George Selden (1929–1989)
Author of The Cricket in Times Square
About the Author
George Selden Thompson was born in Hartford, Connecticut on May 14, 1929. He graduated from Yale University in 1951 and studied in Rome for a year on a Fulbright Scholarship. During his lifetime, he wrote more than 15 children's books and 2 plays under the name George Selden. His first book, The show more Cricket in Times Square, was published in 1960. It won a John Newbery Medal in 1961 and was made into an animated film in 1973. His other works include Tucker's Countryside, The Old Meadow, and Harry Kitten and Tucker Mouse. He died from complications from a gastrointestinal hemorrhage on December 5, 1989 at the age of 60. (Bowker Author Biography) show less
Disambiguation Notice:
George Selden wrote The Story of Harold, an adult book, under the pseudonym Terry Andrews.
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Series
Works by George Selden
Associated Works
Tagged
Common Knowledge
- Canonical name
- Selden, George
- Legal name
- Thompson, George Selden
- Other names
- Andrews, Terry
- Birthdate
- 1929-05-14
- Date of death
- 1989-12-05
- Gender
- male
- Education
- Yale University (BA|1951)
Columbia University - Occupations
- writer
- Awards and honors
- Fulbright Fellowship (1951-1952)
Newbery Honor (1961) - Short biography
- [from George Selden Papers (University of Southern Mississippi Library) website]
George Selden Thompson, who wrote as George Selden, was born in Hartford, Connecticut in May 1929. He studied English and classical literature at Yale, won a Fulbright scholarship to Italy in 1950-1951, and spent an entire year on a grand tour of Europe. Selden always knew he wanted to be a writer, and upon his return to the United States tried his hand at writing plays. A friend at Viking suggested Selden try writing a children's book instead. Although his first book was not his best, it inspired Selden to write The Garden under the Sea (1957), later reprinted as Oscar Lobster's Fair Exchange. In this well-received book, animal characters use humor and witty dialogue to satirize human behavior. Selden used this same technique to write his most famous work, The Cricket in Times Square (1960), a story about a homesick cricket and his friends. The Cricket in Times Square became an instant favorite, was named a Newbery Honor Book in 1961, and earned a Lewis Carroll Shelf Award two years later. Selden eventually wrote several sequels to The Cricket in Times Square as well as many other fiction and nonfiction works for children and intermediate readers. He died in New York City in 1989. - Cause of death
- gastrointestinal hemorrhage
- Nationality
- USA
- Birthplace
- Hartford, Connecticut, USA
- Places of residence
- New York, New York, USA
- Place of death
- Greenwich Village, Manhattan, New York, New York, USA
- Map Location
- Connecticut, USA
- Disambiguation notice
- George Selden wrote The Story of Harold, an adult book, under the pseudonym Terry Andrews.
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Reviews
Chester Cricket has always lived in a Connecticut meadow, but his curiosity about a picnic basket results in his winding up in the Times Square subway station. This is where Mario Bellini, son of the owners of a struggling newsstand, finds Chester and takes him in. Tucker the mouse and Harry the cat also befriend Chester. Their adventures, disasters, and triumphs form the basis of a wonderful friendship.
This book is utterly delightful. It demonstrates the value of true friendship, loyalty, show more and compassion, and teaches us about responsibility and obligation to do the right thing. Chester’s story makes my heart sing, just as his playing affected the passersby in the subway. Garth Williams’s illustrations are perfectly detailed and a wonderful addition to the story. show less
This book is utterly delightful. It demonstrates the value of true friendship, loyalty, show more and compassion, and teaches us about responsibility and obligation to do the right thing. Chester’s story makes my heart sing, just as his playing affected the passersby in the subway. Garth Williams’s illustrations are perfectly detailed and a wonderful addition to the story. show less
The Cricket in Times Square: Revised and updated edition with foreword by Stacey Lee (Chester Cricket and His Friends, 1) by George Selden
Chester Cricket jumps into a picnic basket in his meadow in Connecticut and finds himself on a train to New York City - specifically, the Times Square subway station, where he meets Tucker Mouse and Harry Cat, and is adopted by Mario Bellini, whose family runs a newsstand. Mario ventures to Chinatown to find a cricket cage and learn what Chester likes to eat (mulberry leaves), and Chester wows the Bellinis and the subway crowds by giving concerts of songs he's heard on the radio. But show more Chester's concert schedule becomes exhausting, and he misses Connecticut, so Tucker and Harry help him come up with a plan to go home - and maybe to visit in the future. show less
Utterly charming. I was drawn back to this one by the news of a new edition that will update some of the more, well, racist aspects of the book. Despite doing a whole unit on this book in early elementary school, I didn't remember the Chinese characters at all. But I'm getting ahead of myself.
