Picture Book of the Day: Mr. Tiger Goes Wild, by Peter Brown
I have been a fan of Brown's for a long time and this has now emerged as my favorite book by him. In this witty tale of embracing your wild side, a tiger all dressed in Victorian clothes becomes tired of his oh-so sophisticated and socially restrictive society. All the animals (elephants and monkeys and such, clad in similar attire) stand on their hind legs and exchange dull niceties that bore our hero, and any animal child showing any signs of wildness receives a verbal warning from their elders. Unable to take it anymore, Mr. Tiger (in a brilliant spread that shows him going lower and lower on the page) decides to--gasp!--walk on all four legs and roar his way to heavenly wildness, all the while still wearing his fancy clothes. But these duds soon fall off and this causes his friends to banish him to the wilderness where Mr. Tiger gladly races off the page to go. What follows are spreads containing the most breathtaking work Brown has ever achieved: beautiful drawings of the wilderness with waterfalls and wonder. Seriously, these illustrations could hang on a museum wall. Everything leads to a lovely conclusion that offers Mr. Tiger a chance to don an awesome Hawaiian shirt and his city folk peers now happily joining him in the rumpus. A delightful book, one of the very best picture books of this year, an instant classic.
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