Crow Boy
New York: The Viking Press, (1956). Single volume, measuring 12 x 9 inches: [2], 37, [1]. Original pink cloth stamped in maroon, color pictorial endpapers, original unclipped color pictorial dust jacket. Color lithographic illustrations throughout text. Original painting of bird and nest facing title page, with author’s stamp and ink inscription: “To Lucile Morrison, / with best wishes / Taro Yashima / Nov. 1959.” Small ownership label of Angel Island Institute of California to rear pastedown. Light toning and edgewear to jacket.
Second printing of this Caldecott Honor book, first published in 1955, inscribed with a full-page original painting by Taro Yashima (1908-1994). A dissident imprisoned for his antimilitarist beliefs, Yashima left Japan in 1939 to pursue an artistic career in New York and California. Crow Boy is inspired by Yashima’s childhood experiences in a small village school, and dedicated to a favorite teacher, depicted here as the thoughtful Mr. Isobe. The book follows a friendless, non-verbal child called “Chibi,” or “tiny boy,” a character based on Yashima’s memories of a real classmate. Chibi exhibits many of the characteristics now associated with autism: withdrawal from social interaction, a rigid focus on pattern and routine, and close observation of the natural world, reflected in his command of the “voices of crows,” memorized on his long walk to school. In the end, Mr. Isobe reintroduces Chibi to the school community: “nobody called him Chibi any more. We all called him Crow Boy.” Yashima has inscribed this copy to children’s author and psychologist Lucile Phillips Morrison (1896-1991); the label of her charitable foundation, Angel Island Institute, later Phillips-Morrison Institute of California, is affixed to the rear endpaper. A near-fine copy of a compelling book, inscribed with a vivid painting of a bird flying away from its nest.
Price: $250.00