first reading
“The Song Thief” by the wonderful duo of creators Efraim Sidon and Danny Kerman is made of all the materials that can make a children’s book cross generations. It takes place in some kingdom, emphasis on some, in some place, at some time. The book deals, among other things, with the question of whether there really are endless wars A choice and if so – “with tricks you will make war”, what is the place of the mind and the heart in the content, what is the spirit: when is it bent and when does it straighten up on its way to victory.
The plot in brief: the songs in the kingdom of songs are disappearing. Someone from a parallel kingdom, one where the songs are forbidden, overshadows them. In order to locate and return them, the princess and the court jester volunteer to set off and meet colorful characters. The book is written and illustrated as a story of the past. Prose, mostly rhymed with a perfect rhyme, moving between rhythms (note the frenzied omniscient narrator), between stages, from the everyday to the suggestive, just as Lea Goldberg suggested in her famous lecture on writing for girls and children: “The question is not in the suggestion, because if the suggestion is beautiful – the child will love her. If the language is a little above the everyday language, it is not a sin – it is very beautiful.”
As requested by several children, the ending is happy and shows that sometimes the solution is right under our noses. It should be adopted for joint reading by parents and girls and children from the age of 7. From the book: “‘The spirit is safe,’ continued the minister of the palace, ‘and it is worth remembering that only it can create melodies. And really if we go out into the open air we can listen to the singing of the wind… there are winds of joy and winds of war. Hear the wind in the murmur of the waves, listen to it in the rustle of the leaves. There is a good spirit whose voice is caressing, sometimes the voice of the spirit is sullen. And always throughout our lives, the voice of the Spirit is heard in our ears.”
“The Song Thief” by: Ephraim Sidon. Illustrations: Danny Kerman, Yedioth Ahronoth Publishing House, Hamad Books.