''Animalia'' is an illustrated

children's book Children's literature or juvenile literature includes stories, books, magazines, and poems that are created for children. In addition to conventional literary genres, modern children's literature is classified by the intended age of the reade ...

Graeme Base Graeme Rowland Base (born 6 April 1958) is a British-Australian author and artist of picture books. He is perhaps best known for his second book, ''Animalia (book), Animalia'' published in 1986, and third book ''The Eleventh Hour (children's boo ...

. It was originally published in 1986, followed by a tenth anniversary edition in 1996, and a 25th anniversary edition in 2012. Over four million copies have been sold worldwide. A special numbered and signed anniversary edition was also published in 1996, with an embossed gold jacket.

Synopsis

''Animalia'' is an

alliterative Alliteration is the repetition of syllable-initial consonant sounds between nearby words, or of syllable-initial vowels if the syllables in question do not start with a consonant. It is often used as a List of narrative techniques#Style, litera ...

alphabet An alphabet is a standard set of letter (alphabet), letters written to represent particular sounds in a spoken language. Specifically, letters largely correspond to phonemes as the smallest sound segments that can distinguish one word from a ...

book and contains twenty-six illustrations, one for each letter of the alphabet. Each illustration features an animal from the animal kingdom (A is for

alligator An alligator, or colloquially gator, is a large reptile in the genus ''Alligator'' of the Family (biology), family Alligatoridae in the Order (biology), order Crocodilia. The two Extant taxon, extant species are the American alligator (''A. mis ...

and

armadillo Armadillos () are New World placental mammals in the order (biology), order Cingulata. They form part of the superorder Xenarthra, along with the anteaters and sloths. 21 extant species of armadillo have been described, some of which are dis ...

, B is for

butterfly Butterflies are winged insects from the lepidopteran superfamily Papilionoidea, characterized by large, often brightly coloured wings that often fold together when at rest, and a conspicuous, fluttering flight. The oldest butterfly fossi ...

, C is for

cat The cat (''Felis catus''), also referred to as the domestic cat or house cat, is a small domesticated carnivorous mammal. It is the only domesticated species of the family Felidae. Advances in archaeology and genetics have shown that the ...

, etc.) along with a tongue-twister utilizing the letter of the page for many of the words. The illustrations contain many other objects beginning with that letter that the reader can try to identify (e.g. the "D" entry features, besides a pair of dragons, the dinosaur ''Diplodocus'' and the pelycosaur ''Dimetrodon''; however, there are not necessarily "a thousand things, or maybe more", contrary to what the author states; for instance, the "A" entry features an alarm clock, as does the "C" entry; also, a tennis racket appears in the "T" entry as well as in the "R" entry). As an additional challenge, the author has hidden a picture of himself as a child in every picture.

Related products

Julia MacRae Books published an ''Animalia''

colouring book A coloring book (British English: colouring-in book, colouring book, or colouring page) is a type of book containing line art to which people are intended to add color using crayons, colored pencils, marker pens, paint or other artistic media. ...

in 2008.

H. N. Abrams Abrams, formerly Harry N. Abrams, Inc. (HNA), is an American publisher of art and illustrated books, children's books, and stationery. The enterprise is a subsidiary of the French publisher Média-Participations. Run by president and CEO Mary ...

also published a wall calendar colouring book version for children the same year. H. N. Abrams published ''The Animalia Wall Frieze'', a fold-out over 26 feet in length, in which the author created new riddles for each letter. The Great American Puzzle Factory created a 300-piece jigsaw puzzle based on the book's cover.

Adaptations

television series A television show, TV program (), or simply a TV show, is the general reference to any content produced for viewing on a television set that is broadcast via over-the-air, satellite, and cable, or distributed digitally on streaming plat ...

was also created, based on the book, which airs in Canada. The Australian Children's Television Foundation released a teaching resource DVD-ROM in 2011 to accompany the TV series with teaching aids for classroom use. In 2010, The Base Factory and AppBooks released Animalia as an application for

iPad The iPad is a brand of tablet computers developed and marketed by Apple Inc., Apple that run the company's mobile operating systems iOS and later iPadOS. The IPad (1st generation), first-generation iPad was introduced on January 27, 2010. ...

and

iPhone The iPhone is a line of smartphones developed and marketed by Apple that run iOS, the company's own mobile operating system. The first-generation iPhone was announced by then–Apple CEO and co-founder Steve Jobs on January 9, 2007, at ...

iPod Touch The iPod Touch (stylized as iPod touch) is a discontinued line of iOS-based mobile devices designed and formerly marketed by Apple Inc. with a touchscreen-controlled user interface. As with other iPod models, the iPod Touch can be used as a po ...

Awards

''Animalia'' won the Young Australian's Best Book Award in 1987 for Best Picture Story Book. The

Children's Book Council of Australia A child () is a human being between the stages of birth and puberty, or between the developmental period of infancy and puberty. The term may also refer to an unborn human being. In English-speaking countries, the legal definition of ''chi ...

designated ''Animalia'' a 1987 Picture Book of the Year: Honour Book. Kid's Own Australian Literature Awards named ''Animalia'' the 1988 Picture Book Winner.

References

External links

Graeme Base's official website

A Learning Time activity guide
for ''Animalia'' created by The Little Big Book Club {{DEFAULTSORT:Animalia (Book) 1986 children's books Alphabet books Australian children's books Children's books about animals Picture books by Graeme Base Puffin Books books Puzzle books