Zen Shorts

Zen Shorts

Zen Shorts

Written and illustrated by: Jon J. Muth

Scholastic Press, 2005

35 pages

Multicultural

Zen Shorts is based off of the Japanese and Buddhist culture. Stillwater, the panda found sitting in Addy, Michael, and Karl’s backyard, tells each child a different story to challenge them to reexamine their habits, desires, concepts, and fears. Addy hears the story Uncle Ry and the Moon which is about a man giving a robber his only robe, but wishing he could give him the moon. Michael hears the story The Farmer’s Luck which makes him realize that good luck and bad luck are all mixed up and you never know what will happen next. When Karl visits Stillwater, he is mad at Michael. Karl had such a fun day with Stillwater but doesn’t realize how much fun he had because he spent the whole day complaining about Michael. Stillwater told Karl the story called A Heavy Load. This story was about two monks, one of which did something nice for someone and was not told thank you. Several hours later, the other monk spoke out about the woman’s rudeness. The first monk replied that he set the woman down hours ago and asked why the other monk was still carrying her around. This story made Karl realize that he shouldn’t carry around his anger.

The illustrations in this book were done using watercolor and ink. The text is set in 17 point Monotype Fournier font. I like how Muth illustrates each story differently according to the text.

This will be a good book to use in the classroom when studying different cultures. It can also be used to teach students different lessons like carrying anger around or never knowing what will happen. I would have students write about a story they’ve been told or a lesson they’ve learned and have them share it with the class.

Zen Shorts won the 2006 Book Sense Book of the Year Award and won a Caldecott Honor.