Peter Sís
Author of The Wall: Growing Up Behind the Iron Curtain
About the Author
Peter Sis was born in Brno, Czechoslovakia, in 1949 and attended the Academy of Applied Arts in Prague and the Royal College of Art in London. He began his career as a filmmaker and won the Golden Bear Award at the 1980 West Berlin Film Festival for an animated short. He has also won the Grand Prix show more Toronto and the Cine Golden Eagle Award, and in 1983 collaborated with Bob Dylan on You Got to Serve Somebody. His film work is in the permanent collection of the Museum of Modern Art, New York. In 1982 Sis was sent to Los Angeles to produce a film for the 1984 Winter Olympics. But the film project was canceled when Czechoslovakia and the entire Eastern bloc decided to boycott the Olympics. Ordered by his government to return home, Sis decided to stay in the United States and was granted asylum. Sis then met Maurice Sendak who introduced him to children's books, and he moved to New York City in 1984 to begin a career in children's literature. Sís earned quick acclaim with the publication of the 1986 Newbery Medal Winner, The Whipping Boy by Sid Fleishman, for which he did the illustrations. Sis is a five-time winner of The New York Times Book Review Best Illustrated Book of the Year.. Komodo! and A Small Tall Tale from the Far Far North were each named a Boston Globe-Horn Book Award Honor Book, and he has won a Society of Illustrators Gold Medal for Komodo! and a Silver Medal for The Three Golden Keys. Starry Messenger: Galileo Galilei was a 1997 Caldecott Honor Book, as was Tibet Through the Red Box. Sis has also received a MacArthur Fellowship Sis' editorial illustrations have appeared in Time, Newsweek, Esquire, The Atlantic Monthly, and many other magazines in the United States and abroad. He has published nearly 1,000 drawings in The New York Times Book Review. He has designed many book jackets and posters, including, in 1984, the famous poster for Milos Forman's Academy Award-winning motion picture Amadeus. He has also completed a mural for the Washington/Baltimore Airport, a poster for the New York City subway system, and a stage set for the Joffrey Ballet. His work has been exhibited in Prague, London, Zurich, Hamburg, Los Angeles, and New York in both group and one-man shows. (Bowker Author Biography) show less
Works by Peter Sís
Nicky & Vera: A Quiet Hero of the Holocaust and the Children He Rescued (2021) 169 copies, 10 reviews
Associated Works
Rats: Observations on the History and Habitat of the City's Most Unwanted Inhabitants (2004) — Cover artist — 1,345 copies, 47 reviews
The Wicked, Wicked Ladies in the Haunted House (1968) — Illustrator, some editions — 346 copies, 11 reviews
A Collection of Rudyard Kipling's Just So Stories (2004) — Illustrator, some editions — 283 copies, 3 reviews
The Art of Reading: Forty Illustrators Celebrate RIF's 40th Anniversary (2005) — Contributor — 273 copies, 3 reviews
Tagged
Common Knowledge
- Canonical name
- Sís, Peter
- Legal name
- Sís, Peter
- Birthdate
- 1949-05-11
- Gender
- male
- Education
- Royal College of Art
- Occupations
- writer
illustrator
filmmaker - Awards and honors
- Golden Bear Award (1980 West Berlin Film Festival)
Grand Prix Toronto
Cine Golden Eagle Award
MacArthur Fellowship (2003)
May Hill Arbuthnot Lecturer (2011)
Hans Christian Andersen Award (2012) - Short biography
- Peter Sís is an internationally acclaimed illustrator, author, and filmmaker. Born in Brno, Czechoslovakia in 1949, he began his film career by winning the Golden Bear Award at the 1980 West Berlin Film Festival for an animated short. His film work is now in the permanent collection of the Museum of Modern Art in New York. He turned to publishing in 1984 and quickly became one of the leading artists in the field. With more than twenty books to his credit and almost as many honors, Peter is a seven-time winner of The New York Times Book Review Best Illustrated Book of the Year. Most recently, in 2007, he published The Wall: Growing up Behind the Iron Curtain, which was awarded the Robert F. Sibert Medal and was also named a Caldecott Honor Book. Peter Sís was named a MacArthur Fellow in 2003. He lives in the New York City area with his wife and children.
- Nationality
- USA
Czechoslovakia (birth) - Birthplace
- Brno, Czech Republic
- Places of residence
- Brno, Czech Republic (birth)
Prague, Czech Republic
London, Middlesex, England, UK
New York, New York, USA - Map Location
- USA
Members
Reviews
In this picture book, the author blends a true story from his childhood with adventures from the 1719 novel Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe. The Defoe book, though fiction, purports to be the autobiography of the title character, who is in a shipwreck and then spends 28 years on a remote tropical desert island before he is rescued. During those years, he battles all sorts of dangers, and learns how to survive on his own.
Sís explains in an Author’s Note that Robinson Crusoe was one of his show more favorite books as a child. He even won a school costume contest dressed as Robinson Crusoe, but was disheartened when his friends made fun of him, even though they generally played pirate games.
