Sometimes change seems to be life's only constant. Happily, in children's books, there are the consistencies of authors and illustrators you can count on. For over twenty-five years, children and adults have been able to depend on the excellence of Bill Martin's writing and Eric Carle's illustrations. Adults, who years ago experienced the classic Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See? as one of their first books, can now share the second Martin-Carle creation, Polar Bear, Polar Bear, What Do You Hear? with their own children. The new collaboration has already been awarded the American Bookseller's Pick of the List and has been nominated by Redbook for its annual distinction bestowed on our country's top ten picture books.

Recreating a legendary classic was no small task: how to accomplish a balance of new and old; how to equal the satisfying finale of Brown Bear with a difference. Martin's text for Brown Bear "popped out" in ten minutes --- he worked for three years on Polar Bear. Martin found sudden success when he produced a structural change by emphasizing verbs in Polar Bear, rather than the noun and adjective format of Brown Bear. The use of verbs also created "a very noisy book that invites kids to roar, growl and participate!"

Carle's creation of the spirited ending was just as intuitively designed and mirrored Martin's shift. He knew that he did not want to finish Polar Bear with the same row of children that had given Brown Bear such a powerful conclusion because it felt "too static" . Polar Bear' s dynamic denouement features children costumed as animals. They frolic to a lively and exuberant dance that crept onto Carle's page without planned intention. The play-like climax made sense to him for he has viewed children all over the world actively engaged in performing his other books.

The two men have the utmost respect for each other and both men considered it a great privilege to collaborate again. In conversations, Eric Carle referred to Bill Martin as "a genius" and Martin called Carle a "master designer of the page and also of the entire communication process." Both men also share an respect, appreciation and understanding of children's perspectives of life. This may be because both author and illustrator had frustrating periods in their early schooling.

Carle was moved from a bright, sunny Syracuse, New York kindergarten classroom into a rigid German educational system. He thought for a long time that "it was pop-psychology to feel that that kindergarten year was so important, but the older I get, I see that it really made an impression on me. I got back my kindergarten." Certainly the large shapes, and bright, bold, strong, playful colors he designs make great sense to young children.

Mr. Carle wonders if the colors in his work aren't a reaction to growing up in war-time Germany where "all was grey and camouflage and brownish-green and greenish-brown. I am now frustrated that I can't be even more colorful because of physical limitations."

Martin's education was marked by early inabilities to read. His experiences made him "very aggressive about lots of things other than word recognition, like anticipation of thought and movement in dialogue and the workings of plot." He now realizes that his resulting verbality "was a mask for his lack of reading ability." It may have been his early education that led to a belief that all children except those who are organically damaged will learn to read "just by exposure to things that are worthwhile, worth reading." Martin considers himself a teacher, before a writer. His philosophy is implicit in Polar Bear. The text is a pleasing circle of events that reassures small children. The comfort the form activates urges them to venture with him into the delights of pleasurable, repeatable words and phrases, meaningful tempos and the images they invoke as flamingos flute and leopards snarl across pages.

There is much of the old Brown Bear enchantment still at work in Polar Bear, but new twists produce a fully satisfying companion book. Eric Carle fills double-spreads with the same large, bright, collages that have charmed pre-school children for a quarter of a century. Animals still play a major role, but they are exotic zoo animals this time. Bill Martin's rhymes are just as captivating. As I read Polar Bear, my children began to repeat and I imagined choruses of children chanting on countless playgrounds, just as they resay Brown Bear. Once again, Eric Carle has given such a dramatic graphic representation of Bill Martin's words that the book takes on a dimensionality of its own, allowing children entrance in a way many picture books do not.

In over twenty-five years of creating, these men have come to know their processes well. Bill Martin says, "One never knows what causes the creative impulse, but one does recognize when it's being followed, or when one is beckoned." For years, Eric Carle had carried a star idea in his mind, knowing it was too slight. Finally, a dream he had in France last year revealed the ending ..."and I just filled in the rest." The resulting Draw Me a Star will be released by Philomel next year.

Bill Martin's story ideas pop into his head. After that "original flash", an evolving story becomes "a monkey on my back until at the most unexpected times, the dam will burst and the story will complete itself." He is presently at work on six stories simultaneously, and quite often works this way.

Despite the many accolades the two have won, they both are most impressed by the responses of children. Bill Martin's highest compliments are the letters he has gotten from children who seriously consider themselves writers and ask and offer professional advice. Eric Carle's greatest reward comes when children who view his work remark, 'I can do that too!' This touches Eric Carle "because the child feels he can achieve. Then I have reduced the gap between child and adult."

©Susie Wilde 1998