The Christmas Pageant

by Tomie dePaola (Author And Illustrator)

Text and illustrations retell the story of the Nativity as performed in a children's Christmas pageant.

Genres: Christmas, Picture Books, Childrens, Christian

32 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1978

About the author

Tomie dePaola (pronounced Tommy da-POW-la) was best known for his books for children.

He had a five-decade writing and illustrating career during which he published more than 270 books, including 26 Fairmount Avenue, Strega Nona, and Meet the Barkers.

Tomie dePaola and his work have been recognized with the Caldecott Honor Award, the Newbery Honor Award, the Laura Ingalls Wilder Award, and the New Hampshire Governor's Arts Award of Living Treasure.

Reviews

[Hilary]

A nice enough retelling of the nativity. The story was told as if the children were acting the story in a play. The illustrations were very cartoon like and not to my taste. I really didn't enjoy the faces or the thick black lines, I've read so many retellings of the nativity this would be very low down on the list if not at the bottom but I think that's largely personal taste.

Read on open library.

[Beverly]

This is an adorable story of a class of children putting on a nativity play, which includes the shepherds and the wise men. The text is on one side, with illustrations of the children in the play on the facing page. The illustrations are precious and sweet, typical of DePaola's artistic style.

[Abigail]

The Nativity story is retold by prolific children's author and illustrator Tomie dePaola in this small picture book from 1978, presented in the guise of a school pageant. The language reflects this framing, and the text reads as would the narration of such a pageant, describing all of the traditional elements of the story, while the artwork depicts children dressed up as the various characters...

Originally published in 1978, The Christmas Pageant was reprinted in paperback in 1981 as a "cut out book." I'm not sure exactly what that means, as I read the original hardcover edition. In 2002, dePaola recycled the artwork in a new adaptation of this book, Tomie's Little Christmas Pageant , which features the same basic story, but told in simpler language and presented in board book format. In any case, while glad to have read this one, as part of my deeper dive into dePaola's work recently, I can't say it made a particularly strong impression on me. Younger children might enjoy it, having participated in such pageants, but it isn't destined to become one of my own favorites, when it comes to retellings of the Nativity story. Recommended chiefly to dePaola fans.

[Janice]

Nice Christmas book in German. I enjoy Tomie dePaola's books so when I was in Germany I bought this book and used to bring it into class each year and would often read a section from it to the class.

[Kim]

The retelling of the nativity as if it were a children's play. The illustrations make the story.

themes: Christmas, nativity, plays, school

[Mary Anne]

Cute, short, Christmas story with a great deal of meaning.

[Kristina]

Physically nice small format, easy for little hands. Lovely illustrations that are typical of dePaola's books. A bit wordy but a great narrative of the Christmas story.

[Kay]

Removed from my personal Christmas collection.

[Lynn Davidson]

The Nativity story is retold by the author and presented as a Christmas pageant performed by children in costume. Sweetly presented.