Dear Mr. Pinkwater, I am now 30 years older than when I first read and re-read your books. I’m now an early childhood educator working to support my students online during Covid school closures. For many years I featured your book, The Big Orange Splot, in my classrooms and I shamelessly copied photos from the books to help children learn to literally change your dream houses into their own. You never caught me because these mostly remained in backpacks and under beds in the housing projects of Chicago. Now it turns out that an NPR radio host, who will be reading your book to children, also adores your books. This time, I’d like to prepare online materials using whatever I have in my home (which turns out to be multiple copies of the Big Orange Splot) so I can create visual materials to help young children, especially our students with autism, follow along and extend their imagining after they hear the story. So I am wondering, if I scan and copy images of the book for this purpose, how many chickens are you likely to send to Boston to hen-peck me into ceasing the scanning of your artwork?
With gratitude either way for many years of delightful ridiculousness,
Erica
Because of the emergency anyone may copy, video, record, present, any book of mine in any way at all, as long as they do not sell anything, attempt to copyright anything for themselves, sell copies, sell tickets and that sort of thing. So, go right ahead, and check out my other books, plus make use of the audio books offered on this very website.
