Ruth Krauss Biography

Ruth Ida Krauss – American Poet and Author 1901-1993

Inspired by the experimental atmosphere in child development circles during the 1940s and 1950s, Ruth Krauss created simple stories and poetry for young children. Best known for her classic picture book, The Carrot Seed (1944), illustrated by her husband, Crockett Johnson, Ruth Krauss went on to publish more than thirty books over the next four decades. Among them were eight picture book collaborations with il­lustrator Maurice Sendak. Their fortuitous be ginning resulted in the publication of A Hole is to Dig: A First Book of First Definitions (1951), the small innovative picture book that established Sendak as a formidable figure in children’s book illustration.

During the early 1940s, Ruth Krauss was a member of the experimental Writers Laboratory at the Bank Street School in New York City, a program that fostered the talents of other great picture book writers, such as Margaret Wise Brown. Ruth Krauss incorporated the “here and now” philos­ophy originated by educator and author Lucy Sprague Mitchell, founder of the Bank Street School, who maintained that “young children live in the ’here and now’ world around them, which they use as a laboratory for their explora­tions.” Krauss furthered Mitchell’s ideas by in­corporating psychologist-pediatrician Arnold Gesell’s theories on the acquisition of language to create her own playful perspective on a young child’s reality. She adopted Mitchell’s concept of “direct observation” and went to the children themselves to glean her text for A Hole Is to Dig. She queried the young students to determine their meanings for words and in doing so cre­ated one of the first concept books for young children. Definitions like “Dogs are to kiss peo­ple” or “A lap is so you don’t get crumbs on the floor” reflect a child’s pragmatic approach to language.

In her books Ruth Krauss often used a child’s natu­ral word forms and expressions, most notably in A Very Special House, the Caldecott Honor Book in 1954, in which the young narrator pontificates in an unselfconscious, child-centered stream of thought. Krauss’s imaginative and humorous use of language in the form of invented words and nonsensical rhymes inspired the first books for young children reflecting the child’s inner life, Widely acclaimed as “the little book with the big idea,” The Carrot Seed, which masterfully builds tension by using repetition in its short, 101-word text, has remained in print since 1945.

Unflappable and confident, a little boy weeds and waters his precious carrot seed even though bis parents and brother believe “it won’t come up.” With the simplest word and, Krauss paces the story while Johnson intensifies the climax by introducing bold color and oversize scale to pic­ture the boy’s huge red carrot topped with bushy green fronds — a carrot so big the boy needs a wheelbarrow to hold it. In The Happy Day, selected as a Caldecott Honor Book in 1950, Ruth Krauss’s word patterns create rhythm in the sim­ple text. Following a linear progression, several woodland animals sleep, sniff, and run to dis­cover a bright yellow flower growing in the snow. Repetition and rhythm allow Krauss to seamlessly introduce five different species to the youngest listeners and readers.

Ruth Krauss’s intuitive ability as a writer to capture the free-spirited thought processes and language of young children ensures her books’ widespread acceptance and timeless appeal.

S.M.G.

Source: Children’s Books and their Creators, Anita Silvey.

Ruth Krauss Bibliography

Children’s Books

Poetry and verse plays

• There’s A Little Ambiguity Among the Bluebells and Other Theater Poems (1968)
• The Cantilever Rainbow, illus. Antonio Frasconi (1965)
• This Breast Gothic (1973)