Swan Lake
Chris Van Allsburg, Mark Helprin
Readers rate it 4.0 (3 on Hardcover)
80 pages · Released 1989 · Houghton Mifflin
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Swan Lake parent’s guide: what’s inside
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What it offers
A note for parents
This is a lyrical, illustrated retelling of Swan Lake that extends the classical ballet into a philosophical epic. The story deals with themes of love, duty, and transformation across cycles of triumph and defeat, with beautiful prose and Van Allsburg's striking artwork. While emotionally mature and occasionally dark in tone, it contains no graphic content and rewards kindness, perseverance, and nobility; it may appeal more to older children or those with ballet interest.
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From the publisher
Commissioned to produce his ‘take’ on Swan Lake, the Tchaikovsky ballet for which no fundamental text exists, Helprin modified and extended the story into a surprisingly emotional and profound short epic cycle of ceaselessly alternating triumph and defeat. The world in which this takes place is as extraordinary, hypnot... Commissioned to produce his ‘take’ on Swan Lake, the Tchaikovsky ballet for which no fundamental text exists, Helprin modified and extended the story into a surprisingly emotional and profound short epic cycle of ceaselessly alternating triumph and defeat. The world in which this takes place is as extraordinary, hypnotic, and beautiful as that of Winter's Tale. Children and adults are delighted, captivated, and moved, and those who are able may follow as well a Swiftian political and theological subtext. As a splendid and important addition, the richness and beauty of the texts are interpreted by Chris Van Allsburg, the foremost illustrator of our times. Now out of print, Mark Helprin's three novellas -- Swan Lake, A City in Winter, and The Veil of Snows -- are now available in a single volume, A Kingdom Far and Clear: The Complete Swan Lake Trilogy.
Shelved under
- Ballets
- Fairy tales
- Stories, plots
- Ballet
- Juvenile fiction
- Children's fiction
- Swans, fiction
- Ballets, stories, plots, etc.
- Classics
- Fantasy
- Young Adult
Books in the A Kingdom Far and Clear: The Swan Lake Trilogy series
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ISBN 9780395646472 · Houghton Mifflin