The Vine: March 7, 2008
Hi Sarah,
Your readers have done such a good job of finding books and music I thought I’d give you all a shot at this one. My sister and I are looking for a children’s book that we can’t find. It was illustrated with line drawings, and featured a kid with a lightbulb-shaped head and a striped sweater. I seem to remember two-color illustrations (black & red) but it might have been black and white! My sister thinks the kid’s name was Henry.
It was a smallish book (the size of those old Golden Books) and we must have read it back in the early 1960s. Any suggestions?
Thanks.
Di
Dear Di,
That did sound familiar to me…until I realized I was thinking of that Tim Burton book of poems, The Lonely Death Of Oyster Boy or whatever it’s called.
Anyway, I don’t remember this one, but the readers may. Readers? (NB: If you post links, could you please break them up/TinyURL them, so as not to jenk the comment layout? Thanks!)
Tags: Ask The Readers popcult
Sars, you’re thinking of “The Melancholy Death of Oyster Boy and Other Stories.” Love that book. :-)
The Melancholy Death of Oyster Boy was the first thing I thought of too, heh.
Erm… that’s all. No help here.
Could it be ‘Dem Bones’ or ‘Dry Bones?’ (No sweater, but he has the light-bulb-shaped head & the ribs LOOK like a striped sweater??? He’s a skeleton named Henry.)
Or ‘Henry and Mudge?’ That kid is named Henry & has a striped sweater.
Here’s a list of children’s book illustrators that might help http://www.dmoz (dot) org/Arts/Illustration/Children’s/ (I don’t know how to use tinyurl….)
Harold and the Purple Crayon? I don’t know how to do TinyURL but I’m sure it’s on Amazon. I don’t know about the striped sweater, though. I think Harold was wearing jammies.
Harold and the Purple Crayon was my gut reaction, too, but he wasn’t wearing a striped sweater…
How to do TinyURL
1. go to http://tinyurl.com/
2. paste your big long url into the box labeled “Enter a long URL to make tiny”
3. click on “Make TinyURL!”
4. paste the result into your comment
So, for example, the amazon page for Harold and the Purple Crayon is: http://tinyurl.com/363a5s
Incidentally, that book doesn’t seem to really match the description, but I don’t have any better suggestions.
you just go to tinyURL and it’ll make a tinyURL for you. come on people, if you’ve never heard of it, a good search engine would have solved the riddle for you in mere moments!!!
My vote goes to Harold & the Purple Crayon, too.
Thanks, Sasha! And, um, Tiffanie. I guess.
I was going to say Harold and the Purple Crayon, too. And suddenly I have an image of a tiny Mr. Garrison from South Park…
My first thought was The Phantom Tollbooth http://tinyurl.com/2vbowj but His name is Milo and the sweater is not striped. Also sounds like drawings from Shel Silverstein books.
Do you mean Treehorn? There were three books, my personal favorite being Treehorn’s Treasure, in which the tree in his backyard starts growing dollar bills. They’re fantastic – even if I’m wrong, you should read them anyway. Apparently you can buy the whole set (which I am going to go do right now!)
This one is called “Nobody is Perfick” by Bernard Waber: http://tinyurl.com/2tvnek
I don’t know about lightbulb-shaped head boy, but the drawings are black and red (and other colors too? I would have to dig through my overloaded bookshelves to check).
This book was a hand-me-down from some older cousins and I remember thinking it was the most bizarre thing I had ever read. Still might be. It’s really just a strange, strange book.
I was so excited to have an answer, I totally missed the part where Sars said to use tinyURL. I get the stupid award of the day! If the link I tried to paste messes things up, try this: http://tinyurl.com/2kpwzm or go to Amazon and search “Treehorn.”
Di, any chance you are maybe thinking of Henry, the comic strip by Carl Anderson? Maybe you had a collection of strips in book form?
http://tinyurl.com/2w5s7d
I’m sure its not this obvious, but “lightbulb shaped head with striped sweater” sounds like Charlie Brown. :)
I believe you are thinking of Henry, by Carl Anderson. He’s very tall kid with a bald, bulbous head. He doesn’t wear a striped sweater — but he does wear a red t-shirt and black shorts in the color strips. He seems slow because (1) he has the appearance of a special needs kid and (2) he doesn’t speak.
As near as I can tell, the books are out of print, but there are plenty of used sets on Amazon.com. (Search for “Henry by Carl Anderson” to bypass all the other books about people named Henry).
Henry was also published as a newspaper comic strip; King Features still syndicates the classic strips. The one listed for February 1, 2008, shows Henry and a pal in a striped sweater.
As soon as you said “light bulb-shaped head” I assumed it was Henry, from the eponymous comic strip. There were quite a few compilation books sold through the years, going back to the 1930s. For more info see http://www.toonopedia.com/henry.htm
Yep–I was going to suggest the Henry comic strip. Didn’t know there was a book, too, though…!
http://tinyurl.com/2w2z4t – there ya go.