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Reviews
Caps for Sale: A Tale of a Peddler, Some Monkeys and Their Monkey Business by Esphyr Slobodkina
mdevlin923's review
2.0
A peddler selling caps keeps all of his caps on his head! When he sits down to rest, he wakes up to find his caps are all missing. After searching around him, he looks up into the tree to find monkeys wearing his caps! He finally gets the caps back, and returns to the town to sell them.
graciouswarriorprincess's review
adventurous
funny
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
4.0
tessacmickeyd's review
5.0
I wouldn't usually review a picture book from my childhood, but my father performed this book for me every night and it deserves a good review for the memories.
rebecca_reeves's review
funny
hopeful
inspiring
lighthearted
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? N/A
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
4.0
patrickwadden's review
5.0
A clinical and scathing dissection of the contemporary internet culture that would follow 80 years after the publication of this masterpiece, Slobodkina's 'Caps for Sale' is an oracle opus.
Opening on a quaint unnamed village, we are quickly introduced to our protagonist. A victim of capitalistic burdens that is forced to carry a workload too vast with him everywhere he goes to make ends meet. When finally confronted with his hunger brought on by a lack of sales of the titular 'caps', he's forced to abandon society and flee to the outskirts of civilization. This displays the grave situation that he must face if he thinks he is better off foraging in the wilderness to sustain himself as opposed to inquiring about food in the village. Oh, what dire situations the residents must be of their oppression and circumstances if they could not spare but one morsel of bread to this down-trodden peddler.
Upon arriving in the forest and still crushed by the literal and metaphorical weight of needing to sell to survive, the Peddler's crusade for nourishment subsides and gives way to slumber. Perhaps a more cynical and apathetic capitalist would inquire that sleeping instead of working is what leads our poor protagonist to this hunger; I would argue that was his only choice. The confounding context leads him here involuntarily.
After waking from a much-deserved slumber, he's greeted by our physical antagonists of the novel, the monkeys. Now, beneath their primate faces lie horns, for they are trolls. They steal the caps off our hard-working peddler solely for the purpose of seeing him suffer. They take no personal gain from this heist, sauf seeing him in anguish. I'll let you draw your own parallels to your contemporaries on whatever social media platform you partake in.
Now, I must be frank. Perhaps I'm a bit daft but I didn't pick up on why//how the peddler retrieved his hats when I read the novel for my before-school-program kids this morning. After skimming through Wikipedia, I now know that the monkeys incessantly copied the peddler's behaviour. Thus, when he threw his one remaining cap on the ground out of frustration, the monkeys replicated it. Now isn't that just peachy? perhaps by accident the peddler overcame his conundrum, but isn't there a perfectly good lesson laying in betwixt the caps?
A truly outstanding piece of social critique that surpasses anything that can be fabricated today, 'Caps for Sale' is a manifesto of enlightenment during the age of internet trolls and 'the grind' lifestyle.
Oh, and the pictures are great.
I especially like the one with the sun and the flower.
Opening on a quaint unnamed village, we are quickly introduced to our protagonist. A victim of capitalistic burdens that is forced to carry a workload too vast with him everywhere he goes to make ends meet. When finally confronted with his hunger brought on by a lack of sales of the titular 'caps', he's forced to abandon society and flee to the outskirts of civilization. This displays the grave situation that he must face if he thinks he is better off foraging in the wilderness to sustain himself as opposed to inquiring about food in the village. Oh, what dire situations the residents must be of their oppression and circumstances if they could not spare but one morsel of bread to this down-trodden peddler.
Upon arriving in the forest and still crushed by the literal and metaphorical weight of needing to sell to survive, the Peddler's crusade for nourishment subsides and gives way to slumber. Perhaps a more cynical and apathetic capitalist would inquire that sleeping instead of working is what leads our poor protagonist to this hunger; I would argue that was his only choice. The confounding context leads him here involuntarily.
After waking from a much-deserved slumber, he's greeted by our physical antagonists of the novel, the monkeys. Now, beneath their primate faces lie horns, for they are trolls. They steal the caps off our hard-working peddler solely for the purpose of seeing him suffer. They take no personal gain from this heist, sauf seeing him in anguish. I'll let you draw your own parallels to your contemporaries on whatever social media platform you partake in.
Now, I must be frank. Perhaps I'm a bit daft but I didn't pick up on why//how the peddler retrieved his hats when I read the novel for my before-school-program kids this morning. After skimming through Wikipedia, I now know that the monkeys incessantly copied the peddler's behaviour. Thus, when he threw his one remaining cap on the ground out of frustration, the monkeys replicated it. Now isn't that just peachy? perhaps by accident the peddler overcame his conundrum, but isn't there a perfectly good lesson laying in betwixt the caps?
A truly outstanding piece of social critique that surpasses anything that can be fabricated today, 'Caps for Sale' is a manifesto of enlightenment during the age of internet trolls and 'the grind' lifestyle.
Oh, and the pictures are great.
I especially like the one with the sun and the flower.
blondieesquire's review
4.0
Another one of my favorite books! I also played the narrator in our kindergarten play and got mad at all the monkeys for making too much noise... Of course.
jenhfultz's review
5.0
I made my mom read this over and over and over again to me, and at 3 years old had it so well committed to memory that I could "read" it myself! Wonderful story with charming illustrations.
ewg109's review
5.0
My amazing Children’s librarian introduced me to this one. It’s quirky and the illustrations are right up my alley. It’s also one of the best books to read to a crowd of pre-schoolers.