I Can't Said the Ant (and Polly Cameron)

It's probably not possible for anyone to know what began to form their visual aesthetic as a child, but one thing I think contributed to mine is the book I Can't Said the Ant by Polly Cameron. 

I still have the Scholastic paperback my mom got for us through the school sale. I think it may have been when I was in first grade, since the copyright in the book is 1966, though the book first came out in 1961.

Of course I love the rhymes and the story they combine to tell, but the visual impression of the book probably had more effect. Cameron's illustrations may be woodcuts or they may be ink drawings that simulate woodcuts, and they're printed in red throughout, contrasting with the black Century Schoolbook type.

The design is visually spare, which completely emphasizes the images and words. The illustrations of the kitchen objects speak as much as the words. 

The ant's lone struggle (shown above as it tries to lift the broken teapot back to the countertop) is solved when it goes off to bring back its ant friends. Then, along with some helpful spiders, they mend the broken-off spout and, all together, hoist her back to her usual spot. ("Co-operate," said the plate.) So the book had a good prosocial outcome, too, in addition to the general "keep going" message that's obvious from the title.

That's all I wanted to say about the book when I first decided to write about it, but when I started, I also wondered who Polly Cameron is or was. Searching her, I found that she died in December 2000, but there doesn't appear to be a full obituary available, unfortunately. There was a brief, paid entry in the New York Times, which mentioned that she was a sculptor, painter, and graphic designer, as well as children's book author and illustrator. But that was it. It did say where her funeral service would be, though, so I searched that city name with her name and found out why she had, perhaps, led a not-so-public life.

The clue I found was an obituary for her life partner, Naomi Katz, who died in August 2008. Katz was also an artist, and they had shared a home and love (according to the obituary) since 1965. I also found a  couple of other pages referencing the history of what appears to have been a lesbian colony in New York's Hudson Valley in the mid-20th century that mentioned Cameron. 

Imagine being a lesbian children's book author and illustrator in the 1960s. Even if you weren't closeted in your day-to-day life, you might not want that to be known because it would have affected your ability to get published. I guess I don't know that she was or wasn't closeted, but there doesn't seem to be much of anything about her life generally, so I suspect she was.

But at this point a couple decades after her death, I think it's good for folks to know who authors were, for purposes of representing the underrepresented, if nothing else. And it appears Katz and Cameron were known in their community as a couple.

So there's just one bit of information about the author, Polly Cameron. I wish I could find more about this writer and illustrator/designer who formed part of my way of seeing the world.