The Bull Calf, and Other Tales.

by A.B. Frost

Arthur Burdett Frost was an early American illustrator, graphic artist and comics writer. He was well known as a painter. Frost's work is well known for its dynamic representation of motion and sequence. Frost is considered one of the great illustrators in the "Golden Age of American Illustration". He illustrated over ninety books and produced hundreds of paintings; in addition to his realistic hunting and shooting prints.

154 pages, Paperback

Published January 1, 1969

About the author

Arthur Burdett Frost was an early American illustrator, graphic artist and comics writer. He was also well known as a painter. Frost's work is well known for its dynamic representation of motion and sequence. Frost is considered one of the great illustrators in the "Golden Age of American Illustration". Frost illustrated over 90 books and produced hundreds of paintings; in addition to his work in illustrations, he is renowned for realistic hunting and shooting prints.

Reviews

[Debbie Zapata · Rating 3 out of 5]

Another author I had never heard of, and another that surprised me when I looked him up at Wiki. According to them Frost was an illustrator, painter, and cartoonist who was the first to develop the style which later turned into comic strips. This book, published in 1892, is the only title under his name at Gutenberg that is both written and illustrated by Frost himself. The other titles on his author page are there because he illustrated works of many other writers, including Lewis Carroll.

This is a collection of ten stories, each made up of line drawings with captions, but some are pure pictures, no words at all, and none are needed. Frost had a great ability to show a story, and I was tickled by nearly all of the selections here.

I think my two favorites were Antonio and Jeremiah, an inharmonious tale and 'Twas A Poem About Gentle Spring. The first is one that has no words, just six panels telling the story: 1. We see a man and his dancing bear sleeping by the side of the road, and around the corner comes another man on a horse. 2. The man and bear are up, with the man turning the handle of his hurdy-gurdy and holding out his hat for donations, the bear standing in the middle of the road, and the horse sitting down in surprise. 3. The horse begins to buck, and the man and bear are watching curiously. 4. The horse is seen running away, but the rider is coming towards the man and bear. He is very, very angry! 5. The horse rider has hold of the man and is hitting him, and the bear is laughing. 6. The horse rider walks back along the road the way his horse went, the man goes in the opposite direction obviously complaining about his bad luck, and the bear is walking on two legs behind him with one paw over his face to cover his giggles. Or maybe he is shocked at the language he must be hearing from the man?

The other favorite takes place in the office of the editor of a weekly newspaper. We see a typically cluttered desk, with bookcases behind it, and bust of Someone on the top shelf. The editor is in a terrible mood, complaining about his problems, when he hears a knock in the door and yells 'Come in!' There is a little man in a floor length coat, but somehow the poem he offers to the editor just is too much to deal with and the editor leaps at him in fury. But the little man holds him off, and does all sorts of acrobatic tricks with him while he takes off his coat and tries to explain who he is and why he showed up at the office. He eventually tells his complete story and asks to be allowed to do odd jobs around the office, but the editor is still in a bad mood and sends him away. In the last panel the editor has added a railing in between the door and his desk, and is armed with a gun, just in case anyone else wants to come in and toss him around in the air like the little man did. But what gave me the most giggles in this story was the bust of Whoever on the bookcase. In the first panel its face is sad, like the editor's. Then it smiles when the little man comes in, and goes from surprised to amazed to shocked as the tossing around happens. And in the last panel the poor bust is turned with its face to the wall. I guess the editor doesn't want any witnesses to whatever should happen the next time someone knocks on his door!

The stories I did not care for portrayed country black men in the stereotypical style of Frost's day, but luckily this happened in just a couple of the tales. Overall I enjoyed the book, and the detailed drawings which told their stories so much better than I did here. Oh, and in between each chapter were various cute little sketches that puzzled me at first, until I realized they must have been just to fill space. My favorite of these was the kangaroo playing a violin for the dancing camel.

[Jane · Rating 5 out of 5]

A.B. Frost could draw like an angel - but happily, he liked down-to-earth subject matters. His black and white illustrations (he was color blind) have such life and movement! His animals in particular:
cows; dogs; cats; birds, all will make you smile.

[Ellen Angus · Rating 5 out of 5]

I loved the book; It's old and a part of history.
It can be red from the online Gutenberg site. Check out Gutenberg dot org.