Buy the hardback from Amazon UK
Collections and Retellings
Picturebook
Scholastic Press
Hardback £14.99
ISBN: 0439962986
Reviewed by Gwen Grant
[Armadillo 6.4 Winter 2004]
This is such a sumptuous book, I swear it glowed at me from beneath the padded cover of the envelope it came in. It is also a book to treasure because it is treasure itself. Here we have a masterly retelling of the story that has launched a thousand pantomimes. An exotic story of colour and humour, drama and excitement. It's easy to think we know the Aladdin story so well, we could recite it in our sleep but the most cursory glance back to earlier versions forcibly reminds that this is a meandering and complex story.
What this writer does is retell it with a structure as clear as water and just as refreshing. It's like having a precious jewel reset so that it sparkles all the more brilliantly in its new design. Pullman writes with wit, elegance and humour, presenting Aladdin to us in such a modern guise, the only surprise is that the lad isn't wearing a baseball cap. Talk about accessible. This is accessible. As for the illustrations, they are so stunningly beautiful, when you have finished gloating over them, you'll just be glad Sophy Williams brought them into existence.
Our Aladdin hasn't changed. He's still leading an idle but thoroughly satisfying life, ignoring his Mum, as they do, and hanging about the market place, when along comes a certain Moor who claims to be our lad's dead Dad's brother. But we're not fooled. Oh, yes, you are! Oh, no, we're not. The Moor is a sorcerer who inveigles Aladdin into the adventure which results in his finding the magic lamp and from there, the action fairly rockets along.
I love this story because Aladdin finds fortune and happiness and all those good things simply through chance. He doesn't have an epiphanic moment when he decides to change his ways. Not at all. His life changes for the better through pure luck and he grows into goodness. It's wonderful. The underground garden is here, as are the jewels and the exotic slave girls and the lovely Princess our hero falls in love with. The wretched Grand Vizier is here, too, and so is the palace and the worn-out, hard-working Mum who ends up with her own suite of rooms and, of course, the genie of the lamp and the genie of the ring. But who is this in the shadows? It's Shaheed the Nervous Poet who gets to write the story of the Enchanted Lamp. Quote: 'Blessed be Aladdin, prince of publishers! May every writer of stories find a patron as generous and wise!' Oh, Pullman! May every child find this book and delight in it.