Contemporary Illustrations Portfolio

Design

Design

Not Again! Design as Metafictive Device in Again!

In Emily Gravett’s book Again!, she tells the tale of Cedric, a baby dragon who wants to hear his bedtime story again, and again, and…well, again. In this tale, Gravett’s wee dragon is not only the protagonist of the book the reader is holding, but also that of the storybook he wishes to be read, and the lines between the two are enthusiastically and explosively blurred over the course of the book.

            Gravett’s main metafictive strategy rests in the design of the book itself. Again!’s cover boards are a deep red, with a dragon curled up reading a book in a central circle. This detail identifies Again! as the same book Cedric and his mother are reading from, creating a mise en abyme throughout. This choice is what makes Again! fulfill Lissi Athanasiou-Krikelis’ definition of a metafictive text: “The text in its verbal and pictorial form 1. references itself as text/illustration, other texts/illustrations or forms of storytelling and their conventions; 2. accentuates the reader’s presence and makes the reading process salient; and 3. presupposes it is delivered through a medium, its ‘reality’ mediated by another overarching reality” (3).

One instance where this is on display are the pages in which the story within the storybook is being read. These spreads have the book occurring three times: once in the hands of the reader, once in the hands of the mother dragon, and once behind the characters, so the reader of Again! is able to read Again! and the storybook simultaneously. They are both themselves and a character in this moment, as Cedric is throughout the book.

This metafictive interplay is further utilized for the climax of the book, in which the storybook characters become living things and begin to change and react to elements outside their book. This begins when the text of the book itself falls off into zzzs as the mother dragon falls asleep, and continues when their book is shaken, then burned by Cedric in his anger. Storybook Cedric, the Princess, and the trolls are tossed to one side of their book, and look on Cedric in anger before the tiny dragon’s tantrum culminates in him burning a hole clean through the storybook. The hole is burned through the final page, the end pages, a bit of the dust jacket, and the end cover board, reminding the reader that their book is Cedric’s storybook and that the reality of these two iterations are tied to one another. Cedric peeks out of the hole he created as his storybook self evacuates the book along with the princess and the trolls. The line between the book and its storybook has been erased, and now, presumably the line between both these and the reader’s copy ofAgain!is gone as well. Gravett’s author photo holds a sign pointing to a fire exit clean out the back of the book, and doubtless if she could have found a way for these characters to physically manifest and trot out onto her reader’s bedroom carpet, she would have made it happen. In lieu of this magic, we see the characters end up free of the book and onto its dust jacket.

Works Cited

Athanasiou-Krikelis, Lissi. “Defining Children’s Metafiction: Authorship and Readership in Emily Gravett’s Picturebooks.” The Lion and the Unicorn, vol. 42 no. 1, 2018

Gravett, Emily. Again! Simon & Schuster 2011.

Stats: CIP Fall 2022, Laramie Hearn. Installment #2: Design. 531 words.

Laramie Hearn