I want to love Babar, but this was a fairly traumatic read for my 3 year old. She could not get over the death of Babar's mom, and bored quickly of the main story. Not to mention he marries his cousin??? ( )

This story is about Babar, the elephant, and his adventure to the city and how he adapts when he he meets a welcoming older woman. As the story progresses, Babar goes back to his family in the jungle because he misses them. Additionally, Babar shares his new knowledge about the city with his family and he becomes their king.

https://nextshark.com/colonialism-kids-racist-origins-babar-elephant

This article changed my mind completely about what this book is about. While I can understand that boundary's of permissibility keep changing. I feel that in this day and age such books should not be encouraged or kept in library spaces (without any engagement about the context it was set in).

Good book to introduce Racism and Colonialism to children. ( )

When a hunter kills his mother, the little elephant Babar is so frightened that he runs away and ends up in a big city. He buys himself some nice clothes and accepts a nice Old Lady’s invitation to live at her house. Time passes, and then Babar has an unexpected meeting with his elephant cousins, who have run away. When their mothers come to fetch them, Babar decides to return to the forest with them, where he will become the king of the elephants.

The story and the lovely illustrations have enchanted generations of children. It doesn’t appeal so much to this adult. There doesn’t seem to be much substance to the story, although I might feel differently about it if I had fond childhood memories of reading it. Also, I don’t like stories where animals die. ( )

Odd little childrens book. A minor quibble, elephants live in a matriarchy, so not only is this not educational its actively uneducational :P .
I'm sure there must be some other versions of this book but the one i read had hand-written text!, and in cursive! Even i had issues deciphering a word here or there but i can only imagine the horror on a child's face if they were handed this :lol. And their growing horror if they actually managed to figure out what it says ;) .

There are several dark moments in this which are not well dealt with to say the least. Also Babar is elected King rather than inheriting it, which seems a nice change... until you find out why he in particular is elected. Part of me wants to think it's a biting satire on elections but i suspect not :lol.

The art's still nice though :) . ( )