Picture Book Review - Joseph Had a Little Overcoat

BIBLIOGRAPHY
Taback, Simms. 1999. JOSEPH HAD A LITTLE OVERCOAT. New York: Viking. ISBN 0-670-87855-3.

PLOT SUMMARY
Joseph lives on a farm in Poland. He is also a tailor and uses his knowledge to rework his tattered, plaid overcoat into items that get smaller and smaller with each alteration. The overcoat becomes a jacket, then a vest, then a scarf, then a tie, then a handkerchief, and finally a button for his suspenders. At the end he loses the button and decides to write a book about his experience.

CRITICAL ANALYSIS
Joseph is a resourceful character who makes the best out of difficult circumstances. Children in today's throw away society might not see the value in Joseph's thrifty renovation of his overcoat. Young readers will, however, be thrilled by the illustrator's (also Taback)primitive folk-art style, use of vivid color and clever die-cuts that dwindle in size page by page as the story progresses. Taback also mixes photos of real objects with painted renditions of similar objects in a sort of collage that provides the background setting for the scenes of the story. The use of real photographs, framed and hanging on the walls of Joseph's home, catches the reader by surprise and encourages a closer inspection of the page. The story is set in pre-WWII Poland, and the illustrations support this setting with numerous examples of appropriate cultural markers. The style of dress, facial features, activities, names, home decor, newspapers, and books all reinforce the culture represented in this story. Children who are familiar with Yiddish culture will find sayings and other references tucked away on almost every page.

Caldecott Medal - 2000

REVIEW EXCERPTS

Publishers Weekly: "With its effective repetition and an abundance of visual humor, this is tailor-made for reading aloud."
Horn Book Magazine: "The text is simple to the point of prosaicness...but the art sings with color and movement and humor and personality."

CONNECTIONS

>Read Simms Taback's Caldecott Honor book, There Was an Old Lady Who Swallowed a Fly, and compare the use of the die-cut pages in this book to those used in Joseph Had a Little Overcoat. >Talk about ways to recycle and reuse old, worn out items.