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CM . . . .
Volume VI Number2 . . . . September 17, 1999
Recommended.
Valerie Nielsen is teacher-librarian at Bairdmore School in Winnipeg, Manitoba.
To comment on this title or this review, send mail to cm@umanitoba.ca.
Copyright © the Manitoba Library Association.
Reproduction for personal use is permitted only if this copyright notice
is maintained. Any other reproduction is prohibited without
permission.
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TABLE OF CONTENTS FOR THIS ISSUE - September 17,
1999.
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Clashing cymbals, shouts, whistles and flashing fireworks announce the beginning of the Chinese
New Year each spring. How and why these noisy, colourful celebrations began is the subject of
the latest collaboration by writer David Bouchard and artist Zhong-Yang Huang. The Dragon
New Year: A Chinese Legend is the second book in their "Chinese Legend" series, a
follow-up to the internationally acclaimed picture book, The Great Race: The Legend of the
Chinese Zodiac, published in 1997. In this newest book, a grandmother comforts her small
granddaughter, as the racket outside her window keeps her from sleep, by telling her the story of
the origin of the New Year celebrations. Bouchard, a gifted storyteller, imagines that a ferocious
sea-dragon named New Year terrorizes the people of a long-ago village by arriving each spring to
satisfy his hunger. Year after year, the villagers must flee from this evil monster of the deep, until
one spring the great Buddha, in the guise of a stranger, arrives at the home of a woman who
has lost her son to the dragon. Following the stranger's instructions, the woman prepares food
with as much noise as possible, while her strange guest stokes a blazing mountain of fire. As the
huge bonfire burns it takes the shape of the young fisherman whom the dragon had devoured the
previous spring. Caught in the roaring web of fire, the dragon New Year is frightened and
confused by the dreadful noises issuing from the blazing mountain and plummets to the bottom of
the sea, a demon of darkness temporarily defeated by the power of light and sound. Buddha
brushes away the woman's thanks with modesty, exhorting her to "Share the gift as you will." So
the grandmother does, content in the knowledge that this important story will be passed on from
generation to generation.