I like the fact that Jean's son had a hand in the coloring of this wonderful story of a father's love and special efforts on behalf of his children at Christmastime. Show More of Jean's son who was only 12 years old when his father died. All in all, this was somewhere between two and three stars for me, and a rather lackluster ending to the series. Babar's new canine companion, Duck, was a rather cute addition to the cast, I suppose, and I liked some of the visuals. That said, there was little that really spoke to me, or made a strong favorable impression.
The colonialist themes, to which some have objected ( Should We Burn Babar?, etc.), were very much in evidence here, as Babar once again sets out to imitate European customs, even going so far as to journey to Europe itself, in order to fetch them back to his own home country, but there was nothing that was as egregiously offensive as some of the themes in The Travels of Babar (the low point of the series, in my estimation).
I enjoyed aspects of it - the artwork, as usual, was charming, and I particularly liked the cross-section view of Father Christmas's vast underground complex - but overall, I found the story somewhat disjointed and unappealing. I had mixed feelings about Babar and Father Christmas, which marks the end of my recent Babar reading project - after the initial title, The Story of Babar: The Little Elephant, was chosen recently as a selection for The Picture Book Club to which I belong, I decided to read all of Jean de Brunhoff's original stories. Although disappointed to learn that Father Christmas already has a full schedule for Christmas Eve, and cannot fit the elephants into his gift-giving trip, Babar does convince him to vacation in the land of the elephants, successfully setting up a seasonal relationship. Traveling to Europe, where he hopes to find the seasonal gift-giver, Babar follows a number of false leads before finally tracking his quarry down at his mountainside cavern dwelling in Bohemia (near the village of PRJMNESWE). Show More include the land of the elephants in his annual Christmas voyage.
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