Reviews for Bear Who Wanted to be a Bear

The average rating for Bear Who Wanted to be a Bear based on 2 reviews is 4.5 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2012-09-21 00:00:00 Kristi Rowell I don't use the word "odd" lightly, but I have to say this is an odd book. It's sort of a Marxist parable... well maybe not Marxist but some sort of political philosophy involving oppressed workers divorced from the products of their labor. This bear falls asleep and when he wakes up a factory's been built over his cave, and when he comes out everybody thinks he's a lazybones worker. They make him wear a uniform and try out for different "jobs" (bear skin rug, circus bear, etc.) but he's not interested in working cos he just wants to be a bear. But he starts to forget that. Finally in the end he escapes and remembers his essential bear-ness. The art in this book is great. It's all done in a Soviet-era realism style. (Again I'm not entirely sure if that's a thing but I think it is.) The story however is a bit too on the nose... it sounds odd to say but it lacks any sense of absurdity, the story is played completely straight and the moral about getting caught up in the industrial system seems a little too obvious. There's also a fair amount of text, way too much for a 3 year old at least. I don't think this book is a kid's book... but I don't know what else I'd call it. I guess this book is a good counterpoint to all the worker bee / animals dressed in suits type books targeted at kids. Seriously, there really is a book (Busy Bees at Work and Play) where Mama Worker Bee goes to visit all these other bees working at their jobs-- Plumber Bee, Accountant Bee, etc-- and the point of there book is to teach your kid that everybody has to work! I've read this book to Izzy a bunch of times and am only now realizing what a piece of wage-slave capitalist propaganda it is! So The Bear Who Wanted to Be a Bear serves as a fitting riposte. Plus I love the title.

Review # 2 was written on 2007-09-29 00:00:00 David Dove I am so so excited to see this book is still in print, as my tattered childhood copy is currently held together with silver duct tape. This is a children's book about a bear who emerges from hibernation to find that his beloved woods have been razed and a huge factory has been build right on top of his den. Disoriented and probably scared shitless, he wanders around until he is confronted by an evil looking factory manager who scolds him for being unshaven and out of uniform, calls him a no good lazy bones, and forces him to dress himself, shave his face, and punch in on the time clock. When the bear finally realizes what is happening to him and tries to explain to his bosses that he is in fact a bear, they tell him bears don't work in factories, he works in a factory, and therefore cannot be a bear. When he is taken to discuss the issue with the company president, a bear skin rug adorns the fancy office floor. I won't ruin the rest of it for you. I'll just say, Reading Rainbow style, if you want to know what happens next, you'll have to read this book! ----- 2012 Update: I ordered a copy from Amazon to give myself for Christmas and found the translation has been altered in two horrible ways. First, what was "lazybones" in my 1980s version is now the infinitely less pleasing "slacker." Also, THE LAST SENTENCE HAS BEEN ELIMINATED! The last page used to read, "And then he remembered." But no longer! Now the end feels so much more disturbing and death-like. Not to mention confusing. My mother used to shamelessly alter my children's books to be less sexist and I'd encourage all owners of this book to add in the last line by hand.