Tucker the mouse lives in the Times Square subway station, right across from a struggling newsstand near the Times Square-Union Station shuttle. Late one evening he hears a beautiful, strange show more sound...and so does Mario, the son of the Italian immigrants who own the newsstand. It's a cricket, whose love of liverwurst got him caught up in the basket of some New Yorkers picnicking in his meadow in Connecticut, and who is, like many out-of-towners, overwhelmed by the hustle and bustle of the city. Mario takes him in as a pet on his mother's condition that the dirty bug lives in the newsstand, not their home. That night, Tucker and his friend Harry the cat quickly befriend Chester Cricket.
The book contains a series of adventures before settling into something like a plot: Chester and his friends feast, venture topside to Times Square, and earn a little money to make up for some that they lose; meanwhile, Mario ventures down to Chinatown with Chester to buy him a little cage, and they end up befriending a pair of Chinese immigrants who share cricket lore, care tips, and a delicious meal. After a night when the animals' antics go a bit too far and cause big trouble for Mario's family, they discover that Chester has a talent for music that even humans can love. With the support of an enthusiastic, music-loving customer, word spreads, attracting appreciative audiences who give the newsstand a boost. But fame is a tricky thing, and Chester misses his meadow. In the end, he must make a difficult decision, and is friends and owner must learn to respect his choice and say goodbye.
Selden published The Cricket in Times Square in 1960, so the book is full of glimpses of a bygone city: Italian immigrants abandoning their culture, Chinese immigrants maintaining traditions, a young child allowed to work a late-night newsstand and take the subway downtown on his own in order to learn about and appreciate the new and different; a Times Square full of neon lights instead of digital displays, a subway still divided between companies, and lunch counters in the station instead of cheap souvenir shops and chain stores.
As for the Chinese men, I get the sense (the unfounded hope?) that this was a case where the intention may have been good but the handling and knowledge weren't. Writing out dialect really shouldn't be done by someone who doesn't speak it (though another reviewer points out some unexpected linguistic accuracies); emotions shouldn't be associated with physical characteristics ("The old Chinese man...looked slyly out of the corner of his eyes" [p 45]); cultural signs of respect shouldn't be turned into a joke; and, um, kimonos are Japanese clothing, not Chinese. Still, Mario's overall appreciation of what he learns from the Chinese men--how to care for a cricket, how to use chopsticks instead of asking for a fork, that real Chinese food is delicious rather than strange, that clothes and plates and cricket cages are different but beautiful--struck me as much more inclusive than I would expect from a book written in the '50s, rather than completely othering.
I saw complaints about Sao Feng's sudden switch from suspicion to childlike delight when he learns that Mario has a cricket, but that does seem to jibe with the heightened and childlike emotions displayed by other adult characters, such as Mario's mother's disgust and distrust of an insect, and the music professor's snobby skepticism turning into worshipful awe of Chester's musical talent. This exaggeration is something that I see in many children's books, and I don't think it's necessarily a bad thing, especially when characters who seem like caricatures at first develop more nuance later: Mario's mother gets teary when she hears an old Italian song and the professor shows up for all of Chester's performances. Look no further than Pixar's Inside Out for an illustration of how children feel big, simple emotions while developing more complex feelings, demonstrated by Mario's understanding and acceptance of Chester's ultimate decision. (If anything, Mario's mother's histrionics compared to her young son's level-headedness could be seen as sexist without other high-emotion (male) characters to keep her company.)
This review focuses on the humans because that's what gets the most attention in criticism these days, but the stars of the story are clearly Chester Cricket, Tucker Mouse, and Harry the Cat, three unlikely friends who support each other even when baffled by their preferences, who discuss difficult decisions and mistakes and then help each other follow through on resolutions and amends-making. Their oddball but genuine friendship is what truly gives this book its staying power.
The Cricket in Times Square is endearing, and there is an undercurrent of good feeling and themes of learning about and respecting strangers and people who are different from yourself. I'm hopeful that the forthcoming revised and updated edition will preserve these elements and enhance the charm by revising the parts that we now recognize as less than charming. Hopefully this will allow a new generation of children to love Chester, Tucker, Harry, and Mario, and enjoy their adventures without feeling belittled by or internalizing harmful stereotypes.
