The Very Hungary Caterpillar

Throughout this unit we have reviewed many picture books and easy readers as well. I have to say I already have learned way more about these kind of books then I could ever have thought of. One of my favorite books growing up was The Very Hungary Caterpillar by Eric Carle. Carle’s story has many colorful collage illustrations that just give this book that ‘it’ factor with how the pictures were drawn. I enjoyed how each book had little cut out holes to give the reader a chance to explore the page and actually feel like the caterpillar is eating through all these foods rather than just saying it. In regards to Cover to Cover by Kathleen Horning, this book also touches many of the methods we have studied as well. One of them is the Illustrations

When taking a look at the cover we see the caterpillar long and skinny with the words above it stating the title. Based on how the caterpillar looks, we can get the idea that it will be eating a lot of food. We get this visual based on the fact the caterpillar is long and skinny rather than round and chubby which is how it looks before it spins its cocoon. Besides the caterpillar, Carle does not really offer much else as to what the story will be about. A suggestion to how Carle could emphasize the title even more is maybe have food surround the caterpillar to show that these are the foods it will be eating or just emphasizing the idea that the caterpillar is very hungry and just needs to eat. The rest of the book however offers many unique and nicely drawn pictures with excellent use color and contrast. Color as described in the PowerPoint presentation is said to be “one of the most emotionally evocative artistic elements” (class PowerPoint). Throughout Carle’s entire story he uses many different colors mainly to show the colorfulness of all the food the caterpillar is eating which can make kids get a better idea of what the caterpillar is eating. With how wonderfully drawn out these pictures are, it just makes kids want to read more and more since the author draws them out in such a way kids can follow along with. The next aspect of illustration Carle uses well is the use of contrast which is a key area in regards to pictures of kids’ books. In Cover to Cover, contrast is described as something that “adds excitement to a picture by making an abrupt change in a visual element” (Horning 99). In Carle’s story, he does this very well with all the pictures because he makes the pictures seem very rich in color emphasizing on the colors of the items on the page which gives them a more