Arnold lobel gay
History
Children’s book author and illustrator Arnold Lobel (1933-1987) developed his natural ability for storytelling as a child while facing ill health, isolation, and bullying in his hometown of Schenectady, New York. He later moved to Brooklyn to pursue a pleasant arts degree at Pratt Institute, graduating in 1955. After working in advertising, his career in children’s literature began as an illustrator for Harper & Row in 1961. The first book that he both wrote and illustrated was A Zoo for Mister Muster (1962), which established his fondness for featuring animal characters in his stories.
Lobel’s most beloved, acclaimed, and enduring serve is the Frog and Toad picture book series, beginning with Frog and Toad Are Friends (1970; Caldecott Honor recipient) and Frog and Toad Together (1972; Newbery Honor recipient). The books were published as part of Harper & Row’s I Can Read series, designed to teach children to scan. In 1973, Lobel and his wife, Anita Lobel – his Pratt classmate, fellow children’s book writer and illustrator, and sometimes collaborator – purchased the rowhouse at 603 3rd Street in Park Slope, Brooklyn, as their family r
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The Frog and Toad book series written and illustrated by Arnold Lobel was one of the major reasons that I fell in love with reading. As a child, I speedily advanced through small-print chapter books like Percy Jackson and The Chronicles of Narnia. But in the end, I always came back to these books for easy readers about two amphibian friends, flying kites and growing gardens in the woods, among other wholesome adventures.
Originally published in the 70s, the four-book series has since remained a hallmark of children’s literature for its warmth, humor, and heart. It’s even been adapted into two claymation films and a Broadway musical. But nothing could’ve prepared me for AppleTV+’s animated series based, much less their Christmas special. Throughout watching the show’s nine episodes, I saw one of my favorite guide series beautifully come to life and, in doing so, felt healed, comforted, and seen in my queerness.
It’s worth noting that in the books, Frog and Toad, who are of the same sex, are never explicitly said to be gay or queer, going so far as to live in different houses. But you don’t have to watch hard to see the subte
How Frog and Toad Author Arnold Lobel Explored Gay Love in His Work
In the enlightened year of 2016, we tend to think of the closet as being a uniformly negative space, a shadowy den of oppression and denial from which gender non-conforming people—if they want to be mentally and ethically whole—must eventually emerge. And while that view seems largely accurate, it’s at the same time accurate that the struggle to come out, especially in less welcoming eras, has in many cases driven artists to produce operate of great insight and poignancy—work that most of us, on balance, are glad exists in the world.
In the New Yorker’s online Page-Turner blog, Colin Stokes has a charming post this week pointing to such a function, namely the Frog and Toad series of children’s books by author and illustrator Arnold Lobel. These beloved and award-winning stories, penned by Lobel between 1970 and 1979, track Frog and Toad, a frog and a toad who, despite experiencing a gentle friction of personalities, maintain a deep friendship. It’s the tenderness of this relationship, more than any of the pair’s specific narratives—which find peaceful drama in losing a button or making a list or going for a sw
From the time I was a child, I’ve had an eidetic memory. I can easily recall dates, names, and faces extended after they are irrelevant to my life as a whole. When I was younger, it was something of a party trick other adults would use to probe me out of my shell: a nice round of “let’s see how many family birthdays Jeffrey can recall off the superior of his head love it’s nothing, or why he remembers the let go date of every Disney film ever made” was always a hit at family gatherings. I’ve since come to see my strong memory as a blessing and a curse.
But it’s also frustrating because, as much as I can recall the call of a watch repairman my dad used once in my childhood, I cannot always remember the precise moments when I first picked up a piece of literature that would end up having such a profound impact on my life. As such, I don’t vividly recollect the first day I read a Frog and Toadbook. It could’ve been during library story hour, in a classroom, or in the college library. But I can remember the Saturday my dad and I spent at a bookstore, where I requested a Frog and Toad book of my very own.
I take up the failings of memory only because I think it speaks to the un
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