Fall 2007--Volume IV, Issue 2
By Amy Cox Williams

Ingram Library Services recently caught up with Jan Brett, author and illustrator of The Three Snow Bears, for the following conversation:

You first re-created the story of Goldilocks in a 1992 picture book, Goldilocks and the Three Bears. What brought you back to this classic tale for your upcoming book, The Three Snow Bears?
A story that begins with curiosity and exploration is meaningful to me. The bears with their humanlike stance and facial structure are satisfying to work with as characters, especially since I can clothe them easily. I have dreamt a lot about a door that opens into another world, a fantastic world, all of my life. So again the Goldilocks story intrigues me. When I thought why not polar bears, my next thought was exploring Inuit culture. The more I explored the Arctic world, the more I felt I would not be repeating my first book.

Your trip to Iqaluit in the Nunavut Territory in northern Canada set the groundwork for The Three Snow Bears. Did you travel there intending to do research for a book, or did that happen after you arrived?
We looked at Alaska, Nunavut, and Greenland as possible places to set The Three Snow Bears, all places I still would like to visit and revisit in the case of Nunavut. Iqaluit offered a nearby town, Pangnirtung, that was known for Inuit sculpture and weavings. It also had a large population of Inuit, and the promise of visiting a grade school. They also had a festival showcasing traditional activity during April, a time I could visit.

Can you tell us a little about your trip to the Arctic?
We spent 10 days in Nunavut on Baffin Island, the fifth largest island on Earth. It is five hours north and east of Ottawa, Canada, by jet plane. Some of our time was spent in Iqaluit on Frobisher Bay where it was minus 20 degrees in April. This was business as usual for the people who traveled mainly by snowmobile. We stayed in a guesthouse run by local guides. Our guides, Helga and Eric, introduced us to Mattie McNair, another arctic explorer and guide, and we spent a day with musher Louis-Philip Pothier and her sled dog of Greenland Inuit dogs. We spent a few days in a small, but renowned, art town set in tremendous granite peaks called Pangnirtung, and near a beautiful national park, which we snowmobiled into. Our chartered plane took us over this inhospitable mountain region and over the floe edge where we saw pack ice and majestic icebergs. The ethnic museum and art center gave me much-needed information for The Three Snow Bears.

What was the most interesting thing you learned about the Inuit people?
The Inuit people are proud and self-sufficient. They have one foot in tradition and one in modern-day life. For example, the children we met wearing artfully made parkas with trim made from wild animals--the only way to stay warm in the minus 70 weather--wore sporting caps with The Lord of the Rings logo. They eat seal meat and watch videos; the people speak an ancient, beautiful, soft language and know all the latest hip-hop songs. The most interesting thing I learned about was a game played with the flipper bones of a seal. It is much like Monopoly and the bones represent men, women, children, komatic (sled) dogs, and igloos.

Your books have been described as visual puzzles with intricate artwork framed by borders and panels full of clues to the story. Will you share with us a little about how you developed your illustration style?
I see my stories as tapestries rather than a linear story. When I was little, my vocabulary wasn't large, but I felt pumped full of curiosity and love of learning. In my borders, I hope to fulfill those expectations.

What is your process for writing and illustrating your books?
I think of a plot before character and setting, and I go over it in my mind, then discuss it with my editor, Margaret Frith, when it feels like my idea is worthy to be a book for children. After several versions of manuscripts with thoughtful critique by Margaret, I spend a month creating a book dummy or cartoon version of the story. Next, I often travel to the place my story is set, or, in the case of The Three Snow Bears, I went to the Brookfield Zoo near Chicago to examine one of their polar bears that had been immobilized for medical care. After that it is on to the finished paintings, which I show to Margaret and my art director Cecilia Yung from time to time. My husband Joe not only air brushes the background, but he is also a great sounding board and gives an invaluable perspective.

I imagine many readers will be unwrapping a copy of The Three Snow Bears this holiday season. What's the best book you've ever received as a gift? And is there a particular book you enjoy giving?
The best book I've ever received was The Arabian Nights given to me by my grandmother Baba. The jacket showed a Persian man on an Arabian type horse with a turban and quill of arrows. The typeface was made to look like jewels, set in gold. At the age of seven or eight, I was wild about the authenticity and adventure displayed by the art.

I love matching the person and a book. Besides my own, I enjoy giving Beatrix Potter, Eric Carle, and Tomie dePaola. The book I'm giving adult friends at the moment is The Wild Trees by Richard Preston.

What's next for you--where will you be traveling and what will you be writing and illustrating?
My next book is a sequel to Gingerbread Baby. I think I will call it Gingerbread Pals--a lonely Gingerbread Baby finds his friends. After that, my next will be an Easter story starring rabbits. Since my chicken and duck population is burgeoning, I will not be getting pet rabbits. The book after that though will be about a turtle and we are building a turtle pond.

As for travel, South Africa and Namibia for bird watching will be destinations for 2008, and India for a train ride and more birding is our hope for 2009. If I could go anywhere though, I'd go to Baghdad and visit my daughter and son-in-law, but I don't think that that will happen! Baffin Island has certainly gotten in my blood, and I would love to go back in the summer to hike the area around Pangnirtung.