Lon Po Po: A Red-Riding Hood Story from China

Author/Illustrator: Ed Young

Published by: Penguin Putnam Books for Young Readers,1996

Genre: Picture Book, Traditional Literature, Multi-cultural

Age Range: grades 2-4

Caldecott Award Winner 1990

Lon Po Po is the Chinese version of the traditional Red-Riding Hood tale. A mother lives with her three daughters in the country but one day leaves them to visit her mother for her birthday. She tells her daughters to be good while she is gone and to remember to latch the door tightly come nightfall. During the night a wolf, knowing the mother is away, comes and tricks the girls into letting him in the house by making them think that he is their grandmother, thier Po Po, come to visit. They let him in but after a while the older and most clever of the girls realizes they have been fooled and comes up with a plan to get the wolf out of the house. She tells him that he must come and try the gingko nuts that are high up in the tree outside, they have magical powers. The wolf follows them outside and the three girls eventually defeat the wolf by dropping him three times from a great height out of the basket they tell him they are using to help him climb the tree to reach the gingko nuts.

I enjoyed reading a tale that I have grown up hearing but in such a different way. It was fun to think of how this one is both alike and different from the one I have heard all my life. For example, in this one, the "grandma" comes to the house instead of the granddaughter visiting the "grandma". I also liked how these girls got out of the bad situation using their own cleverness instead of having to be saved by a woodsman hearing the cries for help like in the story from my childhood. I liked that they both shared the "my what big teeth you have"effect though, in that the girls ask why their Po Po's voice is so low, or nails so sharp.

This book provides the opportunity to look at different cultures in not only literature but also in art. The illustrations are very much in the Chinese style, especially the first one where the mother is waving goodbye to her children. The softness of the colors and line, as well as the portrayal of the landscape remind me of Chinese scroll paintings. Asian artwork has a large focus on using words, text, and pictures together to create the art. This book also introduces us to the use of watercolor and pastels. Students can experiment with using chalk pastels to achieve the bright colors and the different qualities of line and shading. Students can learn that a hard line can be accomplished and produce bright colors or they can smear them to get the hazy look that is used often in this book. They can also mix the colors together to get a gradation of color.