"You Ridiculous Little Hedgehog. Don't You Know That Animals Don't Wear Clothes!"

When I heard last winter that Jan Brett would be coming to Erie for a free book reading and signing, I knew I had to attend. The event was on a school day, but later than my morning class and leaving plenty of time, or so I thought, until my afternoon class. I hadn’t counted on the large number of people gathered at Borders to listen to Brett read and have her sign a copy of one of her books. In addition to the many adult fans of Brett’s work, some looking to add to their own collection and some thinking ahead towards Christmas for those special children in their lives, there were several school groups queued up to meet the author/illustrator. Most of them were a bit more savvy than Mom and I and had come to Borders in advance to secure a spot in line. This had never occurred to us, so we walked in twenty minutes before the reading and were handed tickets indicating that 230 people would be in line ahead of us. I ended up giving Shakespeare a miss that day.

All this is leading up to the fact that we purchased this book, The Hat, along with Brett’s newest book, Who’s That Knocking on Christmas Eve?, at the signing and had her put her distinctive mark on both. In this book, there is a picture of Hedgie the hedgehog just before the title page. Above Hedgie, Brett wrote “Love *squiggle* Jan Brett,” and below that, a heart. On the tip of Hedgie’s nose, she drew a stocking, so that the picture now looks like Hedgie about to get into the same situation in which he finds himself in the book.

Hedgie is a small hedgehog based on Brett’s own pet, Buffy. Brett was inspired to write this book after finding Buffy stuck in a slipper sock, held fast by her prickles. She traveled to Denmark to the hometown of Hans Christian Andersen and spent hours committing the place to her sketchpad for use in this book.

The story begins with young Lisa taking out her winter clothes and hanging them on the line to air out. One stocking blows away and lands on the unfortunate Hedgie, who cannot remove it because it is stuck on his prickles. Throughout the remainder of the book, Hedgie covers his embarrassment by telling the other animals he encounters that the stocking is a hat. The animals all laugh, but by the end of the book the tables are turned.

This book contains more words than Annie and the Wild Animals, primarily because of the dialogue between Hedgie and the other animals. The print is still the same size, however, and the text is still much sparser than in Town Mouse, Country Mouse. It is fun to observe through dialogue how the different animals interact with Hedgie.

The illustrations are, as usual, delightful. Hedgie encounters a hen with her chicks, some geese, a striped orange cat, a dog (a German shepherd, perhaps?) and her puppies, a pig and her piglets, and a pony. The intricate features of the animals and the bright color of Lisa’ winter clothes offset the bleak winter landscape that fills the pages. As is the case with all of Brett’s books, or at least the ones I’ve read, the border plays a very important role here.

The borders are fairly uniform in this book, always with what appears to be a wood base with red semi-circles at the bottom and either a floor or table of varying color. Each page has two ovular windows, one on either side of the mirror, and a long oblong one on the top, except in the first and last two pages when the top one is replaced with a large bow. The border around the windows is different on each page, but each retains a specific purpose throughout the book. The window on the left shows the activities of Lisa, while the one on the right shows which animal Hedgie will encounter next. The top window keeps track of the clothesline, foreshadowing the ending of the book.

The Hat is another fine addition to Brett’s body of work with its silly premise and evocative illustrations. As in Annie, this little girl appears to live alone; I guess that Brett would probably prefer to keep adults, at least human adults, out of her work as much as possible, as children would generally rather read about other children and animals. Brett’s young characters are independent and self-sufficient, and this, I imagine, makes them all the more palatable to young readers.

This is not the only book in which Hedgie plays a part, incidentally. He has become a particularly beloved character for Brett and her readers, having also appeared in Hedgie’s Surprise. Meanwhile, The Hat is a companion book to Brett’s The Mitten, in which a boy loses a mitten and it is discovered by a wide variety of animals, all of whom want to take advantage of its warmth. Another endearing tale by Brett and her crew of animal characters.