|
Interview by Alice Cary
"Middle-of-the-road taboo" -- that's how Robert Munsch describes his many books for children. Sometimes a book title alone is enough to get kids giggling, as with "I Have to Go." His plots are famous for outrageous situations. In "Thomas' Snowsuit," a snowsuit battle between a boy and his teacher ends up with the teacher and the principal of the school wearing each other's clothes.
His books may not be realistic, but in many ways they're truer than true. "There's a difference between what really happens and how you feel about what really happens," the author says. "When you're having a snowsuit fight with a kid, it can be horrific. It feels like 'Thomas' Snowsuit' to both parties. And that's the emotional heart of the book."
He never writes about what he calls "serious taboos," which he says are frightening to youngsters. "With second graders," he explains, "you can get up in front of them and say 'underwear' -- that's all, and they just go nuts. It's something that's naughty but not bad."
Sometimes, however, editors balk at publishing even moderate taboos. Take, for example, "Good Families Don't," about farts. His publisher professed to love the tale, but refused to publish it. Munsch then used the story at a convention as an example of a good story he could never publish. It struck a chord with a man in a three-piece suit, and soon the book was in print with another publisher.
His latest book, "Alligator Baby" contains the author's typical comic chaos. When Kristen's pregnant mother heads for the hospital to deliver her child, she and Kristen's father somehow wind up at the zoo. Instead of a baby, they bring back a baby alligator. The baby swap goes from bad to worse as Kristen's parents bring back a menagerie of animal babies, until finally Kristen takes matters into her own hands.
Munsch came up with the idea nearly 20 years ago while working as a daycare teacher. One of his students, named Kristen, was the daughter of a doctor who supervised home births, and the little girl sometimes accompanied him. When her own mother was about to give birth, Kristen was discovered giving her classmates "birthing" lessons. Munsch invented the story as a present for Kristen's sixth birthday.
"I was using storytelling the way people use play-dough," he recalls. "It keeps the kids happy and, for me, didn't require any planning. I did that for ten years before I wrote anything down." His role model was none other than his father, who often told his nine children bedtime stories, "long, connected adventures that took months to finish."
Munsch never intended to be a writer. His father wanted him to be a lawyer. "He never should have told those stories," Munsch says. He published his first story in 1979, and has been telling tales and writing ever since.
He begins by experimenting with a story for five to ten years, telling it over and over again. "It's sort of like aging cheese. I reach a point where they stop changing, and at that point, in my way of thinking, they're ready for publication. Most people don't want to take five years to make up a two-page story. Nobody in their right mind would. It's just that I like the process."
He notes how tough young audiences can be. "They're always asking themselves: 'What has he done for us in the last two seconds?' If the answer is nothing, that's too bad. I try out lots of stories, and for every one that works, 100 won't."
Much to the dismay and delight of teachers and librarians, he loves to drop in unannounced at schools. "I'll call them from the airport and ask if I can stop by," he says. He prefers to meet with a small group of children rather than face an auditorium of students, where reactions are more difficult to monitor.
He also likes to stay with various families during these visits, occasions that often give him some of his best story ideas. For instance, a story called "Fried Chicken" evolved after he watched a host mother and daughter in South Carolina argue about a fried chicken recipe.
Over the years, he's traveled all over North America. Although he was born in Pittsburgh, Munsch lives in Ontario, Canada, where he and his wife went in 1975 in search of jobs. They liked it so much they not only stayed, but became citizens.
Canadian government funding allowed him to travel the country on school visits, thereby providing him with hundreds of children to write about. Had he stayed in the States, he might never have written "Fifty Below Zero," penned in honor of a class of students in the Northwest Territories, who came in from recess one day with bleeding frostbite.
Munsch adds: "Canadians are supposed to be a lot more uptight than Americans . . . but as far as kids' books go, you can do all sorts of stuff in Canada that you can't do in the United States."
Millions of readers in both countries know Munsch as the author of the best-selling "Love You Forever," which has a very different tone from his more raucous yarns. It's a testament to parents' enduring love for their children, from the moment of birth to adulthood, containing the refrain: "I'll love you forever,/I'll like you for always,/As long as I'm living/My baby you'll be."
He invented the lines as a tribute to his two stillborn babies. For nearly ten years he told no one about it, not even his wife. Suddenly, one day onstage, he decided to tell a story about his feelings for these children and what might have happened had they lived, and "Love You Forever" was born.
At first he wasn't sure the story worked. "I knew how the story affected me, but it was so personal that I couldn't predict how it would affect anyone else. Then I looked back at a group of parents and all of them were crying."
His publisher wouldn't publish it, however, calling the sentiments too sad. A wise book distributor offered to proceed, eventually printing 12 to 15 million copies.
Whenever Munsch stands before an audience of children, whether he's telling a tear-jerker like "Love You Forever" or a tall tale like "Alligator Baby," he enters a sort of altered state.
"People sometimes say," he muses, "that when I'm not performing, I come across as very controlled and distant, and when they see me onstage, they say the guy went nuts. I get such an incredible emotional buzz," he adds, "that afterwards I'll sometimes be shaking. . . . I really feel alive when I'm doing it."
Alice Cary is a reviewer in Groton, Massachusetts.
©1997, ProMotion, inc.
Support your