A very sweet friend told me that Harold and the Purple Crayon by Crockett Johnson was one of her favorite children's picture books. I had never heard of it, but I started looking for it right away. I found a YouTube video of the whole book here, very nicely done, and completely faithful to the book, but it does not have the vibrant purple color of the book.
I really think this is a must-have book for every child, for its message is all about the power of creativity. It begins like this:
"One evening, after thinking it over for some time, Harold decided to go for a walk in the moonlight. There wasn't any moon, and Harold needed a moon for a walk in the moonlight. And he needed something to walk on."
With his big purple crayon, Harold draws the moon, and the walk, too. He draws everything that he needs. He creates the horizon line of his own world, puts the moon in the sky, draws a vanishing point, and sets off on a series of adventures.
Crockett Johnson uses a lovely sequence of cause and effect to propel the adventures. For example, Harold takes a short cut to where he thinks a forest ought to be. This leads to two of my favorite lines:
"He didn't want to get lost in the woods. So he made a very small forest, with just one tree in it."
Oh, I love that! The tree is an apple tree, which prompts the drawing of a dragon to guard the apples. The dragon is so frightening, Harold's purple crayon shakes on the page, creating an ocean of waves, which leads to the need for a boat, which leads to . . .
There is a picnic, a mountain, a hot-air balloon, a search for his own window, the drawing of his very own window and his very own bed, and the satisfying conclusion of a little boy tucked under his very own covers.
I wish I had known about this book when I was teaching. I would have started off every single year, on the first day of school, with this book. It had not been published yet when I was four, or six, or eight years old. It would have meant the world to me, literally. My husband would have loved it, too, for he was always quietly drawing his own little world. I was trying to write mine, but I always wanted to draw, too.
I've been looking for this little book in secondhand bookstores, but it is never there. Perhaps no one ever wants to give up their copy of it? So I got it at the library, for I very much wanted to feature it this week, as I have been speaking of all things at that end of the color/light spectrum where ultra-violet can be found.
The "purple" in Harold and the Purple Crayon is the color that I always call "violet," for I think of purple as having more blue in it, a royal purple, perhaps. But I am remembering, now, how my mother used to always talk about loving something "with a purple passion." The perfect color, then, for a book about creativity!
And in researching Harold, I discovered that this little book is so important that it has its own Wikipedia page here.
I hope you will follow your purple passions to the ends of the earth. Take a purple crayon with you. Draw your way into and out of adventures. Be sure to be home before dark!
Oh, I do hope you will have a weekend of unbridled creativity!
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