【童書創作原畫展】Madeline in New York: The Art of Ludwig Bemelmans @ Green Tots Club 育兒消息站

撰文：Green Tots 編輯部　（尊重著作權，請勿擅自轉貼）

慶祝Madeline問世75周年，紐約的Historical Society 與Eric Carle博物館聯合策畫這次的Madeline in New York: The Art of Ludwig Bemelmans展覽。

展出時間：July 02, 2014 - October 19, 2014

地點：紐約市New-York Historical Society, 170 Central Park West

In an old house in Paris
That was covered in vines
Lived twelve little girls in two straight lines.

趁著休假，一早起床就立刻前往在歷史博物館旁的New-York Historical Society參觀。我個人最喜歡一大早博物館剛開門時參觀，因為覺得人潮最少。

在New-York Historical Society附近，就可以開始看到Madeline的廣告旗幟。走在West 77街，往中央公園方向轉個彎到Central Park West便是展覽入口。

哇! 好可愛的入口。你一定不會找不到。製作單位將Ludwig Bemelmans的畫作，變成大型看板一點。果然不愧為經典畫作。一點也不會因年代久遠而感覺過氣顯舊。

street view

付完門票($19)就直接衝往2樓的展場。好期待看到Bemelmans 的真跡。會場有免費的audio guide直接在架上取下，沿著標示的號碼按下，就可以聽導覽。

exbhition hallway

第一個印入眼簾的便是Bemelmans生平介紹。Bemelmans其實是青少年時(16歲)來紐約市的歐洲移民(奧地利與匈牙利後裔)。因為幼年時不喜愛德國系統的教育，所以當他聽到可以到一個到處都有雲霄飛車的城市時，心裡雀躍不已。下面的照片就是Bemelmans幻想的紐約市。大家大概猜到他所指的雲霄飛車是甚麼了吧！

所以Bemelmans也算是個New Yorker。Bemelmans正職是在飯店工作。他由在McAlpin打雜(busboy )做起，最後作到在紐約53街的麗池酒店(Ritz Hotel)的協理。麗池酒店現在已經不存在了。

因為當時Ritz要求，每個飯店工作的員工都要有一個法文名字。所以Bemelmans起一個法文名字(可能就像我們亞洲人都有一個英文名字一樣)。很有趣。

當麗池在1950拆除時，Bemelmans 在Town & Country發表在麗池工作的回憶,下面擷取片段：

Theodore's most esteemed guests were two people whom I called Monsieur and Madame Potter Dryspool, and these he seated at the best table on my balcony. With their arrival everybody fell over themselves, for a complaint from them meant instant dismissal. Madame Dryspool had her special Diet. Monsieur Dryspool was blue from drink.

On the side of the base of the marble column was a stack of menus, the backs of which offered very good sketching surface. The palm there protected me, and I was fascinated with the beauty of ugliness for the first time in my life. And very carefully I drew the profiles of Monsieur et Madame Dryspool on the backs of two menus. In a moment of haste, the Maître d'Hôtel who functioned on this balcony, who had just wished Madame and Monsieur Dryspool "good morning" and shoved the footstool under Madame's foot, and put away Monsieur's cane with the rubber cup on the end (gout), looked for menus to hand to them—and, thinking I was holding them in readiness for him, tore them out of my hand and handed them to Madame and Monsieur Dryspool—there was a sudden awful sound—a bark from Monsieur and a scream from Madame. Looking at each other's back of the menu, they had discovered the drawings of themselves which, of course, they took for caricature, although they were close likenesses. I then heard the three—Monsieur, Madame and the Maître d'Hôtel—calling Theodore, and I thought it best to go downstairs, take off my tie and change, and go see the Gish Sisters in The Birth of a Nation.

I expected to be through with the Ritz Carlton after that, and only came back for my things. But the timekeeper said that Mr. Keller wanted to see me.

