Author and Illustrator. Mo Willems - Research Paper Example

MO WILLEMS Childhood, adult and career life Mo Willems is an award winning animator, television and Hespent nine years as an animator and writer for Sesame Street, and he has created more than 100 short films many of which have featured in HBO, MTV and Mike’s Festival of Animation. Mo’s interest in cartooning started when he was a child. This is illustrated below: "I've been drawing funny cartoons my whole life," he noted on his Web site. "I started out by drawing Snoopy and Charlie Brown and then started to make up my own characters. Luckily, no one has made me stop yet!" Willems decided on a career in animation during the 1980s, while studying at New York University. "My desire as a kid was to find a way to be funny and draw," he explained to Martin Goodman in an interview for Animation World. "Animation turned out to be the best way for me to do that."(Willems, 2005; Llanas, 2012) Mo Willems was born on February 11, 1968. He is an American writer, children’s book author/illustrator and an animator. At the age of 4, he moved to New Orleans where he studied and graduated from Isidore Newman School and Trinity Episcopal School. He was raised by Dutch immigrant parents. At the age of 18, he moved temporarily to London in order to pursue his dream of becoming a stand-up comedian. Due to the excellent skills he had and the humorous nature in him, he was able to establish himself and to some extent he managed to get a spot in the Edinburg Fringe festivals. He then returned to the U.S to become a film student (Willems, 2005). During his time at the New York University, he discovered animation and quickly became entranced by his ability to make movies without begging for any help from other crew members. After graduating from Tisch, Willems spent a year traveling across the globe drawing a cartoon everyday. He finally kicked off his career as an animator and a writer for Sesame Street soon after returning from New York. For the period between 1993 and 2002, he performed stand-up comedy in New York and recorded essays for the British Broadcasting Corporation Radio together with making a promo for Cartoon Network and animating the opening for a show in Nickelodeon (Llanas, 2012). Mo later developed two animated TV series called the sheep in the big city for off-beats for cartoon network and Nickelodeon’s Kablam respectively. The series received many critics than audience and was finally cancelled after two seasons. He later worked as head writer during the creation and production of the first four seasons of Codename: Kids Next Door; which was created by Tom Warburton, his colleague from Sheep (Willems, 2005). Willems’ published his first picture, Don't Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus!, in 2003. In addition to picture books, he created the Elephant and Piggie book, a series that targeted Easy Readers. These were warded the Theodor Suess Geisel Medal in 2008 and 2009. Mo has not assumed older audience hence he has published an illustrated memoir of the time he went around the globe in 1990-91 called You Can Never Find a Rickshaw When it Monsoons. His drawings, sculptures and wire sculptures have found their way in various museums and galleries across the country and his interesting graphic story focusing on his family experiences during 9-11 for DC comic is found in the Library of Congress. Despite the fact that English was his first language, his books have been translated into a number of languages and that makes his work sell in many countries across the world (Llanas, 2012). Awards and Honors Three of Mo’s books published books have been awarded a Caldecott Honor: Knuffle Bunny Too: A Case of Mistaken Identity (2008) Knuffle Bunny: A Cautionary Tale (2005), and Don't Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus! (2004). Apart from these Honors, he has received several awards for his great work in art. ASIFA-East Awards for animation; National Parenting Publications Award (2003) for Time to peel; six Emmy Awards for work on Sesame Street; American Library Association (2004) for Don’t Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus (Llanas, 2012). DON'T LET THE PIGEON DRIVE THE BUS BY MO WILLEMS One of the most interesting books written by Mo Willems is the book by the name: Don't Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus! Don’t Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus is a children’s picture book released in 2003 by Hyperion Press. It was Mo’s first book that was meant for children. The plot is about a bus driver who is forced to leave the wheels for a short while so he asks the reader to watch the Pigeon. On his part, the Pigeon endeavors numerous excuses and tries to wangle readers into allowing him drive the bus. As he pleads, begs and wheedles his way through the book, children will definitely love being able to answer back and hence decide the fate of the pigeon. In this side-splitting picture book debut, Mo Willems directly capture a preschooler’s displeasure outburst (Willems, 2007). This is book is simply a brilliant book that is perfectly true to life; as anyone, who interacts with a PreSchool-Grade 2-A pupil after reading the book, can attest. It is the height of common sense for the driver makes one request of readers, but the driver knows clearly this resolute and readers do not-yet. "Hey, can I drive the bus?" asks the bird, at first all sweet reason, and then, having clearly been told no by readers, he begins his ever-escalating, increasingly silly bargaining. "I tell you what: I'll just steer," and "I never get to do anything," then "No fair! I bet your mom would let me."( Willems, 2005) In a magnificently expressive spread, the at last loses it, and eyeballs popping and feathers flying, scream to allowed to drive the bus. The driver returns to his seat and the pigeon leaves in a funk before spying a huge tractor trailer, and dares to ever dream again. Reading the book the first time will make you laugh out loud. It is not easy to imagine what was meant to be children’s books can turn out to be a source of humor for adults. The book is characterized by humor from the start to the end. The pigeon is not exactly a Michelangelo. His is sketched with thick black lines, shaded in yellow and blue colors. Looking closer at the pigeon you will realize the ultimate genius that exists (Willems, 2005). His big eyeballs elegantly display every possible emotion which ranges from sweet and blameless to consume with an all-inclusive rage. The chapter where the pigeon freaks out and screams at the top of his voice “LET ME DRIVE THE BUS” is the anger outburst of a two-year-old rendered into an aviary form. Now, the big question is: do the kids love the book? Well, the answer is yes. The book is a hilarious one who cannot be resisted by either adults or kids. Each page of the book brings with it the feeling of a perfectly frozen frame of cartoon footage (Willems, 2004). These footage are characterized by actions, wild humor and remarkable expression captured with just few lines. Kids will shriek over the pigeon’s dramatics, even as they realize that he yearns, blows up and wheedles to be powerful just like they do. Some interesting point about the book is that it looks at a child’s potential for mischief. In a plain palette, accompanied with childishly elemental line drawings, Mo has incarcerated the essence of perverseness in the kids. The brilliance of this book is that very young kids will realize the need to appreciate and acknowledges art (Willems, 2005). References Llanas, S. G. (2012). Mo Willems. Willems, M. (2004). Don't let the pigeon drive the bus. New York: Scholastic. Willems, M. (2005). Your pal Mo Willems presents Leonardo the terrible monster. New York: Hyperion Books for Children. Willems, M. (2007). Don't let the pigeon stay up late!. London: Walker Books. Read More