And then he became sick. He reports:
“I was running a fever and stayed in bed for days. Did I really travel to Crusoe’s ‘Island of Despair’? Whatever happened in those lonely days of my shipwreck, it made me stronger. In my solitude, I became master of my own island. And I believed in myself again. So when my friends came to visit, I was able to forgive and forget and move on. They all wanted to hear stories of Robinson Crusoe. And we may have even read the book together.”
This book tells the story of the costume contest, his subsequent illness, and his fevered dreams of being marooned on an island. Very cleverly, his bed turns into a boat in stages, with the intermediate stage having an open book for masts.
The author, who is also the illustrator, manipulates his palette to change mood as well as setting. He even varies his artistic style from spread to spread, with many pages showing only a minimum of text, in marked contrast to his previous works. But each two-page spread is packed with meaning nevertheless, whether from lushly-colored landscapes or pastel floral fantasies.
Evaluation: Peter Sís is one of a small set of wonderful authors for children who can be appreciated on an entirely different level by adults, with neither audience feeling shortchanged. Children will spend hours pouring over the pictures, which may even inspire them to check out the story of Robinson Crusoe for themselves. show less
Sís explains in an Author’s Note that Robinson Crusoe was one of his show more favorite books as a child. He even won a school costume contest dressed as Robinson Crusoe, but was disheartened when his friends made fun of him, even though they generally played pirate games.
And then he became sick. He reports:
“I was running a fever and stayed in bed for days. Did I really travel to Crusoe’s ‘Island of Despair’? Whatever happened in those lonely days of my shipwreck, it made me stronger. In my solitude, I became master of my own island. And I believed in myself again. So when my friends came to visit, I was able to forgive and forget and move on. They all wanted to hear stories of Robinson Crusoe. And we may have even read the book together.”
This book tells the story of the costume contest, his subsequent illness, and his fevered dreams of being marooned on an island. Very cleverly, his bed turns into a boat in stages, with the intermediate stage having an open book for masts.
The author, who is also the illustrator, manipulates his palette to change mood as well as setting. He even varies his artistic style from spread to spread, with many pages showing only a minimum of text, in marked contrast to his previous works. But each two-page spread is packed with meaning nevertheless, whether from lushly-colored landscapes or pastel floral fantasies.
Evaluation: Peter Sís is one of a small set of wonderful authors for children who can be appreciated on an entirely different level by adults, with neither audience feeling shortchanged. Children will spend hours pouring over the pictures, which may even inspire them to check out the story of Robinson Crusoe for themselves. show less
Peter Sis delves into childhood memories and his father's diary to create a book for young readers filled quite literally with wonder and magic. As a child, Sis' father disappeared to Tibet for many months, and returned with secrets that took years to gradually divulge to his son. Less a travelogue and more an exploration of our shared inner psychologies and myths, Tibet transports and transforms.
Celebrated Czech-American artist Peter Sís, who was awarded the Hans Christian Andersen Medal in 2012 for his "lasting contribution" to the world of children's literature, turns in this beautiful picture-book to the story of Christopher Columbus. Inspired by the voyage of Marco Polo centuries before, Columbus dreamed of sailing west in order to find new routes to the Indies and the Orient. He clung to this dream despite years of refusal from the various European monarchs whom he approached show more for support, and refused to give up, even when he was seemingly the only person who believed it was possible to find land by sailing west. Eventually, he gained the support he needed, sailing west in 1492, thereby making history and setting in motion events that would radically change the world...
Today, as I write this review of Follow the Dream: The Story of Christopher Columbus, it is Columbus Day, marking the 528th year since modern contact was made between the peoples of Europe and those of the Americas. It is a holiday that has become controversial of late, dividing opinion between those who feel we should not celebrate the day, given the disastrous consequences that first contact had for the native peoples of this hemisphere, and those who believe that, however flawed the man, he did achieve something unprecedented in human history, and laid the groundwork for the modern world we know today. Some cities have replaced Columbus Day with an 'Indigenous Peoples' Day,' while other communities continue to honor the great explorer. Complicating the matter is the fact that Columbus Day has become intertwined with Italian-American identity in many quarters, and is one of the few moments in the national calendar when this community is honored and remembered. For my part, I have little sympathy with the cultural and historical vandalism currently consuming the (so-called) left, but also have no interest in whitewashing history. I tend to believe that historical achievements should be remembered and honored, even when those who achieved them were far from perfect, recalling that old phrase that "we see further than our ancestors because we stand on their shoulders." With that in mind, and given my all-consuming interest in children's literature, I decided to read and review a number of different picture-book biographies of Christopher Columbus, as a means of marking the day. The titles I chose include David A. Adler's A Picture Book of Christopher Columbus (1991), Peter Sís' Follow the Dream: The Story of Christopher Columbus (1991) and Demi's Columbus (2012).
