Woutertje Pieterse Prize for book in which animals speak for themselves

“Yes, she compared me to a barcode,” the zebra complains. “I have no idea what it is, but it sounds, how shall I put it: disrespectful.” That ‘she’ was Bibi Dumon Tak, who in Bibi’s special animal book (2006) gave a ‘talk’ about the zebra. The animals are now canceling her: “A line through that human, zebra.”

The animals themselves take the floor Today I’m giving my talk about the anaconda. The children’s book, written by Bibi Dumon Tak and illustrated by Annemarie van Haeringen, was awarded the annual Woutertje Pieterse Prize (15,000 euros) this Saturday. It is the first time that the youth literature prize has been awarded to Dumon Tak, who has already received a Zilveren Griffel six times for her earlier children’s books and a Gouden Griffel once (for Winter animals, in 2012) and was honored with the 2018 Theo Thijssen Prize for her oeuvre. She received this for the form innovation she brought to non-fiction for children: thanks in part to Dumon Tak, the norm in the genre shifted from school to playful.

In her now award-winning book, the animals give talks about animals they have a thing for. The earthworm about the anaconda, the squirrel butterfly about the squirrel monkey, the midwife toad about the koala – the last two differ considerably from each other, but both carry their young with them. “You have them in all shapes and sizes,” the fox begins his talk about geese. “To me, a goose is a goose. They all taste equally good.”

Special form and content

The seed for this book was already planted during the previous collaboration between Dumon Tak and Van Haeringen; the bundle of poems Leave a message in the sand (2018). It also had a special form and content: non-fiction children’s poetry with ‘even-toed ungulates’ as the subject. Only the tapir, with three toes, maneuvered into the bundle with a speech about even-toed ungulates. In which he pointed out that his species is actually more special: there are 200 species of even-toed ungulates, and only 16 species of odd-toed ungulates. “Even-toed ungulates are more successful on earth than odd-toed ungulates.”

Jealousy or admiration is often the background of the speaking choices – the earthworm does not just choose the invincible strangling anaconda, the skittish hermit crab not by chance chooses the extravagant Picasso surgeonfish. The zebra tells of “pure black and white animals,” of which it is one, along with only six other animal species in the world, whose habitats never touch each other.

Author and illustrator have entered into an ideal marriage in this stylistically exemplary book

Jury of the Woutertje Pieterse Prize

Of other animals, it is explained how they do come into contact with each other, for good or for bad: the mole talks about the crane fly, whose larvae it eats. “Crane gnats are my cook and my cook,” he says, with sardonic realism. By choosing animal perspectives on animals, Dumon Tak underlines that animals are not in the service of humans, and that they are more multifaceted than the human-centered stories we usually tell about them. The common cleaner fish talks about sharks, which he mainly knows as “super tame guests”, “super polite”, because the cleaner fish cleans them: he is a dentist, dermatologist and beautician all rolled into one for the shark. That is not an invention of Dumon Tak: the form may be playfully fictitious, the content is non-fiction. Similarly, Van Haeringen drew the animals in her own style, but truthfully. “The author and illustrator have entered into an ideal marriage in this stylistically exemplary book”, the jury of the Woutertje Pieterse Prize judged.

Bibi Dumon Tak and Annemarie van Haeringen: Today I’m giving my talk about the anaconda. Querido, 112 pp. €18.99.