The Shoe Bird

The Shoe Bird is a 1964 children's novel by Southern writer Eudora Welty. The novel tells the story of a parrot in a shoe store, as he talks to other birds about shoes.[1] Welty, who had never written any children's literature before, wrote it to satisfy a contractual obligation with her publisher Harcourt Brace and to pay for a new roof on her house.[2]

First edition (publ. Harcourt Brace)
Cover art by Beth Krush

An orchestral ballet was composed by Lehman Engel and performed by the Jackson Ballet Guild in 1968.[2] A 2002 choral piece was also commissioned by the Mississippi Boy Choir and composed by composer Samuel Jones.[3]

Reception

Reception of the novel was mixed, with critic Nancy Hardgrove calling most reviews in major publications "cordial but restrained".[4] However, reception amongst children's literature commentators was largely negative.[2] Kirkus Reviews described the novel as uneventful: "Practically no action occurs during the lengthy discussion, which consists almost entirely of a stream of witticisms, many of which are irrelevant."[1] The review concludes wryly "the overly wordy result is so obscure that readers are likely to want to leave dictionaries as well as shoes to the birds."[1]

References
  1. "THE SHOE BIRD by Eudora Welty". Kirkus Reviews. Retrieved 2016-04-14.
  2. Ann Waldron (22 December 2010). Eudora Welty: A Writer's Life. Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group. p. 269. ISBN 978-0-307-77388-3.
  3. "EUDORA'S FABLE: THE SHOE BIRD". Samuel Jones – Composer. Retrieved April 13, 2016.
  4. Hargrove, Nancy D. (1992-06-01). "Humor in Eudora Welty'sThe Shoe Bird". Children's Literature in Education. 23 (2): 75–82. doi:10.1007/BF01141844. ISSN 0045-6713.


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