Sís' Follow the Dream: The Story of Christopher Columbus is the second of the three books I have read, after the Adler, and is very different in feeling. While that other title offered a outline view of Columbus' entire life, this one concentrates on the dream that drove Columbus, and concludes when his ships reach San Salvador, on his first historic voyage. Although this is still a biography, and does give a great deal of information, it is not a complete one, and is arranged around the theme of creative thinking and sticking to one's purpose, even when everyone around you thinks differently. There is no exploration of the consequences of Columbus' voyage for the native peoples of the Caribbean, or indeed, the peoples of Europe and the rest of the world. The book was first published in 1991, just in time to mark the 500th anniversary of Columbus' first westward voyage in 1992, and reflects its creator's identification with that explorer's historic dream, as someone who himself came west, from his home in then Czechoslovakia, to live in the United States. Sís' author's note discusses this in greater detail, noting how many maps in Columbus' time showed Europe existing inside a great wall, something he (Sís) found deeply moving, given his own early life enclosed by the wall of the Iron Curtain. This is a much more sophisticated book than the Adler, and is as much about how we approach history, and make meaning from it, as about the history itself. I don't know that I would recommend it, by itself, as a biography of Columbus, but I think it could be paired very well with a fuller, more factual biography, perhaps the one by Demi, which I intend to read next. The accompanying artwork here, done in oil, ink, watercolor and gouache, is beautiful, and well deserving of its selection as one of The New York Times Best Illustrated Children's Books. Recommended to slightly older picture-book readers - six to seven, I would say - looking for stories about Columbus, and about exploring the world and following one's dreams. show less
Today, as I write this review of Follow the Dream: The Story of Christopher Columbus, it is Columbus Day, marking the 528th year since modern contact was made between the peoples of Europe and those of the Americas. It is a holiday that has become controversial of late, dividing opinion between those who feel we should not celebrate the day, given the disastrous consequences that first contact had for the native peoples of this hemisphere, and those who believe that, however flawed the man, he did achieve something unprecedented in human history, and laid the groundwork for the modern world we know today. Some cities have replaced Columbus Day with an 'Indigenous Peoples' Day,' while other communities continue to honor the great explorer. Complicating the matter is the fact that Columbus Day has become intertwined with Italian-American identity in many quarters, and is one of the few moments in the national calendar when this community is honored and remembered. For my part, I have little sympathy with the cultural and historical vandalism currently consuming the (so-called) left, but also have no interest in whitewashing history. I tend to believe that historical achievements should be remembered and honored, even when those who achieved them were far from perfect, recalling that old phrase that "we see further than our ancestors because we stand on their shoulders." With that in mind, and given my all-consuming interest in children's literature, I decided to read and review a number of different picture-book biographies of Christopher Columbus, as a means of marking the day. The titles I chose include David A. Adler's A Picture Book of Christopher Columbus (1991), Peter Sís' Follow the Dream: The Story of Christopher Columbus (1991) and Demi's Columbus (2012).
Sís' Follow the Dream: The Story of Christopher Columbus is the second of the three books I have read, after the Adler, and is very different in feeling. While that other title offered a outline view of Columbus' entire life, this one concentrates on the dream that drove Columbus, and concludes when his ships reach San Salvador, on his first historic voyage. Although this is still a biography, and does give a great deal of information, it is not a complete one, and is arranged around the theme of creative thinking and sticking to one's purpose, even when everyone around you thinks differently. There is no exploration of the consequences of Columbus' voyage for the native peoples of the Caribbean, or indeed, the peoples of Europe and the rest of the world. The book was first published in 1991, just in time to mark the 500th anniversary of Columbus' first westward voyage in 1992, and reflects its creator's identification with that explorer's historic dream, as someone who himself came west, from his home in then Czechoslovakia, to live in the United States. Sís' author's note discusses this in greater detail, noting how many maps in Columbus' time showed Europe existing inside a great wall, something he (Sís) found deeply moving, given his own early life enclosed by the wall of the Iron Curtain. This is a much more sophisticated book than the Adler, and is as much about how we approach history, and make meaning from it, as about the history itself. I don't know that I would recommend it, by itself, as a biography of Columbus, but I think it could be paired very well with a fuller, more factual biography, perhaps the one by Demi, which I intend to read next. The accompanying artwork here, done in oil, ink, watercolor and gouache, is beautiful, and well deserving of its selection as one of The New York Times Best Illustrated Children's Books. Recommended to slightly older picture-book readers - six to seven, I would say - looking for stories about Columbus, and about exploring the world and following one's dreams. show less
I really get choked up by the quiet, competent, and humble heroes like Nicholas Winton, those folks who just do a thing that needs doing. And that he persisted, saving one Jewish child after another from the Nazis, until his list grew to over six hundred names leaves me awestruck.
Peter Sís tells the story well with his bizarre yet fascinating page layouts and meticulous linework and by intercutting Winton's story with that of one of the many young girls he managed to evacuate from Prague to show more England in 1939, just before the borders closed and the Holocaust began.
This one's going to linger in my mind. Recommended.
(Another project! I'm reading all the picture books and graphic novels from NPR's Books We Love 2021: Kids’ Books list.) show less
Peter Sís tells the story well with his bizarre yet fascinating page layouts and meticulous linework and by intercutting Winton's story with that of one of the many young girls he managed to evacuate from Prague to show more England in 1939, just before the borders closed and the Holocaust began.
This one's going to linger in my mind. Recommended.
(Another project! I'm reading all the picture books and graphic novels from NPR's Books We Love 2021: Kids’ Books list.) show less
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