Children’s book author Robert San Souci, known for his colorful and intelligent retellings of folktales and myths from numerous cultures, died suddenly on Friday, December 19 at his San Francisco home of a traumatic head injury incurred in a fall several days prior. He was 68.
San Souci was born in San Francisco and attended school in the Bay Area, graduating from Saint Mary’s College in 1968 with a major in creative writing and literature. His education also included some graduate study in folklore and world religions. After college he held jobs as a bookstore manager and copy editor before making the transition to full-time children’s book author. He said in interviews that a childhood interest in storytelling and a long-held fascination with exploring exotic locales served him well as he began to adapt unusual, and sometimes obscure, tales for new audiences of children.
Among the standouts of his more than 100 published books are The Legend of Scarface: A Blackfeet Indian Tale (Doubleday, 1978), his debut picture book, illustrated by his younger brother Daniel San Souci, an accomplished artist with whom Robert shared a birth date. The brothers would collaborate on 12 books over the years. The Talking Eggs: A Folktale from the American South, illustrated by Jerry Pinkney (Dial, 1989) was one of San Souci’s many African-American retellings and he also crafted a body of scary stories beginning with the popular collection Short and Shivery: Thirty Chilling Tales (Doubleday, 1987). His adaptation Fa Mulan: The Story of a Woman Warrior, illustrated by Jean and Mou-Sien Tseng (Hyperion, 1998), served as inspiration for the Disney animated film Mulan.
A memorial is being planned for February or March.
