On Monday the American Library Association will announce the
winner of its highest award for a picture book, named for the
great English illustrator Randolph Caldecott (1846–1886). Why
was Caldecott so important? Here’s an answer from Maurice
Sendak, who won the Caldecott Medal for Where the Wild Things
Are: “Caldecott’s work heralds the beginning of the modern
picture book. He devised an ingenious juxtaposition of picture
and word, a counterpoint that had never happened before. Words
are left out – but the picture says it. Pictures are left out –
but the word says it. In short, it is the invention of the
picture book.” * * * “My favorite example of Caldecott’s
fearless honesty is the final page of Hey Diddle Diddle. After
we read, ‘And the Dish ran away with the spoon,’ accompanied by
a drawing of the happy couple, there is the shock of turning the
page and finding a picture of the dish broken into ten pieces –
obviously dead – and the spoon being hustled away by her angry
parents. There are no words that su