Lon Po Po: A Red Riding Hood Story from China

Young, E. (1989). Lon Po Po: a red riding hood story from China. New York: Philomel Books.

The Caldecott Award Winning story of Lon Po Po is the Chinese version of Little Red Riding Hood. There are many things that are the same but there are some variations to the story.  A mother and her three children live in the country, and the mother is going out to visit their grandmother, Po Po, for her birthday.  Their mother told the children to make sure to shut the door tight when the sunset.  There was a wolf in the nearby forest that saw the mother leave.  The wolf dressed up like their grandmother, knocked on the door and was persistent to get in.  At first they questioned the wolf multiple times before they grew with a too much excitement, so they opened the door.  The wolf walked in and made himself at home and blew out the candle.  It wasn’t until it was time for bed did they realize that their Po Po was not their Po Po, that it was a wolf.  The oldest girl convinced the wolf that he needed to eat gingko nuts from the top of the tree outside to live healthy and forever.  The girls hurried up to the top of the tree to escape the wolf. 

This week’s book selection was a book from the multicultural genre.  Lon Po Po is a multicultural picture book that is a Chinese version of Little Red Riding Hood, written, translated, and illustrated all by Ed Young.  As cultures are different, there are still many ways to tie everyone together.  This progressive plot gives an introduction to how the children are left alone; the conflict is introduced and developed with a climax of the children realizing what they had just let into their house.  The resolution is then figured out by the oldest of girls and before you know it they are back in bed safely asleep.  The writing style of this story is very similar to the folktale Little Red Riding Hood, how the story reads and flows without having to back track to make sure that you have not missed anything.  The use of pastels, or chalk, in this book is a first for me.  Out of the children’s books that I have read, I have not seen illustrators use chalk.  I noticed the use of media on the wolf to give him good texture.  The texture of the wolf gives his fur a coarse feel and makes the reader see that he is a wolf and not just a dog or a pet.  The use of color, although bright, makes the entire story realistic and adds characterization to each character.

“My little jewels,” said the wolf, “this is your grandmother, your Po Po.”  This quote is just like the wolf who tries to disguise himself as Little Red Riding Hood’s grandmother when lying in her bed.  When reading these books, it takes me back to my childhood living in the country.  I lived in a place where the moon lit the area and when knocking noises happened, it seemed like someone was knocking on the door and most of the time it was a branch falling or hitting the house/roof.  We, my sisters and I, would sometimes let our imaginations run wild, like what if something were trying to fool us to letting them in for a midnight snack, which in the morning always made us laugh.  The imaginations of young children can always cook up something fun!

Big Question:  If you were in the same situation as these children after have letting the wolf in, what would your solution be to get him out of your house?  As the oldest, what would you do to protect your siblings for harm?