Quotes
p. 6) Now Tucker Mouse had heard almost all the sounds that can be heard in New York City. He had heard the rumble of the subway trains and the shriek their iron wheels make when they go around a corner. From above, through the iron grills that open onto the streets, he had heard the thrumming of the rubber tires of automobiles, and the hooting of their horns, and the howling of their brakes. And he had heard the babble of voices when the station was full of human beings, and the barking of the dogs that some of them had on leashes. Birds, the pigeons of New York, and cats, and even the high purring of airplanes above the city Tucker had heard. But in all his days, and on all his journeys through the greatest city in the world, Tucker had never heard a sound quite like this one.
p. 8) Mario heard the sound too. . . . If a leaf in a green forest far from New York had fallen at midnight through the darkness into a thicket, it might have sounded like that.
p. 102) Just as I wondered about whether the Chinese was accurate, I wondered whether the Italian was as well. Still, this scene where Chester softens Mama Bellini's hard heart by playing, at Tucker's encouragement, a song that turns out to be her favorite, with an accompanying description of her memories of young love in Italy, was heartwarming.
Disclaimer: While I work for the parent company of the imprint that publishes this book (now--I read an edition published by Dell/Yearling), my opinions are entirely my own and do not reflect those of the publisher. show less
Tucker the mouse lives in the Times Square subway station, right across from a struggling newsstand near the Times Square-Union Station shuttle. Late one evening he hears a beautiful, strange show more sound...and so does Mario, the son of the Italian immigrants who own the newsstand. It's a cricket, whose love of liverwurst got him caught up in the basket of some New Yorkers picnicking in his meadow in Connecticut, and who is, like many out-of-towners, overwhelmed by the hustle and bustle of the city. Mario takes him in as a pet on his mother's condition that the dirty bug lives in the newsstand, not their home. That night, Tucker and his friend Harry the cat quickly befriend Chester Cricket.
The book contains a series of adventures before settling into something like a plot:
Selden published The Cricket in Times Square in 1960, so the book is full of glimpses of a bygone city: Italian immigrants abandoning their culture, Chinese immigrants maintaining traditions, a young child allowed to work a late-night newsstand and take the subway downtown on his own in order to learn about and appreciate the new and different; a Times Square full of neon lights instead of digital displays, a subway still divided between companies, and lunch counters in the station instead of cheap souvenir shops and chain stores.
As for the Chinese men, I get the sense (the unfounded hope?) that this was a case where the intention may have been good but the handling and knowledge weren't. Writing out dialect really shouldn't be done by someone who doesn't speak it (though another reviewer points out some unexpected linguistic accuracies); emotions shouldn't be associated with physical characteristics ("The old Chinese man...looked slyly out of the corner of his eyes" [p 45]); cultural signs of respect shouldn't be turned into a joke; and, um, kimonos are Japanese clothing, not Chinese. Still, Mario's overall appreciation of what he learns from the Chinese men--how to care for a cricket, how to use chopsticks instead of asking for a fork, that real Chinese food is delicious rather than strange, that clothes and plates and cricket cages are different but beautiful--struck me as much more inclusive than I would expect from a book written in the '50s, rather than completely othering.
I saw complaints about Sao Feng's sudden switch from suspicion to childlike delight when he learns that Mario has a cricket, but that does seem to jibe with the heightened and childlike emotions displayed by other adult characters, such as Mario's mother's disgust and distrust of an insect, and the music professor's snobby skepticism turning into worshipful awe of Chester's musical talent. This exaggeration is something that I see in many children's books, and I don't think it's necessarily a bad thing, especially when characters who seem like caricatures at first develop more nuance later: Mario's mother gets teary when she hears an old Italian song and the professor shows up for all of Chester's performances. Look no further than Pixar's Inside Out for an illustration of how children feel big, simple emotions while developing more complex feelings, demonstrated by Mario's understanding and acceptance of Chester's ultimate decision. (If anything, Mario's mother's histrionics compared to her young son's level-headedness could be seen as sexist without other high-emotion (male) characters to keep her company.)
This review focuses on the humans because that's what gets the most attention in criticism these days, but the stars of the story are clearly Chester Cricket, Tucker Mouse, and Harry the Cat, three unlikely friends who support each other even when baffled by their preferences, who discuss difficult decisions and mistakes and then help each other follow through on resolutions and amends-making. Their oddball but genuine friendship is what truly gives this book its staying power.
