The story portrays four viewpoints on a sequence of events that occur within a park which subsequently mean two families from different socioeconomic origins meet in a park. A boy called 'Charles' is struggling within an elitist, judgemental and restricted environment that doesn’t allow him to express himself and feel free. Due to his mothers oppressive nature his voice is being oppressed. The young girl from a lower socioeconomic status does, however, have more freedom, including a voice. Children's books reviewed by parents for you and your kids. 17 Aug. 2003. 1 Children Books Malaysia. 17 A walk in the park can bring joy and peacefulness to your day. Join four different perspectives of voices that take a stroll through their local park as they reflect on the lives. Why do you think Anthony Browne chose a park as the setting? Would a different setting affect the attitude and behaviour of the characters?

I really didn’t enjoy the choice to make the “people” depicted as monkeys/apes?? The one place where it worked for me and that gave me a good laugh was on the sign of the homeless panhandler. Anthony Browne has avoided making commentary on race by giving the humans the bodies of gorillas. This is one reason ( among many) why illustrators/storytellers utilise animal bodies when telling stories about humans. This illustration is from the eye-level of a child. Smudge sees the park as her personal carnivalesque playground, hence the fruit in the distance. Einari Wehmas (Finnish, 1898-1955) In The Park 1920-1. Note the similar palette of yellow and orange juxtaposed against green. MRS SMYTHE

Think about the hopes and dreams of the different voices who are speaking. Could you describe these to a friend? The third voice is the little boy from the first story. He is also a sad child looking for a friend to play with at the park. Again you are going to ask the same two questions. “Who is talking in this story?” and “Who’s voice is missing?” The reason we keep asking these questions is to get the children to focus on who is telling the story so we can have more discussions once we have read all four voices. Read The Fourth Voice

Could you turn the story into a radio play with different children playing the role of each voice in the story? This is the equivalent to WEEKS of literacy teaching and learning - we spent ten weeks in total looking at the work of Anthony Browne using these resources. Anthony Browne has described Mrs Smythe as “dominant” and “militaristic” and explains that she loves her son but overprotects him. This is evident from what the girl says later, about how she won’t even let a dog smell her dog’s butt (something dogs don’t mind at all). Mrs Smythe wears the female version of a bowler hat. MR SMITH

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The symmetry of the composition of full bleed illustrations of this story contribute to general creepiness, much like paintings by Italian artist Alessandro Tofanelli. Alessandro Tofanelli, Italian surrealist landscape painter. For more examples of his work see here. STORY STRUCTURE OF VOICES IN THE PARK The exception to ‘all on one level’ is the see-saw scene, but the nature of a see-saw is that people take turns being up and down. Effectively, this is an egalitarian metaphor. In this image, the poor girl is higher than the rich boy. Life can thrust us out of riches (more frequently than it thrusts us into them.) Socioeconomic circumstance should be considered, like life, like health, a temporary state which can change suddenly at any time. write letters to an agony aunt or hold an ‘advice surgery’ for each character to discuss their problems; The composition tends to symmetrical. Clearly the symmetry serves to emphasise the inherent equality between human beings; in this park, outside the individuating arena of their homes, everyone is on the same level, literally.

This book is a collection of experiences of characters going to the park on the same day. Whilst the story is told one perspective at a time, the characters are linked through the illustrations that support the text in this picturebook. Initially I read the book and didn't realise the perspectives were linked until I noticed that two of the other characters had met and where doing the same activities from their own perspectives, in the illustration of a third character's perspective. For Smudge's father, the type is a less formal type of font that is bolded. There is just more of a noticble rounding of the letters, not as rigid as the ones for the font listed above. The informal bold text, along with the type of grammar of the sentences, leads one to conclude he is a working class person. The fact of it being in bold makes one envision he has a deep, rough voice. This book belongs into the Contemporary Realistic Fiction genre. This genre is defined by a vivid, realistic setting; multidimensional, credible characters; and believable problems that are understood by the intended age group. Voices in the Park, satisfies these criteria. This is a plausible story that could happen in today’s world. An upper-class mother and son could walk their dog to the park and meet other people who may not be of the same socioeconomic status as they are. There are other parts of the story that qualify this text in this type of genre. This is a realistic occurrence that can happen daily, with easily understood problems for the reader. The characters in the story make it easy for children to relate to through use of language and how they interact with each other. Australia’s first Postmodern picture book is thought to be The Watertower, written by Gary Crew and illustrated by Steven Woolman (1994). See also Caleb, by the same duo. Unfortunately these books are a little difficult to source now. Use the story as a starting point for learning about the first / third person and how they are written.

The father’s walk home will show his emotional state much improved, like the cheerful night before Christmas. Street-Lamp-Flower-Voices-In-The-Park

Voices in the Park has four different first-person narrators that describe their day in the park. Books that have first-person narrators are characters within the story and “refers to themselves using first person pronouns; I, me, my, mine, our,” (Kachorsky, Unit 3 Characters & Narrators, slide 26). The characters in Voices in the Park narrate the story in first-person. For example, the first voice says, “it was time to take Victoria, our pedigree Labrador, and Charles, our son, for a walk,” (Browne, 1) and the second voice says, “I need to get out of the house, so me and Smudge took the dog to the park,” (Browne, 8). First-person narration tells us what the character of the book does and what they say or think about themselves. To start your critical literacy session with the kiddos, I suggest that you read the book and have the discussions anytime but bedtime. We read them during our calm down time of the day which is after lunch. Sit down in a cozy spot and pull out the book. Read the title of the book and ask your child this question: Of course, books mean different things to different people. However, it is interesting to list the varying ideas the children have. One Y6 class I worked with recently listed the following ideas: happiness; relationships; money doesn’t make you happy; making friends; the dogs are the happiest; posh people and snobs; things are not what they seem. The text can be a very useful example for children to look at, as a model for writing in different perspectives and as a model for how to effectively create links between the text and illustrations. There is some disagreement about the origins of the numerous variations of the name Smith. The addition of an e at the end of the name is sometimes considered an affectation, but may have arisen either as an attempt to spell smithy or as the Middle English adjectival form of smith, which would have been used in surnames based on location rather than occupation (in other words, for someone living near or at the smithy). WikipediaVoices In The Park is loved by teachers because it requires students to read pictures as well as text, and offers a lot to talk about. There’s a sparse loneliness to Anthony Browne’s work, like looking at a Hopper painting. Even when characters share the same arena, they aren’t necessarily understanding one another. I prefer Browne’s picture books as daytime rather than before-bed reads. FOR FURTHER INVESTIGATION