Yale University Press | 208 pages | $40
By GREG COOK | December 3, 2007
William Steig, who spent his last decade in Boston, was one of the great cartoonists of the past century. He drew cartoons for the New Yorker and children’s books (one inspired the Shrek movies) with an endearing, spontaneous, ramshackle style that recalls kids’ doodles, and shares their sense of wonder and magic, too.
The Art of William Steig, published in conjunction with an exhibit at New York’s Jewish Museum through March 16, marks the centennial of Steig’s New York birth and is the first major assessment of his career since his death in 2003. It’s a soft-focus appreciation by curator Claudia Nahson, Maurice Sendak, Edward Sorel, Steig’s daughter Maggie, and his last wife, Jeanne. Former New Yorker cartoon editor Lee Lorenz’s beautifully illustrated 1998 book The World of William Steig (Artisan) offers better biography, insight, and context.
This book, with some slightly different material, again surveys seven decades of Steig’s art and writing: early Bronx neighborhood gags, surreal psychological sketches, and children’s books. Steig’s work was sometimes mistaken for simplistic, but the 281 illustrations here actually reveal a sharp-eyed, Picasso-loving, funny, empathetic social observer. Jeanne Steig reveals insider details. Why are Steig’s drawings uniformly small? To fit on his cramped desk and for easy transport to the New Yorker. His last words? “Blue skies.”
Related:
Nanny McPhee, Every picture tells a story, Common ground, More 
- Nanny McPhee
This sweet confection stars Emma Thompson (who also wrote the screenplay, adapting the Nurse Matilda children’s books) as the magical nanny who descends on a brood of unruly motherless British children and ever-so-gently teaches them to behave.
- Every picture tells a story
“Dear Diary: I know I should be asleep already, but I just can’t sleep if I don’t write this all down. I’ll burst!”
- Common ground
Like the American naturalists of the last century, Ann Patchett examines race and class in her new novel, Run .
- Swan's way
Madonna, Lynne Cheney, and Ray Romano have all written children’s books, why not rising British literary star David Mitchell?
- Reading is fundamental
Some of the books I enjoyed most this year were written for an audience more than 10 years my junior.
- Restoring a master
When Marc Chagall died in 1985 at the age of 98 he was internationally famous, wealthy, and had lived to see a museum built for him by the French government.
- Race and romance
You may recognize Tomine’s clean yet highly stylistic illustrations from the New Yorker or Rolling Stone , but this is his first attempt — and a successful one — at long-form narrative.
- The parent trap
Coraline pushes familiar buttons
- Objects of desire
It’s hard to avoid thinking about Freud when contemplating the richly symbolic, highly sexual sculpture and drawing of Louise Bourgeois.
- Bunny girl
A film about one of the world’s bestselling children’s books and the ballsy British woman behind it marks the stirring return of Babe director Chris Noonan. Watch the trailer for Miss Potter (QuickTime)
- The Artist's Body, edited by Tracey Warr, Amelia Jones
This paperback reprint of last year’s hardcover is the perfect gift for the transgression-loving art nerd on your list.
- Less
Topics:
Books
, Media, Books, Visual Arts, More
, Media, Books, Visual Arts, Pablo Picasso, Maurice Sendak, Shrek, Children's Books, Less
