From Nursery Rhyme to Picture Book, by Pippa Goodhart

Nursery rhymes are often nonsensical, at least to modern child understanding, and yet they persist, generation to generation, often having lasted hundreds of years.  Why?  It’s the rhythm and the rhyme and the repetition that makes them memorable and easy to join in with, as well as nice to rock a baby to.  Those three ‘r’s, rhythm, rhyme and repetition, are often found in picture book stories for young children for those same reasons.  So it makes good, clever, sense to use an established old rhyme as the basis for a new picture book story.  Here are three such books which work wonderfully well –

Brand new, bright and fun, full of vehicles and sounds, with a proper mix of people driving the many vehicles, is Car, Car, Truck, Jeep, written by Katrina Charman and illustrated by Nick Sharratt.  This whizz along with busy vehicles comes to a nicely sleepy end, and matches the pattern of rhythm and rhyme laid out in Baa Baa Black Sheep … ‘Baa baa black sheep, have you any wool?  Yes, sir.  Yes, sir, three bags full.  One for the master.  One for the dame.  One for the little boy who lives down the lane.’

Quieter, and more sophisticated, but wonderfully powerful, is This Is The Star, written by Joyce Dunbar and illustrated by Gary Blythe.  This tells the Christmas story, mirroring the cumulative rhyme that is This Is The House That Jack Built … ‘ This is the house that Jack built.  This is the malt that lay in the house that Jack built.  This is the rat that ate the malt that lay in the house that Jack built.  This is the cat that killed the rat that ate the malt … and so on for many more verses.’  The big problem with a cumulative story is that the text gets bulkier and the pictures more crowded, meaning that the finale can all look at bit small.  But Joyce Dunbar punctures that with a spread that breaks that pattern startlingly to give us, ‘This is the child that was born.’ 

Each Peach, Pear, Plum by Janet and Alan Ahlberg is, of course an old favourite. The original playground rhyme seems to go something like, ‘Each, peach, pear, plum, out goes Tom Thumb.  Tom Thumb won’t do so out goes Betty Blue. Betty Blue won’t go, so out goes you!’ It’s one of those rhymes for eliminating a child at a time in order to choose who will be 'It' for a game.  The Ahlbergs took the structure, and the idea of playing with familiar nursery rhyme or fairytale characters, from that rhyme, and made a classic of it.  

 

Do you know of any other picture books based on well-known children’s rhymes?  Can you suggest a rhyme ripe for such picture book treatment?

The Wonderful Rule of 3 by Natascha Biebow

All good things come in threes (and bad things, too). Why? It seems that three is the smallest number needed to create a pattern; it makes stories more satisfying and funnier. Plus everyone knows that stories must have three elements: a beginning middle and end.

From early on, children are preconditioned to expect this pattern:

The rhythm of the day has three parts – morning, noon and night –
and three meals too – breakfast, lunch and tea.

The rhythm of growing has three stages: baby, child and teen.

Most of the lullabies, songs and nursery rhymes told and sung from babyhood are built upon the rhythm of the magical number 3:

Baa, baa black sheep – three baa’s and then wool for the master, the dame and little boy in the lane 

Three little bears – with three sizes: big, middle-sized and small

© www.peoniesandpoppyseeds.com

Three little pigs, three billy goats gruff, and so on.

From Pat-a-Cake Nursery Rhymes by Annie Kubler

Even in the tiny story of the nursery rhyme, the rhythm of three sets up the pattern of storytelling, in which the story is set up, there are three examples and then a turning point/conclusion:

Set up the story: Pat a cake, Pat a cake, baker's man
Bake me a cake as fast as you can; 

Now, build up the story with three elements:

1. Pat it,
2. and prick it
3. and mark it with a ‘B’, 

Give it an outcome: And put it in the oven for baby and me. 

When writing picture books, it is often handy to keep in mind how using the rule of three helps to deliver an exciting, page-turning plot and keep the narrative moving swiftly forward.

1.  Sometimes, the whole plot is built upon the rule of three. For example, in Duck in a Truck, when Duck’s truck gets stuck in the muck, Jez Alborough uses three instances to resolve the main problem: 

1.   Frog hops down to help.
2.    Sheep tries to push.
3.   Then Goat, passing by in his motor boat, comes up with the clever plan that solves Duck’s problem:
   
   
   

   

   From Duck In a Truck by Jez Alborough

   
   

   
   

2.    The rule of three is also a great tool for advancing the plot.  

Once the author has set-up the story and its central problem, it can help to build-up suspense and work towards a clear turning point in the plot.

