“I like being an underrated author. It is so much better than being an overrated author.â€
“Tell your mother that junk food is what one calls a ‘literary device.’ I would not eat a Big Mac if you held a gun on me.â€â€œSome of these things seem to make more sense when you hear them on the radio while driving in traffic.â€
— Author Daniel Pinkwater
Daniel Pinkwater’s fans are devoted to him with a cult-like intensity — and that’s just fine with him.
For 35 years, the distinctive-looking author of over 100 quirky picture books, chapter books and young adult novels, including “The Hoboken Chicken Emergency,†“The Big Orange Splot†and “At the Hotel Larry,†has been catering to an audience that’s smart and unconventional — in other words, he writes for people like himself.
“I’m a cult figure in this regard,†Pinkwater said in a recent phone interview from his studio in the Hudson Valley, where he “works†just down the hall from his writer/illustrator wife, Jill.
“If you’re a bright kid, you’re tired of being given stuff that assumes you’re dumb. I’m an honest writer; I respect my readers. Kids respond to my books because I know my trade. That brings them back for more — I don’t have many readers that read just one.â€
Pinkwater not only likes his readers, he happily interacts with them. One of the advantages of being part of the small, loyal band that follows his constantly growing list of instant classics is the personal attention he gives. On the P-Zone, a Web site created by fan Ed Weiss, the portly pen-pusher holds a sometimes sassy, ongoing online conversation with his admirers, who ask him everything from whether he’s the same chubby kid named Manus Pinkwater who lived in the apartment building next door (he is), to where to find the second half of the audiobook of his intergalactic adventure “Borgel†(you can’t; only one tape fit in the box, so that’s all they sold).
An e-mail one evening to the author asking for an interview had no sooner been sent when the phone rang, and the inimitable voice of the master himself (familiar both from his audiobooks and his regular radio commentary on NPR) came on, ready for an hour-long chat on children’s books, the seamy side of the publishing business, and why he writes so much about the Arctic.
From “Uncle Boris in the Yukon and Other Shaggy Dog Stories†(a collection of humor for adults) to “Irving and Muktuk: Two Bad Bears,†about a pair of blueberry muffin-thieving polar bears in the fictional town of Yellowtooth (blueberry muffins themselves being another recurring theme in his fiction), for Pinkwater the frozen north is familiar territory.
“I come from Chicago, which is similar to the Arctic in a lot of respects,†he said. “I once heard an old explorer say on the radio that he came closer to dying of the cold on Michigan Avenue than anywhere he’d been.â€
Years of being forced by his nattily-attired gangster father to wear low-cut Oxfords through the snow instead of boots further strengthened his identification with the Eskimos. Then one day, while living in New York City, Pinkwater spied a Malamute and decided he had to have a dog like that. Luckily, he was married to an animal lover “as crazy as myself. If I said, ‘Let’s get a wolf,’ she would have said yes.â€
Pinkwater and his wife — whose training manual “Superpuppy†is still in print after more than 20 years — have owned a number of sled dogs over the years, as well as an Icelandic horse named Lokkur, which Pinkwater described as “a lot like a compact car.†But his current love is Lulu. A Canadian Inuit dog, or Qimmiq, Lulu has a pet dog of her own, a Labrador retriever named Maxine 2. According to her doting owner, Lulu has trained Maxine 2, and both of them can read _ a feat he insists is well documented.
“She’s like a cross between a wolf and a chimp: beautiful and really, really complicated,†he said.
And so Pinkwater’s books are populated with Huskies and Mounties, a blue moose with delusions of grandeur who’s the maitre d’ at a little out-of-the-way place famous for its gingerbread, and lots and lots of polar bears. One advantage to writing about Irving and Muktuk, whose latest chronicle, “Bad Bears and a Bunny,†is due in April, and Larry, the hotel lifeguard and ice cream company mascot, is that “Jill draws them so beautifully.â€
Although he used to illustrate his own books, at some point his wife took over those duties, working in the same felt-tipped marker style but, Pinkwater feels, much, much better. Most children’s book authors never get to meet their book’s illustrators. For the Pinkwaters, the arrangement is — the occasional fight over ideas aside — an advantage.
“It’s like having Disney Studios down the hall,†he said. “I can make suggestions, she’ll see if she can top me. And she’s just so happy doing it. She’s in there now, surrounded by dogs and cats; she’s watching TV; it’s a whiz bang.â€
Pinkwater’s writing routine sounds equally unpressured.
“I’m obliged to show up at my desk,†he said. “What happens, happens. Some days I watch TV or search the Internet for strange things. Sometimes things happen that I can’t see. I’ll be bidding on an Eskimo bone carving and suddenly it’s all there.â€
He can take a couple of days or a year to write a picture book. His latest book took six months to come together, he said.
