Many parents and children are familiar with the Dreamworks movie Shrek. Less people realize that the movie was based on a picture book titled Shrek! authored by William Steig and published in 1993. The book begins with this hilarious sentence, “His mother was ugly and his father was ugly, but Shrek was uglier”.
The book is different than the movie, and the illustration don’t really match the movie characters that we are familiar with. This is such a fun book, but it takes a little while to get used to the differences.
Shrek is an ogre. Everywhere he goes trees and flowers bend out of hs way. Every living creature flees out of his way. He even gobbles lightning. In the story, Shrek meets a witch who tells him to find a donkey and that he will meet a princess even uglier than he. Shrek has a bad dream where children hug and kiss him in a field of flowers and warbling birds. He sets off, meets that donkey, beats a dragon, and finds himself in a castle. Inside the castle is a hall of mirrors. Shrek is appalled to find himself surrounded by hundreds of hideous creatures until he realizes the creatures are him, then he preens.
When Shrek sees the princess, they are captivated by the ugliness of each other. They whisper such endearments as “Your nose is so hairy”. At the end “they lived horribly ever after: scaring the socks off all who feel afoul of them”.
Shrek! is a fun, silly book. Kids love how Shrek’s world is so different – that ugly is good, and that they live “horribly ever after”. My only caution is that Shrek does call the donkey a “jackass”. The book also contains a lot of good vocabulary words like blithe, irascible, noggin, stagnant, and putrid. I think it’s great to find such long words in a children’s book.
Also See:
C D B! and C D C? – William Steig
Top 10 Picture and Read-aloud Books for Ages 5 to 7