Mr. Keller said: "Gotdem Cheeses Greisd, they are going to sue diss Hotel and it's all your fault." Mr. Keller never could fire anyone, and he was sorry a moment after he screamed at people. He loved art, and he was a friend of the art dealer Reinhart and of Sir Joseph Duveen; they were both daily guests at the hotel. He told them the story. The two menus with my drawings of Monsieur and Madame Potter Dryspool were in a safe place in his office. He showed them to Mr. Reinhart and to Sir Joseph and asked them: "Has this boy any talent?" and both said "Yes."

One day, I looked into one of the manymirrors of the Ritz. The rosy cheeks were more rosy than they had been when I arrived from Tirol, but this was due to indoor exposure. The capillaries had exploded from too much drinking. I had a stomach. I gasped when I walked up the stairs. Morally, I felt as disgusting as I looked, and I said to myself, how many more of these meals, how much more of this life before you look like Theodore the penguin-shaped maitre d'hôtel or, what is even worse, like some of the guests. You will be unhappy, useless, a snob, a walking garbage can. Get out, throw yourself in

雖然，他曾經有離開飯店決心以寫兒童書為全職的想法，但是屈就於二次世界大戰後的大蕭條，還是繼續回麗池工作。一共在哪裡工作了15年的時光。他將寫童書當作閒暇時後的娛樂。除了童書外，他也替報紙會連環漫畫，也出過一些成年書籍。展覽中，意外的收穫便是有一面牆，將他在麗池打工的經歷，以詼諧的方式用連環畫的方式將他放在一起。因為展覽規定無法攝影，但在館員答應可以照fixtures情況下。大家可以由這個照片窺見我說的綠色牆面掛的連環畫。

Madeline in NYC #2

所以囉! 想當然Madeline也是在紐約市誕生的。Bemelmans在位於 East 15街的Pete's Tavern創造出Madeline這個調皮的角色。

madeline born

為什麼是法國？我猜想大概是Bemelmans的工作需要接觸許多法國人的緣故吧！值得一提的是Madeline一開始的名字是Madeleine。

為什麼會拿掉e呢？

嘿嘿！因為Bemelmans覺得比較容易找出與Madeline發音押韻的字來組成故事。

當時的童書作者真辛苦。現在有多少人還像Bemelmans或是Magarate Wise Brown那樣注重押韻。最受歡迎的不多是依些迪士尼與電影一起出版的繪本嗎？

但是事實上，Bemelmans是到18歲才來美國，所以他的英文參雜了德語與法語的腔調。關於使用押韻的字寫出Madeline的故事，下面這段Bemelmans的孫子John Bemelmans Marciano訪問，提供了他對祖父寫作的有趣幻想：

"He didn't speak any language without an accent," Marciano recalls. "I don't know that he really had a first language. He spoke French, basically until he was 5, then he moved to Germany until about 13 or 14. And then he moved to America. By the time he was 18, I think he had all three of those languages in his head."

"He must have driven his editors crazy," Marciano says — for example in Madeline's Rescue, he insists on rhyming the words Genevieve and beef. "In German ... the v and the f is the same," Marciano says. "I can just imagine [the editors] saying: No. It does not rhyme in English."

展場中放展示約30幅 Bemelmans的真跡。許多都是Madeline系列繪本的代表圖片。抱歉！尊重展覽規定，我們無法照相提供給大家看。只能在一張展覽的入場大型牆板給大家想像囉！

Madeline in NYC #4

展覽中也陳列了Pepito的原創手稿。為了完成Madeline and the bad hat一書，Bemelmans去西班牙多次旅遊，才可以將真實的西班牙特色呈現在創作繪本裡面。其中，Bemelmans一共創作了3種不同的帽子，最後選出的便是今天我們在書中看到的。

MadelineandtheBadHat

若是在10月中能夠來參觀的朋友，你喜歡哪一頂？

值得一提的是：展覽還有呈列當時的甘迺迪總統夫人-賈桂琳邀請Bemelmans先生撰寫Madeline in White Housse的兒童繪本。兩人的書信往返。甚至，賈桂琳還於1962年4月邀約到白宮的邀請函。可惜的是，Bemelmans在同年10月便辭世。這個Madeline at White Housse的夢想，後來由Bemelmans的孫子John Bemelmans Marciano於2011完成。

Madeline at White House