Beatrice Schenk De Regniers
Personal Information
Description
Beatrice Schenk de Regniers (August 16, 1914—March 1, 2000) was an American writer of children's picture books. Beatrice Schenk de Regniers was born in Lafayette, Indiana, and studied social work administration at the University of Chicago, earning her M.Ed. in 1941. During the 1940s she worked in the US and in a Yugoslav refugee camp on the Sinai peninsula. During the 1950s she was a free-lance writer of nonfiction, humor, short stories, and columns, as well as children's books. Her first book was The Giant Story, a picture book illustrated by Maurice Sendak, published by Harper in 1953. From 1961 she worked at Scholastic, Inc. as the founding editor of its "Lucky Book Club", four days weekly with Monday reserved for her own writing. She retired twenty years later. She wrote over fifty books, ten of which were published under the pseudonym of Tamara Kitt, including The Adventures of Silly Billy (1961), and The Boy Who Fooled the Giant (1963). Illustrator Beni Montresor won the annual Caldecott Medal for May I Bring a Friend?, published by Atheneum Books in 1964.
Books
What did you put in your pocket?
Two groups of animals tell each other about the food and other things that they put in their pockets.
Week in the Life of Best Friends
A collection of poems describing some of the joys and sorrows of friendship.
The way I feel-- sometimes
Presents a collection of poems about feelings, from anger to acceptance.
This big cat, and other cats I've known
Describes in rhyme the activities of cats and the joys of knowing them.
So Many Cats!
Counting verses explain how a family ended up with a dozen cats.
Picture book theater
In these two plays about magic, a wicked witch imprisons a princess and a wizard transforms a boy into a cat.
Everyone is good for something
Everyone tells the boy he's good for nothing until he rescues a wise cat and helps save an island from a plague of mice.
Laura's story
Laura tells her mother a bedtime story about the perilous rescue of a tiny woman.
A bunch of poems and verses
A collection of limericks, poems, and verses.
Little Sister and the Month Brothers
A retelling of the Slavic folktale in which the Month Brothers' magic helps Little Sister fulfill seemingly impossible tasks which prove the undoing of her greedy stepmother and stepsister.
It does not say meow, and other animal riddle rhymes
Nine riddles contain clues in verse to well-known animals.
The boy, the rat, and the butterfly
A boy, a butterfly, and a scholarly rat find a jar of Wishing Solution with a Magic Straw inside.
Catch a little fox
In this traditional folk rhyme the children catch all the animals; however, the illustrator has a surprise for the reader.
David and Goliath
A shepherd boy leads the Israelites to victory by killing the giant leader of the opposing army.
Willy O'Dwyer jumped in the fire
Recounts Willy O'Dwyer's jumping journey that took him to the sun and back again.
The day everybody cried
At the start a little girl is crying all alone, but at the end the little girl, two boys, and all the animals are laughing together.
Adventures of Silly Billy
Poor Silly Billy. He feeds boiling water to chickens to make them lay hard boiled eggs and plants popcorn in the ground to make a popcorn tree grow. His parents say he will always be silly, but when he sets off out into the world, he meets people even sillier than he. He helps them with their problems, and he is rewarded for his help.