Argentina
156
Gandman, Alexiev (text/illus.)
Los planos de mi ciudad (The maps of my city)
Buenos Aires : Ed. del Eclipse, 2005. – [40] p.
(Libros-álbum del eclipse)
ISBN 987-9011-67-8
City
The city in this imaginative picture book is a complex organism with
innumerable cords connecting its sometimes very quaint parts in an ingenious
way. Alexiev Gandman’s black-and-white illustrations present an urban habitat
that seems magical and mysterious, sophisticatedly constructed, yet cheerfully
playful. An unspecified first-person narrator explores the world in which he
lives by drawing maps of the city, then of the surrounding area, and finally
of outer space. Eventually, he ends up in his own room again, a place that he
considers just as »wonderfully inexplicable« as the whole city. This
scintillating book invites readers and observers to create their own
individual spaces for living that are hitherto unseen. (5+)
157
Giampieri, Elena (text)
Farías, Carolina (illus.)
Papelote = Papelino <proper name>
Córdoba : Comunic-arte, 2006. – [24] p.
(Los niños del Mercosur)
ISBN 987-602-018-8
(Bilingual ed.: Spanish and Portuguese)
Paper – Longing – Happiness – Flying
Papelote, a plain sheet of paper, longs to be a bird or a butterfly; or maybe a page in a book, because then he would be able to comfortably sit in a bookshop. Instead, he is forced to brave the world as a newspaper page. Although he still wishes he were something different, something better, something more beautiful, he slowly starts to enjoy life a little, as fragrant flowers are wrapped inside him, or as he is folded into a paper hat for a child. Eventually, after he has been crumpled up and thrown into the gutter, his great dream of flying finally comes true. In a poetic way, the simple text describes Papelote’s utterly human feelings, especially his desire to burst his (metaphorical) chains. The double-page mixed-media colour illustrations aptly express this longing. (4+)