The Cricket in Times Square is endearing, and there is an undercurrent of good feeling and themes of learning about and respecting strangers and people who are different from yourself. I'm hopeful that the forthcoming revised and updated edition will preserve these elements and enhance the charm by revising the parts that we now recognize as less than charming. Hopefully this will allow a new generation of children to love Chester, Tucker, Harry, and Mario, and enjoy their adventures without feeling belittled by or internalizing harmful stereotypes.
Quotes
p. 6) Now Tucker Mouse had heard almost all the sounds that can be heard in New York City. He had heard the rumble of the subway trains and the shriek their iron wheels make when they go around a corner. From above, through the iron grills that open onto the streets, he had heard the thrumming of the rubber tires of automobiles, and the hooting of their horns, and the howling of their brakes. And he had heard the babble of voices when the station was full of human beings, and the barking of the dogs that some of them had on leashes. Birds, the pigeons of New York, and cats, and even the high purring of airplanes above the city Tucker had heard. But in all his days, and on all his journeys through the greatest city in the world, Tucker had never heard a sound quite like this one.
p. 8) Mario heard the sound too. . . . If a leaf in a green forest far from New York had fallen at midnight through the darkness into a thicket, it might have sounded like that.
p. 102) Just as I wondered about whether the Chinese was accurate, I wondered whether the Italian was as well. Still, this scene where Chester softens Mama Bellini's hard heart by playing, at Tucker's encouragement, a song that turns out to be her favorite, with an accompanying description of her memories of young love in Italy, was heartwarming.
Disclaimer: While I work for the parent company of the imprint that publishes this book (now--I read an edition published by Dell/Yearling), my opinions are entirely my own and do not reflect those of the publisher. show less
Chester Cricket, a native of Connecticut, gets stuck in a picnic basket and is eventually found and taken in by a young boy, Mario, whose parents own a newstand in the subway. Chester is befriended by two other denizens of the subway station, Tucker Mouse and Harry Cat.
Lots of depth can be found in this small book about Chester Cricket and his summer spent in the Times Square subway station. I particularly like that Tucker Mouse is left to be a less than perfect character. He never learns a show more "lesson" that changes him into a paragon; he remains a real, fully-fleshed out character with plenty of faults. I also found the exploration of the effects fame can have on a performer to be quite interesting, particularly in light of the current fishbowl climate celebrities live in.
Listened to the Recorded Books Playaway narrated by Barbara Caruso. The depiction of the Chinese man Mario goes to see for cricket advice made me uncomfortable, but I wonder if the accent was an audio production decision or written into the book. If it was written into the book, I think it would make me less uncomfortable because the book was written in the early 1960s before political awareness was as common. If it was an audio production decision or Barbara Caruso's choice, I'd find that less acceptable since the audio was produced in 1994. Maybe it shouldn't bother me at all, but it just seemed to be in slightly poor taste. I also would love to hear an audio production that incorporated some of the classical music mentioned within the story. What a great way that would be to introduce that music to children and to deepen the impact of the story. I believe my parents read this aloud to us as children, but I didn't remember it at all so maybe I'm wrong. show less
Lots of depth can be found in this small book about Chester Cricket and his summer spent in the Times Square subway station. I particularly like that Tucker Mouse is left to be a less than perfect character. He never learns a show more "lesson" that changes him into a paragon; he remains a real, fully-fleshed out character with plenty of faults. I also found the exploration of the effects fame can have on a performer to be quite interesting, particularly in light of the current fishbowl climate celebrities live in.
Listened to the Recorded Books Playaway narrated by Barbara Caruso. The depiction of the Chinese man Mario goes to see for cricket advice made me uncomfortable, but I wonder if the accent was an audio production decision or written into the book. If it was written into the book, I think it would make me less uncomfortable because the book was written in the early 1960s before political awareness was as common. If it was an audio production decision or Barbara Caruso's choice, I'd find that less acceptable since the audio was produced in 1994. Maybe it shouldn't bother me at all, but it just seemed to be in slightly poor taste. I also would love to hear an audio production that incorporated some of the classical music mentioned within the story. What a great way that would be to introduce that music to children and to deepen the impact of the story. I believe my parents read this aloud to us as children, but I didn't remember it at all so maybe I'm wrong. show less
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