See you on the dark side, Babar

The great response to the children's book post from the other day was encouraging. I was thrilled to hear that many of you shared my favorites plus had new ones to recommend.

It's easy to have fun reading favorites, but what about when your child comes to you with one of the titles you dread? You know, the book you meant to hide in the closet (thanks for the tip, E . . . ), the one you try to subtly push under the bed with your toe so that your child does not notice it at bedtime, the one that makes you feel bone weary just imagining reading it one more time, the one that takes SO DARN LONG to get through, or the one that requires more "condensing" or "censoring" than you feel right or good about . . .

For me, that book is Babar. I'm pretty sure scholars have already had a field day with the large elephant, but I will just give you an overview of my problems with the book . . .

1. It is long. Not terribly, terribly long, but longer than I prefer for before bedtime when you know that it is only one of six or seven books to be read.

2. It features death. I'll concede that when the king of the elephants dies of eating a "bad mushroom," one could almost be amused, but one's child is just confused. Worse than that, however, is the fact that Babar's mother is SHOT BY HUNTERS on the SECOND page of the book. Though I consider myself anti-censorship to the core, I just can't help glazing over this scene for the Bub by mentioning that the hunters "hurt" Babar's mom.

3. Babar is not that likable. He is greedy and materialistic. His greatest pleasures are shopping for and admiring himself in his new clothes and driving the rich old lady's red convertible.* I suspect he is using the rich old lady for the loot and the nice bathtub, though it is nice of him to do exercises with her in the morning.

4. The rich old lady might also be using Babar. After all, she dresses him up, has him tutored, and then shows off her smarty-pants elephant at dinner parties like he's a trick pony.

5. Babar doesn't keep it real. When he sees his cousins, Arthur and Celeste, in the city, he immediately gets them all dolled up in new clothes (and takes them to get cakes to eat), as if he would be ashamed to be seen with them without the clothes. When Babar returns to the forest and is offered the opportunity (based on, it seems, his new clothes, human learning, and fancy red car) to replace the king (who died of the bad mushroom), he accepts on the condition that he first be allowed to travel to the city to BUY WEDDING CLOTHES. Never mind your people are mourning their king and in need of a leader--first things first, get another green suit.

6. Babar is buying wedding clothes because he is marrying his COUSIN Celeste.

I know there are more Babar books, and I read one of them that belonged to my friends' kids. In it, one of Babar and Celeste's three children hits another in the head WITH A SHOVEL. I guess that is keeping it real in another way.

While Babar is the book I always mean to hide, but can never quite bring myself to (again, it's something about not wanting to censor literature for Bub, I guess), there are also others I don't love to read, especially at bedtime when my patience is waning. Some of the seek-and-find books can get tedious, especially the Cars one. I am also not a huge fan of the books with labeled pictures of dinosaurs, household objects, and vehicles. One that we have has a two-page spread of farm vehicles that features like eight different kind of tractors. As my friend E. . . and I discussed, books with multiple flaps per page can also get old.

So, there it is, I do love reading to my kids, but I love reading some books more than I do others.

What about you? Any books you wish to hide or have hidden? Any books you demanded repeatedly as a child that your parents might have wanted to kick under the bed? Entertain us please.



*Babar also enjoys pastry shops, but I'm not going to hold that against him.