85. Pat the Bunny

Pat the Bunny. Dorothy Kunhardt. 1940. 18 pages. [Source: Library]

First sentence: Here are Paul and Judy. They can do lots of things. You can do lots of things, too.

Premise/plot: Pat the Bunny is an interactive book for very young children. It was originally released in 1940. I don't know how many other books for VERY young children existed at the time. (Certainly not as many as there are in recent decades). But this is one of the books from 1940 that has lived on, if you will, from its original publication and become somewhat iconic. (Though perhaps less so these days? I know it was iconic in my own childhood.)

Judy and Paul do "lots" of things. "Judy can pat the bunny. Now YOU pat the bunny." Judy can play peek-a-boo with Paul. Now YOU play peek-a-boo with Paul. Paul can smell the flowers. Now YOU smell the flowers."

My thoughts: Pat the Bunny is one of the books I remember my mom reading to me. I could NOT find my own copy--perhaps long destroyed????--for the purposes of review. Though it has been decades since I last read Pat the Bunny, I remembered more than half the activities. I think, for some generations at least, this book is iconic. I'm not sure it is *still* iconic for the past few generations. Is this still being bought and read today? Has it been replaced with other board books, other interactive books in the past fifteen to twenty years? Perhaps. I don't know. I know that Guess How Much I Love You and Love You Forever are certainly become icons. Goodnight Moon--an older title--is still an ever-present icon. 

This one is a spiral bound interactive, "activity" book. I haven't heard any outlandish stories about it being canceled, but, honestly it wouldn't shock me if there was someone out there somehow, somewhere who could find reasons to take offense at this one.

 

© 2023 Becky Laney of Young Readers