Arrivals and Inventions: A Two-Book Review
By Stephanie Lile
The Arrival by Shaun Tan. Published in the United States by Arthur A. Levine Books, an imprint of Scholastic, Inc., 2007. Copyright 2006.
The Invention of Hugo Cabret by Brian Selznick. Published by Scholastic Press, New York. Copyright 2007.
There is a land somewhere far away from each of us where the language is unknown, the symbols unidentifiable, and the social structures unseen. And yet we must go there. For reasons that lurk larger than life, that threaten our very existence, we must go. We must travel to another place, and make our way in unfamiliar territory. Still, memories linger, and merge with new experiences. Do we despair at the differences, or do we celebrate survival? Whether going to a new place or learning a new thing, we are all in some small way, at risk of becoming The Arrival.
Shaun Tan, in his extraordinary work The Arrival, explores what it is like to arrive in a new place not knowing the language or the geography or the people. His is a story of a man who must leave his wife and daughter to go find work in another country. Through pictures and gestures, the man finds a room to rent, a job to work, and food to eat. All is strange and confusing, but he learns to survive and make friends. Through it all, a lone family picture and an origami crane symbolize memory and hope for a happier future. Tan does all this without placing a single word on the page.
In The Arrival, pictures tell the entire story. But these are not just any pictures. They are both universal and exclusive to every reader. Rendered with an unparalleled imagination and emotion, Tan’s story in pictures touches the soul of anyone who has ever felt out place anywhere. It reveals the complexity of the immigration story with detail and insight pulled from actual stories and references of migrants to Western Australia, Britain, and the United States. From the frustration and discrimination of being tagged as an immigrant, to the joys of being befriended by an unexpected pet, to the compassion expressed through the sharing of arrival stories, Tan gives us a personal glimpse of what it takes to survive in a new place. Faces of sixty immigrants line the endpapers like a high school annual—each black and white pencil drawing alluding to another life story, another story of Arrival.
This moving work, published in the United States by Arthur A. Levine Books, begs the question, “Why no Caldecott for this one?” This year, in 2008, the Caldecott Medal for illustration went to Brian Selznick’s clever and intriguing book The Invention of Hugo Cabret. While “Hugo” is without question a compelling work of art and story, highly deserving of its honor, The Arrival stops any Caldecott follower in his or her tracks. Like Hugo, its pictures speak as loud (actually louder) than the words, and the images are rendered with a similar technique and style. But the catch of the coveted Caldecott is that it “shall be awarded to the artist of the most distinguished American Picture Book for Children published in the United States during the preceding year. The award shall go to the artist, who must be a citizen or resident of the United States, whether or not he be the author of the text.” The Arrival fails these criteria on two counts. Shaun Tan is not American and the book was not originally published in America. It was first published in Australia by Lothian Books in 2006.
Testament to Levine’s eye for signing international books with groundbreaking impact, The Arrival is stunningly produced. Harkening back to turn-of-the-century leather bound photo albums, even the pages possess a gritty texture and faux crackled edges to suggest the original documents that provided much of its inspiration.
Production for Hugo was groundbreaking, too. Echoing the old wide-angle to tight shot movie imagery, the book’s hefty 530 page count stunned booksellers and buyers. But its message, innovation in production, and early film inspiration moved readers beyond those hurdles as quickly as a 30-second film trailer makes a person want to sit through a three-and-a-half-hour movie. Unraveling the mystery of a broken automatron and a young, orphaned Hugo Cabret, this story weaves a magical tale of life’s desires and disappointments as seen through the eyes of Hugo. After the death of his father and uncle, he secretly takes over the maintenance of the clocks in Paris’s grand train station. The story evolves from what he sees and hears while secreted away inside the station’s walls.
In comparing these two books, one significant difference is the speed at which you find yourself reading. I found myself wanting to read Hugo film-flicker fast and The Arrival sightseer slow. Yet interestingly, while these two books vary noticeably in dimension, production, and pace, their messages are largely the same. Theirs is a message of invention—and reinvention—of our selves. And yet the bigger question both stories pose is, “How will you do it—how will you get there?”
If we follow Tan’s and Selznick’s lead, we invent and reinvent ourselves by unlocking the stories captured in life’s pictures. Their works make it seem deceptively simple.
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This review first appeared on the Whidbey Writer’s Workshop student site at www.whidbeystudents.com.
