The Adventures of the Dish and the Spoon is a children's picture book written and illustrated by Mini Grey, published by Jonathan Cape in 2006. It won the annual Kate Greenaway Medal from the professional librarians, recognising the year's best-illustrated children's book published in the U.K. It was also bronze runner up for the Nestlé Smarties Book Prize in ages category 6–8 years.>
The title alludes to "Hey Diddle Diddle", an English nursery rhyme whose last line is "And the Dish ran away with the Spoon". According to the British librarians, the story shows "what happens next in the astonishing tale of the dazzling Dish and Spoon duo, after they run away together". According to the U.S. national library summary, they "become vaudeville stars before turning to a life of crime."
The Adventure "falls neatly into the currently popular slot of post-modernist retellings", according to Julia Eccleshare, children's books editor for The Guardian newspaper. Commenting on the 2007 CILIP awards, she concluded, "Filmic in feel, and full of cinematic references, it unfolds beautifully with loads of visual jokes for children and adults alike."
In the U.S., it was published within the calendar year by the Random House imprint Alfred A. Knopf. It was adapted as a musical by Bert Bernardi (writer and lyricist) and Scott Simonelli (composer) and staged in 2009 at the Downtown Cabaret Children's Theatre in Bridgeport, Connecticut.
Read more about The Adventures Of The Dish And The Spoon: See Also
Famous quotes containing the words adventures, dish and/or spoon:
“A large volume of adventures may be grasped within this little span of life, by him who interests his heart in everything.”
—Laurence Sterne (1713–1768)
“Hey, diddle, diddle,
The cat and the fiddle,
The cow jumped over the moon;
The little dog laughed
To see such sport,
And the dish ran away with the spoon.”
—Mother Goose (fl. 17th–18th century. Hey, diddle, diddle (l. 1–6)
“by Spoon Rivergathering many a shell,
And many a flower and medicinal weed—
Shouting to the wooded hills, singing to the green valleys.
At ninety-six I had lived enough, that is all,
And passed to a sweet repose.”
—Edgar Lee Masters (1869–1950)