East of the Sun & West of the Moon is a retelling of a Norwegian fairy-tale, slightly in the vain of a combination of The Frog Prince and the Psyche/Eros myth.
It tells the tale of a farmer’s daughter whose father marries her off to a bear, a fact she isn’t very happy about. Her husband tells her that he will only come to bed after dark, and she is never to light a candle so as to gaze upon him. Quickly breaking that, she discovers her husband is actually a handsome prince who had been cursed by trolls. Of course her not listening causes the curse to not be broken, and her husband to be carried off to the trolls who had previously cursed him. Not wanting to give up her husband, and wanting to rectify her mistake, the young woman travels to the troll’s keep, which lies so far away that it is East of the Sun and West of the Moon. Along the way, she must rely on the help of several fantastic creatures.
Seeing as this is a rewrite for children, Mercer Mayer changed the bear in the original to a frog; I don’t know why other than to connect it to The Frog Prince. He says the decision was made as frogs are less scary than bears and children shouldn’t be frightened, but really? Children understand fantasy vs. reality better than adults think (Terry Pratchett in Hogfather has a very true bit about how far you should sit from children while at the playground) and trolls in this book are certainly creepier looking than any bear would be. And as an adult I am a little more wigged out over the thought of a frog wanting to marry a woman than a bear; then again, the bear in question is supposed to be a polar bear, and I think they’re gorgeous animals.
The artwork is very strongly drawn; we are talking extremely definitive line work. Which makes the characters attractive but not pretty, and every illustration seem to be almost 3D. Mayer (who both wrote and illustrated the book), embodies his drawings with both life and character; you can read the emotions the characters are experiencing on their faces.
(Tell me this troll is not more disturbing to children than a bear would be?)
Out of all the fairy-tales Mercer Mayer did renditions of (this, Sleeping Beauty, Beauty & The Beast, Favorite Tales From Grimm) this has to be my absolute favorite. I lost my original copy (the joy of having a father that decided that “children’s books are for children, not adults who like the artwork”), and had to track down a new one as soon as possible. It’s a must in my collection of “children’s books for nostalgia/for the artwork alone”.
(And if the name of Mercer Mayer sounds slightly familiar? He also wrote and illustrated the “Little Monster” book collection. I didn’t realize that until I went looking for another copy of this book, which is funny as my mother bought me several Little Monster books growing up.)