Author: Christopher Harbo (no website found)
Publisher: Capstone Publishing
Rating: WORTHY!
Illustrated by Danny Chatzikonstantinou (no website found).
This is a flip book, which means nothing if you read it in ebook form, since it's linear. If you flip it, all you get is the back side of your ebook reader, which I assure you isn't very entertaining! This is why you should glue a print book to the back of your ebook reader, just in case. Make it one of those ass-backwards Japanese manga books which you have to read backwards anyway, so it's no great loss. Note that this is a serving suggestion only so you can't sue me if your TV dinner looks like capybara vomit and not a whit like the charming picture on the box...!
I have not seen the printed form of this version of Humpty-Dumpty, but I imagine that you literally flip the book over and read the other half from the back to the middle. This is actually a cool idea, because the first half tells the traditional nursery rhyme, whereas the second half gives rather a different and non-traditional perspective.
According to Wikipedia, the earliest version of Humpty-Dumpty wasn't like the one which is commonly known:
Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall,
Humpty Dumpty had a great fall.
Four-score Men and Four-score more,
Could not make Humpty Dumpty where he was before
The newer version makes more sense! Various scholars have tried to equate Humpty with Richard the Third, or with a medieval siege engine known as a tortoise, but as far as I can see, there's no real provenance for these claims, and it's probably nothing more than what it was originally intended to be: a nineteenth century riddle, the answer to which is an egg.
The delight of this particular book is that we get not only Humpty's side of things, but also the heartfelt complaints and if I may make so bold, the highly practical assessment of the king's men. Since The King's Men was an acting company to which William Shakespeare belonged, I do feel that we should take their view as gospel in this matter, and accept it as the true fate of Humpty. I recommend this flip-book for flipping off all those who disagree!
