Last month we wrote of Pumpkin Moonshine, the first of five small volumes known as the "Calico books." That title began Tasha Tudor's long publishing career. This month we continue with a look at the second book in the series Alexander the Gander. All five "calicos" were small picture books that would fit into a child's pocket. The story lines were easy to follow with believable characters and plenty of action. None of the five books (Oxford University Press, 1938-1946) had numbered pages. They were later reprinted; but since there were no page numbers in the beginning, no page numbers were ever added.
Alexander the Gander was published September 28, 1939. This followed Pumpkin Moonshine by only a year and two weeks. Text and illustrations for a book were delivered approximately a year in advance of publication. Tudor would have had this second manuscript ready for her editor Eunice Blake at about the time the first book appeared in bookstores. And The County Fair appeared a year after that in 1940. So it would have been coming from Tudor's mind and brushes as Alexander made its public debut.
This demonstrates that even as a young married woman, Tudor was already setting herself a busy schedule and a pattern of production that she would maintain nearly her whole life. Another year, another book. She stopped painting only for the few years after moving into her Marlboro, Vermont, home forty years ago. This (1971-1973) was one brief hiatus in the busy life that produced nearly 100 books.
New England stone walls appear on page [6] of Alexander the Gander as does the young girl Sylvie Ann whom we met in Pumpkin Moonshine. She is recognizable because she wears the same blue gingham dress and muslin apron. In addition to her dog Wiggy, we meet two of the farm geese, Araminta and Alexander (of the title). Sylvie Ann has become a girl more in control of her surroundings in this story. Alexander is the mischief-maker whose escapades carry the story along. He has a special attraction for heliotrope pansies, a hankering that gets him into more than one scrape. How like Beatrix Potter's Peter Rabbit he is! The problems he creates propel the story of a "naughty goose" across all 46 pages of illustrated text.
Mrs. Fillow makes her single appearance in Tudor's books here. She is a neighbor and essential figure in this book. It is her pansies and her garden greens which are so appealing that Alexander is unable to say, "No." He just can't stay out of Mrs. Fillow's garden patch.
Tudor used the name Fillow in her first (and still unpublished) manuscript "Hitty's Almanac." It is a pity that her followers never got to hear the full story of Hitty as Tudor imagined her. We have an old book from Tudor's library in which a very young Tasha Burgess inscribed the name "Hitty Fillow." It was clearly a name that intrigued her. She practiced it in writing as most of us do when we are learning to write our names. It also reveals the dilemma in understanding her own name. Was it Starling or was it Natasha or Tasha? Was it Burgess, or was it Tudor? How perplexing this would be to any child.
But back to the book. As most of Alexander the Gander's action is out-of-doors, we learn a lot about gardens and country lanes. Tudor includes picket fences and three different gates in her illustrations. This is a country village, so the pickets are quite simple pointed slats. Mrs. Fillow has a flower garden and a vegetable patch. Tudor painted them both into the story. There is a pond with lily pads among the farm pastures. Tudor takes an artist's short cut on pages [14] and [18] by reproducing a scene. On page [14] Sylvie has taken off her shoes, and waded into the water towards some lily pad blossoms. Then, four pages later, Tudor pulls the view back a great deal to show more of the surrounding waterscape. All the detail of Sylvie, the rushes, the gate in the wall and a distant tree are still there, but the picture has been much expanded to include the geese at their foraging. The previous illustration shows a poorly expressed Wiggy chasing frogs. And in this picture the pond is so large that it could easily be Connecticut's Saugatuck Reservoir which was near the house of Tudor's mother.
Folk ways get painted into these illustrations. Look at the linens laid across the grass to bleach in the sun on page [30] for instance. Do you remember your grandmother laying her sheets and table cloths across the summer lawn to dry? Perhaps you've done it yourself. Notice Mrs. Fillow's fresh jars of jelly sitting on the kitchen window sill to cool on page [34]. This kitchen scene is the only interior in the entire book, but its open cupboard is true to Tudor's style - right down to the glass cookie jars that stayed with her through many illustrations and books.
You'll enjoy Alexander's capers if you've never read the book. Or renew an old relationship if your copy has set too long on a shelf. One point on page [48] eludes us. Perhaps you can solve the puzzle. Why are the two milk cans (?) inverted on top of sticks at the garden gate? They seem to have been recently washed and placed to dry. Are they really milk cans or are they buckets used for watering the garden? What at first appears to be a pulley on the pole is soon recognized as the lid to one of the cans.
Alexander the Gander page [28]
Next month, we'll examine the elusive County Fair