“A picture book has to be right on the money. Writing novels is easier. People reading a good novel don’t want it to end. You can go on and on. You really have the time and space to develop the story. With a picture book, you have to be so attentive. I can maybe do two or three picture books a year, but I could write six novels a year.â€
As it happens, Pinkwater believes his newest novel, “The Artsy Smartsy Club,†is his best ever. It takes place in Hoboken, N.J., another favorite Pinkwater locale, and features many characters and elements from other books: Henrietta, the 6-foot-tall, 266-pound chicken; her onetime owner Arthur Bobowicz, now grown, and Jolly Roger, Hoboken’s famous dog-about-town. It’s a story about three bored kids who stumble across some amazing sidewalk chalk drawings and end up spending the summer immersed in art. There are references to Bellini, Vincent Van Gogh and Albert Pinkham Ryder and a lot of talk about how to look at what you’re painting that will really make kids think.
Pinkwater’s people talk funny — they always refer to each other by their first and last names and tend to eschew contractions — and he makes no effort to get the latest slang just right (no 11-year-old, and probably not even some parents of 11-year-olds, will get the reference to “Here comes da judgeâ€). But that’s OK, because Pinkwater and his readers have their own language.
It’s a smart, funny book for smart, funny kids. And once they’ve tried one, they’ll keep coming back for more. Pinkwater still remembers the little girl, no older than 6, who came up to him at an event for local authors and told him she’d read all his books. It took a few tries, but after she began reeling off the titles of all the books she’d read, including the young adult novels, Pinkwater realized she wasn’t exaggerating and gratefully presented her with the response she’d been waiting for.
“It’s an honor,†Pinkwater told the diminutive fan, “to have a reader like you.â€
Kathy Ceceri of Saratoga Springs, N.Y., is a regular contributor to The Family Beat. Her Family Online column [Page ???? ] runs every month.
If you would like to contribute information on this article, contact us at info@iberkshires.com.
Your Comments
iBerkshires.com welcomes critical, respectful dialogue. Name-calling, personal attacks, libel, slander or foul language is not allowed. All comments are reviewed before posting and will be deleted or edited as necessary.
No Comments
Public Health Advisory Issued for Pontoosuc Lake
PITTSFIELD, Mass. — Blue-green algae blooms have been observed at Pontoosuc Lake and a public health advisory has been recommended by the state Department of Public Health for the lake in both Pittsfield and Lanesborough.
As this bloom may present harmful health effects for users of the lake, the Pittsfield Health Department issues the following directives for this waterbody for people and pets until further notice:
Do not swim.
Do not swallow water.
Keep animals away.
Rinse off after contact with water.
Warning signs are being posted around the lake.
Blue-green algae, also known as Cyanobacteria, occur naturally in lakes and ponds throughout Massachusetts. These microscopic organisms are components of the aquatic food chain. In ordinary circumstances, Cyanobacteria cause no apparent harm. However, warmer water temperatures and high nutrient concentrations may induce a rapid increase in their abundance. This response is commonly called a “bloom” because algal biomass increases to the extent that normally clear water becomes markedly turbid.
Harmful health effects from the bloom can result through skin contact with the algae tainted water, swallowing the water, and when airborne droplets are inhaled. Pets are especially prone to the health effects not only through skin contact, but also by ingesting significant amounts of the toxin by licking their wet fur after leaving the water.
To protect yourself and your family from any harmful effects of this blue-green algae bloom, residents and visitors are advised to avoid contacting water that has a noxious odor, appears green throughout (sometimes referred to as looking like pea soup), or that has mats, films or scums accumulating on the surface.
Until further notice we recommend avoiding these high-risk activities:
Any contact with the water including swimming, diving, playing, or wading
Drinking, or allowing animals to drink the water
Water sports, e.g. water skiing, wake boarding, wind surfing, jet skiing, tubing
Other activities that pose a moderate risk to health include:
Fish consumption
Canoeing
Rowing
Sailing
Kayaking
Paddle boarding
Motor boating
The health outcomes of concern are:
Irritations of the skin, eyes or ears
GI problems like vomiting and diarrhea
Muscle cramps
In extreme cases nerve or liver problems
If you or your pet accidentally come in contact with algae tainted water, thoroughly rinse off with clean water.
If you experience any of the symptoms of blue-green algae exposure (listed above), contact your health care provider or call Poison Control at 1-800-222-1222. If your pet experiences symptoms, contact your veterinarian immediately.
Regular monitoring of lake conditions will occur moving forward until bloom dissipates. The community will be notified of the bloom dissipation at that time. The rescinding of the public health advisory will only occur after two successive samples, collected a week apart, demonstrate cell counts or toxin levels below the state guideline values.
For more information or questions, contact the Pittsfield Health Department at 413-499-9411.
The increase is because of a 9.12 percent hike in the levy based on the budget and fiscal articles approved for FY27 at May's annual town meeting. click for more
The mission of the Nonprofit Center of the Berkshires is to facilitate growth for charitable organizations through shared resources, affordable services, and creative collaborations. click for more
Talk about strangers in the night. There's lots of social intercourse between Frankie and Johnny. There's also lots of sexual intercourse. click for more
