SLIS 5420 The Invention of Hugo Cabret

Week Two: Caldecott Winners – 2008 - The Invention of Hugo Cabret by Brian Selznick



Summary:

Hugo Cabret is a twelve-year-old boy who comes from a family of horologists, or clock makers, and is brilliantly capable of creating, fixing, and simply keeping clocks and anything mechanical in order.  After being orphaned and his uncle disappears, Hugo becomes the clock keeper of a busy train station, so he must keep his life hidden and go on as if nothing has happened in order to not be sent to an orphanage.  When Hugo’s life suddenly intertwines with a young girl and her Godfather, a toymaker and shop owner, he feels his deepest secrets are in danger of being revealed.  Once he befriends the girl, his life changes as he tells her of the automaton he is restoring, his father’s death, and the unfortunate circumstances causing him to live in the train station.  The girl’s life is impacted as well when she finds out the reason why she lives with her Godparents, and her Godfather rediscovers his lost passion of films.

APA Reference: 

Selznick, B. (2007). The invention of Hugo Cabret. New York, NY: Scholastic Press.


My Impressions:

            This is an amazingly illustrated book using pictures not only to explain what has happened in the text, but as a replacement for text.  If you only were to read the words, half the story would be missed, and if you were only to discover the illustrations, you would have the same problem.  Selznick created an innovative experience when he chose to write a story with words, achromatic pencil sketches, film stills and photography.  The inclusion of sketches and film stills from Georges Melies, the real life model for the toymaker, work creates a believable world for Hugo and his acquaintances.
            The sheer length of this book has always scared me off in the past because even though there are almost three hundred pages of illustrations, it is difficult to go on to the next page before analyzing each tiny detail of the toys in the shop or the workings of the mechanical automaton.  The illustrations, which of course is why this book won the Caldecott in 2008, are breathtaking and more mature than many other picture books or graphic novels. 

This is a wonderful read, and I feel it would be a great recommendation to an older reluctant reader in order to boost their confidence levels.  It could be recommended based on the fact that there are more pages of illustrations than text, but once the reader had finished, they will have read an over 500-page book! 

Professional Reviews:

          Suspenseful text and wordless double-page spreads tell the story of young Hugo, an orphan secretly living in the walls of a train station where he labors to complete a mysterious invention left by his father. The 2008 Caldecott Medal Book and a 2008 Best Book for Young Adults.

The invention of Hugo Cabret [Review of the book The Invention of Hugo Cabret by B. Selznick]. (2008). Booklist,  
          104(13), 18. Retrieved from http://www.booklistonline.com

          Here’s a dilemma for the Newbery committee . . . and the Caldecott: what do you do with an illustrated novel in which neither text nor pictures can tell the story alone? Not to mention the drama to be found in the page turns themselves. A brief introduction sets the time (1931) and place (Paris) and invites readers to imagine they’re at the movies. And with a turn of the page, they are, as, over a sequence of twenty-one double-page wordless spreads, a story begins. A picture of the moon gives way to anaerial shot of Paris; day breaks as the “camera” moves into a shot of a train station, where a boy makes his way to a secret passage from which, through a peephole, he watches an old man sitting at a stall selling toys. Finally, the text begins: “From his perch behind the clock, Hugo could see everything.” The story that follows in breathtaking counterpoint is a lively one, involving the dogged Hugo, his tough little ally Isabelle, an automaton that can draw pictures, and a stage magician turned filmmaker, the real-life Georges Méliès, most famously the director of A Trip to the Moon (1902). There is a bounty of mystery and incident here, along with several excellent chase scenes expertly rendered in the atmospheric, dramatically crosshatched black-and-white (naturally) pencil drawings that make up at least a third of the book. (According to the final chapter, and putting a metafictional spin on things, there are 158 pictures and 26,159 words in the book.) The interplay between the illustrations (including several stills from Méliès’s frequently surreal films and others from the era) and text is complete genius, especially in the way Selznick moves from one to the other, depending on whether words or images are the better choice for the moment. And as in silent films, it’s always just one or the other, wordless double-spread pictures or unillustrated text, both framed in the enticing black of the silent screen. While the bookmaking is spectacular, and the binding secure but generous enough to allow the pictures to flow easily across the gutter, The Invention of Hugo Cabret is foremost good storytelling, with a sincerity and verbal ease reminiscent of Andrew Clements (a frequent Selznick collaborator) and themes of secrets, dreams, and invention that play lightly but resonantly throughout. At one point, Hugo watches in awe as Isabelle blithely picks the lock on a door. “How did you learn to do that?” he asks. “Books,” she answers. Exactly so

R., S. S. (March/April 2007). The invention of Hugo Cabret [Review of the book The Invention of Hugo Cabret by B. 
          Selznick]. Horn Book Magazine, 83(2), 173-175. Retrieved from http://www.hbook.com

Library and Classroom Uses:

          The librarian could collaborate with classroom teachers on several different types of lessons using The Invention of Hugo Cabret.  English teachers could discuss vocabulary, point of view, or storytelling.    Science teachers could look at the mechanics of automation and clocks.  Art teachers, of course, could use the illustrations to teach pencil sketches and closing in on details within an illustration.  I think the most interesting part of the illustrations is how Selznick takes a wide angle shot of an area, goes in a little closer with the next illustration, a little closer with the next, then may have an extreme close up of a foot or an eye before moving on to text or another drawing.  This would be a great lesson in art, especially for older grades. The science and art lessons would be the simplest to use collaboration between the librarian and classroom teachers.  The librarian could help the science teacher by showing students books and websites on mechanics for them to research.  The librarian could pull books on other sketch artists for the art teacher as well.


There are also many online resources for the book including the Scholastic website and Selznick’s website. 

http://www.scholastic.com/hugocabret/

http://www.theinventionofhugocabret.com/about_hugo_intro.htm