A new translation of Erich Kästner's splendid novel for children
'Gadzooks!' said Dot ... 'The things that boy can do!'
Dot loves play-acting, dressing up her pet dachshund Piefke and making up words like 'splentastic'. Her best friend is Anton, who lives in a little apartment and looks after his mother.
They share a secret - every night, when their parents think they are asleep, they sell matches and shoelaces on the streets of Berlin with Dot's grumpy governess. But why?
The answers involve a villain called 'Robert the Devil', a club-wielding maid, a wobbly tooth, a pair of silver shoes and a policeman dancing the tango, as Dot and Anton get into all sorts of scrapes and even solve a crime in this delightful, touching and hilarious adventure story.
Walter Trier s deceptively innocent drawings are as classic as Kästner s words; I never tire of them Quentin Blake
Erich Kästner's Emil and the Detectives, was published in 1929 and has since sold millions of copies around the world and been translated into around 60 languages. After the Nazis took power in Germany, Kästner's books were burnt and he was excluded from the writers' guild. He won many awards, including the prestigious Hans Christian Andersen Award in 1960. He died in 1974.
Walter Trier was born in Prague in 1880. In 1910 he moved to Berlin, where he would later be introduced to Kästner, and began his career drawing cartoons for the Berliner Illustrated. He also contributed to the satirical weekly Simplicissimus, where during the 1920s, despite great personal risk, he ridiculed Hitler and the Nazi Party in a series of cartoons. In 1936 he fled to London, where he was involved in producing anti-Nazi leaflets and political propaganda drawings. He would go on to have a rich career, producing around 150 covers for the humorous magazine Lilliput. He died in 1951 in Ontario, Canada.
REVIEWS
"Dot is a delightful creation... A child reader will adore the pug dogs and cream cakes and Christmas lights, all winningly illustrated by Walter Trier-the Quentin Blake to Kastner's Roald Dahl. An adult, though, will see behind the pigtails and street chases, to signs of a Germany which had lost track of morality and reason." - Standpoint Magazine
"Full to the brim with memorable characters... The bold line drawings by Walter Trier enhance the story wonderfully... Nearly a century later the messages of courage, pride, respect and friendship remain equally relevant today." - Children's Books Ireland
"First published in 1931 and last available in English in 1973, the tale is presented here in handsome packaging with its original fluent line drawings, and it wears its age reasonably well... A minor classic featuring a pair of intrepid protagonists, a comically suspenseful climax, and a mildly caricatured adult cast." -Kirkus
PRODUCT DETAILS
Paperback with French flaps
Publisher:
Pushkin Children's Books
ISBN:
978-1782690573
978-1782690573
Pages: 160
Ages: 8 to 12
