 |
Adult publishing has its posthumous Hemingway; now children's literature gets a newly discovered Madeline adventure. With the October publication of Madeline in America: And Other Holiday Tales by Ludwig Bemelmans and grandson John Bemelmans Marciano (Scholastic/Levine), cynics could be forgiven for wondering if Bemelmans's heirs went prospecting for treasure -- but neither Marciano (who is also the author of Viking's October title Bemelmans:The Life & Art of Madeline's Creator) nor publisher Arthur A. Levine knew Bemelmans had left a full-length draft for another Madeline story when they arrived at a contract in 1997.
Marciano, a self-taught artist whose gentlemanly way of speaking belies his relative youth (he was born in 1970, eight years after Bemelmans's death), had originally thought to mark the anniversary of his grandfather's 1898 birth with a centenary volume. With the enthusiastic support of his family -- two older brothers, mother Barbara Bemelmans and grandmother Madeline Bemelmans -- Marciano signed on three years ago with Elizabeth Sheinkman of the Elaine Markson Literary Agency. He and Sheinkman created two lengthy proposals. One featured Bemelmans's paintings, magazine work and nuggets from his archives, including letters exchanged with then-First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy about a possible collaboration. The second highlighted Bemelmans's out-of-print children's books and one or two works that were in progress at the time of his death, plus a 12-page booklet called "Madeline's Christmas in Texas," which Bemelmans had created for the Neiman-Marcus department store in 1955.
After discussions with several publishers, Marciano chose Scholastic for the children's books. Arthur Levine, he said, had seemed to express the most serious commitment, offering a three-book contract with an option on a fourth.
The project that became Bemelmans: The Life and Art of Madeline's Creator also drew interest from a variety of publishers, and it was won by Viking, Madeline's original publisher. In the spring of 1998 Marciano produced the first of what would be 15-20 drafts. "The book took us by surprise," said Tim Moses, director of hardcover publicity at Penguin Putnam Young Readers. "Even people who think they know Bemelmans's work will find something new here. It really d s present Bemelmans's life as a fine artist, not just as the man who created Madeline."
Over at Scholastic, Levine wanted to kick off his trio of Bemelmans picture books with a compilation of Christmas stories. He and Marciano decided upon the 1950 book Sunshine, set in New York and Marciano's own childhood favorite; the 1935 magazine piece "The Count and the Cobbler," set in a fairy-tale Europe; a reminiscence by Barbara Bemelmans; and "Madeline's Christmas in Texas."
The Madeline section, Marciano said, had not been meant to dominate the collection, as it d s now. All Marciano had intended to do was add color to his grandfather's line drawings. But serendipity overtook him. Exploring his grandmother's extensive archives for Bemelmans, Marciano found a full-length dummy book for the Texas Madeline story. "I thought, 'This is great! We should expand it,'" he remembered, the excitement still audible in his voice.
Was Marciano concerned that he was proceeding with work that had been set aside or possibly abandoned? "I know if my grandfather had continued with it, it would have been very different," he said. "It was not a finished manuscript by any means. Yet it was certainly as far along as Madeline's Christmas, which Viking published [in 1985]. They actually hired an artist to reproduce my grandfather's drawings. And you never know why somebody puts something aside," he added. "We all loved the story and the visual possibilities were great. My mother's guess is that he simply didn't want to spend a lot of time in Texas."
Barbara Bemelmans was closely involved with work on the text; together she and Marciano compressed parts of the story and made some other changes. "In part because Madeline is partially based on her, my mother feels incredibly strongly [about the text]. It made the process a bit difficult," Marciano said candidly.
The art, he said, was "a joy" to produce. The hardest parts, he recalled, were the beginning and the ending, because they take place in Paris, with the settings and dress familiar to Madeline fans. The Texas locale, by contrast, freed Marciano from the icons and conventions established in the other Madeline books.
Marciano chose to work in gouaches to render the illustrations, which are based on the pencil sketches in Bemelmans's dummy. "I had originally thought about doing the art like the other Madeline books, where only a quarter to half the pictures were paintings," he said. "I had always considered myself adept at line drawing, and I had no experience with watercolors and gouaches. "But pen-and-ink is like handwriting -- and someone's handwriting is so distinct. I did some line drawings that I really liked, but I looked at them and thought, 'This isn't Madeline.' "
While not everyone will agree that the final work is Madeline per se, Levine d s. "The more familiar I became with all the Madeline stories," he said, "the more comfortable I felt with how typical Ludwig's story and sketches and John's paintings were of the series." He compares the enterprise to the duet famously sung by Natalie Cole along with a recording made by her late father.
According to Jennifer Pasanen, v-p of marketing in Scholastic's trade division, the publisher is paying special attention to Texas, with Marciano visiting Austin and Dallas as part of his five-city fall tour. And the 125,000 copies of Madeline in America in print look like a Texas-size vote of confidence.
Another Jolly Holiday for Olive
But first, a glance back to last fall, when Waldenbooks selected the book as the centerpiece of its holiday promotion; the chain's stores were blanketed with images of Olive, appearing on banners, section headers, shelf talkers, catalogues and newsletters. Chronicle produced a gift set that packaged a plush Olive with a copy of the book for the chain, an item that this year is available to all retailers. Victoria Rock, Chronicle's associate publisher, reported that by the end of October the company had advanced its entire 36,000-copy printing of the boxed set and has ordered 10,000 more packages. In addition, Chronicle has shipped more than 80,000 units of its individually sold plush Olive. Fast forward to the end of this month, when Olive will be the featured holiday attraction at Nordstrom's department stores nationwide. This fashion specialty retailer's outlets, which do not normally sell books, will be trimmed with scenes from the book and decorated with colored lights that pick up on the funky hues of Seibold's retro '50s-style, computer-drawn illustrations. Three-dimensional, moving figures based on the book's characters will grace store windows, and images of the dog and her cohorts will float above the main floor. Company spokesperson Amy Jones noted, "This is the first time we have taken our holiday décor inspiration from a picture book and used it as a theme company-wide." In conjunction with this promotion, Nordstrom's will make a $100,000 contribution to Reading Is Fundamental. Santa's canine helper will find herself in yet another spotlight during the holiday season, when Fox TV will air an animated, hour-long special based on Olive, the Other Reindeer, featuring the voices of Ed Asner and Drew Barrymore, among others. In addition to the books, Nordstrom will sell a number of tie-in products licensed by Fox. The folks at Chronicle are predictably thrilled about the holiday hoopla surrounding Olive. In Rock's words, "Having this kind of high-profile retail support for a book two years in a row is amazing and very gratifying. From what we hear, retailers believe that Olive will be around for quite awhile." And with Olive's extensive exposure this season, "all of" the other children who haven't yet discovered her have an excellent chance of doing so. -- Sally Lodge |
