Chris Van Allsburg has involved and inspired readers to muse since the publication of his first picture book, The Garden of Abdul Gasazi (Hougton Mifflin, $15.95) in 1979. Van Allsburg enthusiasts range from older picture book readers of seven or eight to adults who are drawn to wonder. The marvel, challenge, and play generated by Chris Van Allsburg's books are not accidental. Those elements are so intertwined in his creative process that his products cannot help showing their influence. Van Allsburg does not aim for these results, they are a natural outgrowth of satisfying his own curiosity. "I want something that engages me, that I find provocative.  If I accomplish that then I think that it's fair to assume that I may have accomplished that for others, too."

Chris Van Allsburg's work has always prompted a wide range of response. Fans are quick to scan the pages of his books to find the hidden Bull Terrier which has become one of Van Allsburg's signatures. They pause and muse over his odd perspectives and mysterious characters. All over the country, kids have imagined and written stories sparked by The Mysteries of Harris Burdick (Houghton Mifflin, $14.95); invented their own game boards after reading Jumanji (Houghton Mifflin, $14.95); and built trains to the North Pole, remembering The Polar Express (Houghton Mifflin, $16.95).

Chris Van Allsburg's newest picture book, The Widow's Broom (Houghton Mifflin, $17.95) begins in an authoritative non-fiction voice, informing readers about how an aging witch's broom can lose the power of flight and sometimes fall to earth without warning. Before knowing it, readers have once again slipped into the world of Chris Van Allsburg where all things are possible. The matter-of-fact introduction is followed by one of Van Allsburg's unusual visual viewpoints--the witch's fall seen from a vantage point far above her. Witch and broom land in the garden of the kind, lonely widow Minna Shaw.  Minna and the broom, both lonely by their ages, become companions. The broom quickly and eagerly learns the work of Minna's home and delights in everything from chopping wood to playing the piano. But the joy of friendship and fancy are not to last. A distrustful neighbor, Mr. Spivey decides that the broom is "evil and dangerous." Spivey launches a campaign of slander that turns to menace and ends in broom burning. The broom returns in ghostly form, its axe raised as if to return the threat, and frightens the bullying Spivey from the community. Has the broom been revived from cinders? The clever Widow Shaw, unwilling to sacrifice her friend or their companionship, has painted the broom white to fight the narrowness of her neighbor's vision.

Gamesome questioning is an important part of Van Allsburg's writing process. He believes it is more important to ask the right questions, than to give the right answer "because if the question is right, the answer always seems like the only one that could work." Over half of Van Allsburg's books have been stimulated by a single puzzling image fixed in his mind's eye.  In his efforts to describe what's happened sometimes a story is revealed. The Widow's Broom began with the idea of an animate broom. The animate broom became a witch's broom and soon after... wonder set in. Was the relationship of witch and broom antagonistic? friendly? romantic? Van Allsburg played around with those ideas, but they didn't seem to lead him anywhere.   For a time he chased the notion of a belligerent and undisciplined broom that deserted a witch only to discover "it required her antagonism and felt disappointed in the company of kind people." When Widow Shaw entered the speculative process, Van Allsburg found his questions satisfactorily answered. His inquisitive mind, however, is never completely at rest. "I probably could write another story about a witch and her broom, maybe I'll do that next year."

Van Allsburg's wonder and play often lead to complex story lines with several subtexts and themes. He's definite that it is story, not message, that initiates his tales. "In my effort to create an interesting book about a broom, I have to introduce story elements that hold my attention and those story elements usually have genuine psychological meaning otherwise they wouldn't hold my attention. It's not really until I get done with a story that I usually discover what the book was about." Though the story line of The Widow's Broom is whimsical, much lies below the narrative. Themes of prejudice, puritanical sentiment, and fear of the different and new play out with an undercurrent as frightening as a Salem witch hunt. Buried beneath the plot are also a vision of women who are far more tolerant and men who are threatened. There are also comments about companionship and aging that defy stereotypical pictures.

Van Allsburg continually challenges himself in his visual artistry as well. Though some of his books may look similar, each has been composed with different materials or techniques. His choice of color often has to do with story content. In The Widow's Broom, Van Allsburg thought sepia-toned images appropriate for the story. He finds that black and white reproductions have a quality they didn't have thirty five years ago when television, film, and photographs all depicted life without color. Now, "the altered reality represented by monochromatic pictures ends up being interesting in a way that it didn't used to be. Seeing the world deprived of color creates a surrealistic quality."  The blend of real and surreal filters through word and visual pictures of The Widow's Broom. It is, in fact, a thread that runs through many Van Allsburg books. "I like the juxtaposition of things that are not opposites, but usually considered to be antagonistic to one another."

Whether he is searching to discover stories or struggling in a constant dialogue of self-criticism to make his visual images convincing, for Chris Van Allsburg, picture book creation is an active process. The marriage of antithetical elements is one more way Van Allsburg creates the magic of interaction that, regrettably, happens less and less frequently in children's books. Just as many of his characters battle passivity, the words and art of this author strive against apathetic, automatic thought, inviting and challenging readers to enter into an active relationship with his books.

©Susie Wilde 1998