While Frog and Toad are having fun, going on adventures, and encountering trials, they are loyal, kind, respectful, and calm. But Frog and Toad seems even more classic, even more gentle, and even more universal. However, while I was groaning through Jack Stalwart (review forthcoming), I was thoroughly enjoying Frog and Toad.Īnd I think some of the reasons I loved it spring from the time period when it was written, which is also why I enjoyed Ramona. So while he was discovering Frog and Toad, he also discovered Jack Stalwart, which expanded his enjoyment of books by more than 200 per cent. Both my eight-year-old son and I were pleasantly surprised and soon, we had bought the whole treasury. I kinda hoped a book about creatures would intrigue my son, but so far he had only liked exactly one series of books in the whole world (and a whopping lifetime total of about three other books (Cleary’s Ramona series, The Day the Crayons Quit, Press Here, and Peek-a-Who)). The first book came in the school supplies box and was scheduled for the end of the first semester. My son and I actually read this book as part of our virtual school curriculum for second grade. What we know is that he was talented and prolific, and his writing changed the Early Reader genre. Not much seems to be made of his life, as details are scarce. He grew up in Schenectady, New York, went to art school, and married another childrens’ illustrator and writer and had two kids: one boy and one girl. He won several awards and praise–including the Caldecott–for books like Frog and Toad Are Friends, Mouse Soup, and Fables. The Frog and Toad series by Arnold Lobel, which we read in Harper’s Frog and Toad Storybook Treasury, which includes all four Frog and Toad books:Īrnold Lobel, 1933-1987, was a children’s book illustrator and writer.

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