What is your opinion of Richard Scarry, the picture book author and artist?
He totally fucking rocks. Gold bug ftw!
I was all about him when I was a kid. I STILL have my Busy, Busy World book on my bookshelf, and occasionally read through it. I always loved the Denmark page - a detailed map of a haunted castle.
He’s also responsible for my fear of furries - I distinctly remember being traumatized as a young kid by a drawing of a pig standing upright in boxer shorts in a doctor’s office in another one of his books.
I had his Best Storybook Ever when I was a kid and wore it out; I was so happy to find another one in a flea market 25 years later. My kids love the stories like “Pierre, The Paris Policeman” and “Good Luck In Rome” because I’ll attempt a (really awful) French or Italian accent.
ETA: I see fusoya has the same book.
Lowly worm driving an apple car FTW!
I still have my books. I spent countless hours looking at all of the details of the illustrations. I knew how to read, my colors, my numbers…all that stuff before I even went to kindergarten and I am sure it’s because of the imagination of Richard Scarry. When I was a little older, the How Things Work book was fascinating.
I had a couple of those books when I was a kid. I loved them.
I remember a kid writing a letter to his grandmother and the postman tucking it into his hat because his bag was full…
I couldn’t tell you what book it was in, but it’s an image that has stayed with me some 35 years.
He was brilliant, I loved his books.
I had never heard of him until now.
This was interesting (from his wiki)
He’s brilliant. I’ve blocked out much of my childhood, but his books take me back, in an enjoyable, nonthreatening way. Scarry rocks.
I had the Best Word Book Ever, which was partially responsible for my nerdy trivial knowledge about America, as a kid.
I used to like the recurring characters Wolfgang Wolf, Benny Baboon, Harry Hyena, and, of course, Lowly Worm in his cute little hat.
I remember seeing his books when I was child, but I never really found them very interesting.
Is this a trick question? Like, are you really asking us about unbridled lust or Busy Town as some kind of Communist dystopia?
He was huge to me. He and Sendak were the twin gods of high literature when I was in first and second grade :).
Great guy, and my kids loved and loved and loved his books.
We had one that was signed and personalized. While personalizing, he asked if the kid had any pets, and he said yes, a black cat. So Richard Scarry went through and drew a little black kitty into quite a few of the frames (no dialog for kitty, though).
Of course after this, we didn’t want to let the kid actually read the book anymore, because that would wear it out.
Add Dr Seuss and you’ve got my holy trinity for the same age.
He was excellent.
astro’s relation of how someone’s work after death can be altered just like a soviet photo is unearthly creepy.
Loved his books as a smallchild - I used to scrutinize the pictures for all the little details of characters doing funny things in the background. Incidentally, it wasn’t until I revisited them as an adult that I got the joke about the name “Lowly Worm”.
I’m still waiting for the OP to return and reveal that Scarry was a secret pedophile or goat rapist or something terrible.
I loved him. It was terribly exciting when I was four and realized just after my dad taught me to read that I now knew exactly what the words under the pictures in the Busytown and Crockett Johnson’s Harold’s Purple Crayon books meant. 