When a Nobel-prizewinning novelist turns to illustrated fiction, it’s time to question assumptions
While anglophone fans await a translation of her 1,100-page magnum opus, the Nobel-prizewinning Polish novelist Olga Tokarczuk has a picture book out. She created her story, The Lost Soul, with artist Joanna Concejo. At 48 pages it is certainly slender compared with her epic historical novel, The Books of Jacob, which will be published in English in November. Concejo refuses the idea that the book might be any more suitable for children than adults – or vice versa.
It seems a quixotic move from Tokarczuk. And yet, from the unfurling visual narratives of Chinese handscrolls, to the jewel-bright stories contained in the stained-glass windows of medieval cathedrals, it is perfectly clear that there is intense pleasure and meaning to be gained from stories told through images. Those lucky enough to have had books to hand as children often remember, with fierce delight, the pictures at least as clearly as the words – classics such as Tove Jansson’s Moomin books, or Edward Ardizzone’s lively artworks for Stig of the Dump. And there are picture books proper, like The Tiger Who Came to Tea by the late, great Judith Kerr, that are recognised as much more profound than “mere” children’s books.
