Children's books, Soviet style -- Garbo

 A few weeks ago I was reading a memoir by a woman who was a child in the decade after the Russian Revolution and who lived through Stalin's reign of terror. This woman's youth was such a mix of political upheaval, abrupt changes in social status, and normal childhood interests like ice-skating and going to the movies. And reading.  She describes fond memories of the kids' books she grew up with, and as I began to chase down some of this children's literature (not an easy task), I came across this collection in our state library system. 

I know, we see "rainbow" and we think LGBT+ but the reference is to the name of a Russian publishing company. 

One would expect Communist kids' books to be austere and a bit scary and they certainly can be.

 There are some grim ones in here featuring cartoon children bandaging their youthful comrades and learning to fire rifles but I have spared you those and have put in a couple of the industrial ones I liked. 

This one is called Two Trains.

This image of fishermen in a boat is instructive but also restful to look at. 

The book on painting is sensible of course. 

But then we do have some photos of animals. Well, the Russian bear is intense. 

Peasant problems: the sheep have gotten outside the enclosure. But they've arranged themselves in a nice way. 

There are other colorful pictures in the featured books which show animals, fish, and birds. Not a lot of cartoony silly ones, but I like these monkeys using an old-fashioned crank telephone where you have to yell into a tube. The book is called Telefon, which of course is Russian for Telephone.

Here are some of the faux orders the monkeys are placing by telephone. There are a couple pages of more the rhymes.

The author of Telefon was a children's poet who has been called "the Russian Dr. Seuss." He wrote a number of popular books including one called "The Monster Cockroach." You can read about him in this Wikipedia article.