posted on 07 Jun 2017

The Boy In The Striped Pyjamas by John Boyne, illustrated by Oliver Jeffers

Sometimes a book touches such a chord with readers that it breaks free from its author and goes off to have a life of its own. There seems no stopping it and it finds a host of different ways to make itself known to ever expanding audiences by transmuting into a whole range of different formats. This is essentially what has happened to John Boyne’s The Boy In The Striped Pyjamas, the war time story of two boys, Bruno and Shmuel, who literally find themselves on different sides of the fence.

The book was a runaway success when it was first published in 2006 and it has since been made into a movie, a stage play and, most recently, a ballet. Now we also have the special 10th anniversary deluxe, illustrated edition to add to the roster.

I’m not sure that Oliver Jeffers would have been on a list of illustrators that I would have drawn up to illustrate a book like this. Jeffers is a great, original talent but I have to say that his style doesn’t immediately seem to lend itself to the illustration of a book of this kind – it always seemed to me Jeffers strength lay in the whimsical and almost ethereal nature of his drawings. But, of course, I have been proved entirely wrong because this lovely book is an absolute triumph.

I should say that from top to toe this book is a beautiful thing. The choice of paper, the print font, the binding and the book boards are all superbly selected – it’s an exemplar of the book designers art. What Jeffers adds however is a brand new dimension to the book.

The starting point has to be the sensational jacket. Dark inky blues grade into looming, ominous blacks as two small boys stand hand-in-hand in front of a monstrous, towering Nazi prison guard , featureless bar from the red, glowering eyes watching their every move. The slash of colour is provided by the red and white of the prison guard’s swastika armband. The jacket is a genuine classic, a masterpiece of design and illustration and it sets the tone exactly for what’s to come in the book itself.

Inside Jeffers uses his deceptively casual and simple pen and ink style to maximum effect. The disarming openness and simplicity of the way the boys are drawn can’t help but conjure echoes of E.H. Shepard’s drawings for Christopher Robin in the Pooh books. The drawings work by contrasting the naïve innocence of the children with the terrible, mechanical inhumanity of the Nazis. Jeffers depiction of the prison guards and the soldiers reminded in an odd way of the way Ted Hughes’s Iron Man is most often drawn – emotionless and unnerving. His Chaplinesque depiction of Hitler is superb - seemingly cartoonishly flanked by a Jessica Rabbit-like floosie - and made morally sinister by Jeffer's decision to give him no eyes, thereby depriving him of his humanity.

There are a generous number of illustrations too – some of them are double page spreads and Jeffers rarely gives his drawings hard boundaries, allowing the white space to almost spread across the page like a pool that’s been deliberately created.

The book is a must have for anyone who loves beautiful books and as a work of art in its own right it really isn’t too expensive. A copy will cost you about £15  ( five or six cups of coffee in your local Costa/Starbucks*) and in my world that’s a real bargain.

 

Terry Potter

June 2017

 

*Other coffee shops are available