than Kaj Beckman's garish setting for last year's The Happy Prince, but it won't help you relate to the story on Wilde's or any terms. Copyright ©Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.