A SMALL TALL TALE FROM THE FAR FAR NORTH

Alfred A. Knopf, 1993. 1st Edition 1st Printing. Hardcover. Very Good+/Very Good. Peter Sis color illustrations. CONDITION: Very Good+ 1993 Alfred A. Knopf hardcover (decorated boards) & dust jacket (in mylar cover), first edition, first printing. Problems: DJ shows some edge wear both top and bottom edges; book appears pre-read but unevenly. It's not a terrible condition, but it is for sure not even "as new." CONTENT: Sis draws on boyhood memories for this imaginative yarn about a maybe-real, maybe-fictitious Czech explorer, Jan Welzl. As the tale begins, Welzl breaks free from a drab existence and lights out for the Far North, where he encounters treacherous storms, a mysterious golden mountain on the horizon, northern lights, and kindly Eskimo hunters who teach him their traditions and a host of survival skills. When gold diggers arrive and threaten his newfound friends' peaceful existence, Welzl outwits the intruders. The story itself is slight, a fragment really, but readers are borne rapturously along on Sis's exquisitely intricate artwork. At times recalling Da Vinci's sketches, Sis's handsome pen-and-ink washes are filled with maps, intriguing borders, eclectic details and a pervasive sense of the fantastical that provides just the right balance for the story's nostalgic tone. Vignettes dropped onto antique-like papers suggest the look of an old picture album, while other spreads are joyfully quixotic (Eskimos dine under the canopy of a dinosaur skeleton; Welzl is carried down a tunnel decorated with pseudo-pictographs which illustrate a folktale). Whether or not Welzl existed is irrelevant; he certainly lives on in Sis's imagination, and will continue to thrive in the memories of Sis's readers. [Note: the DJ flap states that Jan Welzl was a Czechoslovakian author of tales of the Arctic. AND there are pages in this book that could be classified as "activity." Reading around a large curve on at least 2 levels, etc. Fascinating presentation.]