For instance, in That Rabbit Belongs to Emily Brown, the Queen wants Emily Brown’s much-loved rabbit Stanley in exchange for a golden teddy bear. Feisty Emily Brown tells the Chief Footman firmly that the rabbit is not for sale. So, the Queen sends: 


 1. The Army

From That Rabbit Belongs to Emily Brown by Cressida Cowell and Neal Layton

2. The Navy

From That Rabbit Belongs to Emily Brown by Cressida Cowell and Neal Layton

3. The Air Force

From That Rabbit Belongs to Emily Brown by Cressida Cowell and Neal Layton

Each time, they try to exchange ‘Bunnywunny’ for an even greater number of outlandish gifts. And, with each spread, Emily Brown’s consistent refusal builds until she is “FED UP!”

Then something must change in the pattern of the plot. So when the Queen has Stanley stolen, Emily Brown has no choice but to confront the Queen herself so she can tell her how to make the golden teddy as loveable as Stanley.

In another example, when Max is crowned King of the Wild Things in Sendak’s classic, three wordless spreads follow, adding drama and indicating the passage of time. These illustrate the wild things’ antics, building up to the turning point when Max orders the them to stop and sends them to bed. Then, realizing he’s lonely, he goes home to his supper and those who love him "best of all".

From Where the Wild Things Are by Maurice Sendak

From Where the Wild Things Are by Maurice Sendak

From Where the Wild Things Are by Maurice Sendak

Often, three consecutive examples can also help to advance a sub-section of the plot.

In the classic, Harry the Dirty Dog, when Harry comes home after having played by the railway, played tag with the other dogs and slid down the coal chute (three things!), he is no longer a white dog. His family are sure that this can't be Harry, so he:

1.  “flip-flipped and flop-flipped”
2. “rolled over and played dead”
3.  “danced and sang
   

   

    From Harry the Dirty Dog by Gene Zion & Margaret Bloy Graham

But, his family still don't recognize him . . . What follows is a moment of pause, before the story picks up again and Harry remembers to dig up the scrubbing brush he's hidden in the garden and ‘beg’ for a bath!

3.   Sometimes, the rule of threes is even used like a mini-plot within the story, as in Olivia:

1. Olivia admires modern art at the museum
2. She tries it herself at home . . .

   

    From Olivia by Ian Falconer

 

3. Then, “Time to think!“ 

Or as a way to introduce some information about the characters (especially useful as an illustrative device across a page or a spread).

As in Quentin Blake’s Angelica Sprocket’s Pockets:

1.       “There’s a pocket for mice,”
2.       “and a pocket for cheese”
3.       “and a pocket for hankies in case anyone feels that they’re going to sneeze”
   
   

   

   From Angelica Sprocket's Pockets by Quentin Blake

In Olivia, her morning routine includes three elements:

 From Olivia by Ian Falconer

1. “In the morning, after she gets up and moves the cat,”
2. “and brushes her teeth and combs her ears,”
3. “and moves the cat”

4. Finally, the rule of three is a really useful way to give the writing a satisfying rhythm.
Here are just two examples:

In Jane Clarke’s Knight School, Little Knight and Little Dragon discover that  school is fun:

From Knight School by Jane Clarke & Jane Massey

1.   “Little Knight and Little Dragon sang funny songs.
2. “painted fabulous pictures,”
3. “and listened to fantastic stories.”
   

In Mo Willems’ Goldilocks and the Three Dinosaurs, by virtue of it being a spoof of Goldilocks and the Three Little Bears, practically the whole book follows the rule of three. Here is an example of how Willems uses it at the climax of the story, giving the page a great read-aloud rhythm: 

“Just then a loud plane flew by, which sounded pretty much like a trio of Dinosaurs yelling 

1.   “NOW”
2. or “CHARGE!” 
3. or the Norwegian expression for “CHEWY-BONBON-TIME!"

From Goldilocks and the Three Bears by Mo Willems

The rhythm of three is everywhere in picture books! If you look for it, you will start to see how it can work wonderfully to create predictable and unpredictable rhythms in your work, too.

Natascha Biebow

Author, Editor and Mentor

BlueElephant Storyshaping is an editing, coaching and mentoring service aimed at empowering writers and illustrators to fine-tune their work pre-submission. Natascha is also the author of Elephants Never Forget and Is This My Nose?, editor of numerous award-winning children’s books, and Regional Advisor (Chair) of SCBWI British Isles. www.blueelephantstoryshaping.com