On Madeline | Elyssa Dahl Madeline, a picture book written and illustrated by Ludwig Bemelmans in 1939 is a classic in American fiction

for children. It depicts young girls Paris, and the excitement surrounding the precocious Madelines appendix surgery. The story has few literary flourishes, and suggests the importance of courage and adventure. Bemelmans text is effortlessly charming, but it is his use of color that deliberately points the reader to the books lessons. Or, rather, it is his selective overuse of color. By interspersing elaborate watercolor-inspired scenes with a comforting shade of yellow, Bemelmans contrasts the values of ordered life against the chaos of Paris and comments on the importance of both extremes. In Format, Design, Predominating Visual Features: The Meaningful Implications of Overall Qualities of Books and Pictures, Perry Nodelman outlines the visual features that function as the primary rhetorical devices in picture books. The narrative devices that illustrations offer are as complex as the text, setting the tone for how we interpret the work as a whole (41). Among other things, Nodelman points to color as being one way to illicit the emotional connotations that most influence the mood of picture books (60). Before readers eyes ever comprehend the text, the page before them expresses a color scheme that brings about subconscious mood associations. To further Nodelmans argument, we can contend that it is not only a selective use of color that moves the reader. In associating one color scheme with a particular theme (yellow as nostalgic) and contrasting it against another (colorful scenes as chaotic), readers are not having a lesson imposed on them via color, but must consciously discern what Bemelmans is advocating with these subtle differences. The use of yellow is central to Madeline. It is a color which Nodelman references as bringing to most minds cheerfulness, calmness and serenity (63). The first five pages of Madeline contain nothing but strong vertical lines, and two shades of yellow. On Madelines first page we see an old house in Paris that was covered with vines. The house itself is ordered and containedso old and regal, in fact, that it has charmingly been surrounded by vines. Bemelmans sets readers up to associate yellow with a peaceful Parisian lifestyle. The vines are bolder than the house and its surroundings, holding the house itself down, and magnifying the sense that things in this old house rarely change. But when Bemelmans strays from yellow, he complicates Nodelmanss argument and provokes more from his reader. Bemelmanss two-page illustrations of Pariss Opera and The Place Vendome are complexly colored (6, 7), with the girls in white dresses with yellow hats, Miss Clavel in a blue frock, and the city shaded with tones of gray, brown, and green. In the Opera scene we see a Parisian feeding a horse, and another running into the background. At The Place Vendome, there is a policeman running after a thief while all the girls look on disapprovingly. These colored scenes stir something in the girls and Madeline, and readers see this as an alternative to the order connected to yellow. Because the contrast of this two-page spread is so great compared to what came before, readers are startled by its imagery, much like the characters themselves. After establishing this juxtaposition, Bemelmans asks his readers to weigh the benefits of each alternative. At the end of the book, we learn that both extremes are important. Madelines lessons about confronting excitement with a sense of discernment culminate in the title characters appendix fiasco, all of which only two scenes are in yellow. This truth does not distract from the effectiveness of Madeline, but intensifies it. More than anything, Bemelmanss stresses the importance of a courageous spirit in confronting everyday experiences that can prove alarming for children, such as a sudden case of appendicitis. By using safe, comfortable tones of yellow in these scenes, we are reassured that Madelines positive demeanor will prevail, and that our fears were unfounded. Because Bemelmans relies on more than a readers sense of comfort with the color yellow, and asks them to contrast it against the chaos presented in colored scenes, he most effectively reveals both the vibrancy of urban life and the values of spirited order.

Bemelmans, Ludwig. Madeline. New York: Viking Press, 1967. Print.