Looking at a Wordless Picture Book: Quentin Blake’s Clown

Abstract

In this study of Quentin Blake’s wordless picture book, Clown, which won the International Bologna Ragazzi Award in 1996, I examine the ways that the layout, color, line, perspective, directional bias and point of view act as subtexts which can influence the ‘reading’ of the pictorial narrative. Besides brief outlines of other wordless picture books and their creators there are references to those literary theorists who have informed my own work. I conclude that the lack of words in Clown is compensated for by the abundance of images, the clown’s expressive body language and the textual quality of the drawing style.

KEYWORDS:

• layout
• directional bias
• subtexts
• body language

The author is grateful to A. P. Watt at United Agents on behalf of Quentin Blake for permission to reproduce illustrations from Clown.