Book Review: The Ox-Cart Man
Rating: 
This beautifully written story follows a year in the life of a 19th-Century New England family. It echoes the style of Donald Hall’s poetic version of the story, which probably preceded this book.
In the first scene, the Ox-Cart Man loads his cart with goods to drive into town: wool, knitted goods, woven flax, hand-whittled brooms, shingles, and so on. As he loads the cart, the narrator embeds brief descriptions of how the family worked to create them. On selling the goods, the man buys supplies for his family for the coming year: a needle for his daughter, a knife for his son, a cooking pot for mother, and some wintergreen candies. He returns home, and the family incorporates the new supplies into their work, which is now described in more detail. The story ends with unspoken anticipation that soon the man will load a new cart to take this year’s goods to town.
The hard work of colonial life is made very attractive in this story, as the children cheerfully pitch in and the family works together to build their life and homestead. The rhythmic text is gentle and spare, with just the right tone of anticipation for what will come next. Cooney’s beautiful paintings, with earth-toned colors and straight lines, evoke a feeling of peaceful simplicity that encourages the reader to look back to those bygone days with romantic nostalgia. A beautiful book.
Categories: 5 Stars, Age 04-08, Amblesideonline, Book Tree, Books Children Love, Caldecott Medal, Classicalhomeschooling.org, Honey For a Child's Heart, World Books That Show, World Nifty 50
Tags: 19th Century, Candy, Circular Stories, Cooperation, Diligence, Farm Life, Historical Fiction, Honoring Parents, New England, Responsibility, Strong Families, Work
Posted on August 10, 2009
No responses yet. You could be the first!
Leave a Response
Subscribe
Search by:
Tags
Quotes
The Wart… did not like the grown-ups who talked down to him like a baby, but the ones who just went on talking in their usual way, leaving him to leap along in their wake, jumping at meanings, guessing, clutching at known words, and chuckling at complicated jokes as they suddenly dawned. He had the glee of the porpoise then, pouring and leaping through strange seas.
—
Recent Posts
Wish List
