Books conceal magical worlds where someone is always hiding in a dark forest, unreachable kingdoms lie beyond the mountains, and the seas and oceans are ruled by the elements. Each fairy-tale setting has its own symbolism and its own origin story. And the illustrators are the very wizards who brings the picture to life, shifting the focus at will. In their hands, anyone or anything — even a river — can become the main character and tell a story from its own perspective.
A river can represent many things. It may be a path to a happy ending, a boundary between worlds, or a test of courage. Sometimes, it symbolizes time, the cycle of life, or the fear of the unknown; at other times, it is the most familiar embodiment of nature itself — ancient and powerful element.
We have chosen several children’s books to show how differently rivers can be drawn, how much meaning an artist can invest in this image, and how a beautiful background can be transformed into something more.
In his book, Peter presents fascinating facts about landmarks, animals, and historical events through the shapes of real rivers. His rivers become living witnesses to both momentous global events and smaller, yet no less intriguing ones. Thus, the book makes room for stories ranging from the evolution of men’s headwear in England to the bombing of Dresden. Such stories show that rivers have accompanied humanity throughout its journey, becoming the foundation of our history and culture.
Elena Safonova presents the river as a symbol of human progress in her 1930 picture book. Its course carries the reader from villages and wooden bridges to steamships, railways, power stations, and apartment blocks, and finally flows into the open sea. Here, the river becomes a force of nature that humanity has managed to tame and put to its own use, portraying humans as rulers of nature, reshaping landscapes, and mastering rivers, seas, and oceans.
The river can symbolize the flow of life: at first clear and untouched, gradually filling with new colors, events, and encounters. In Michael Roher’s book, the reader follows the river, drifting alongside the red-haired girl who is the main character. As she journeys, the girl grows up, falls in love, and experiences life in its fullness. Roher combines collage and drawing: the paper boat, trees, faces, and figures create rich textures, while small, bright details like leaves, flowers, and fish resemble a kaleidoscope of the heroine’s memories.
In Alessandro Sanna’s nearly wordless book, the reader follows the four seasons along the Po River, witnessing the flow of time and the lives of characters who become part of the current. Soft watercolor transitions capture the first rays of dawn, twilight in the reeds, and storm-darkened skies. The horizontal frames guide the eye along the river, creating the sensation of gliding through it alongside the characters. As Sanna writes in the afterword: «I draw like a blind person, not wasting time on details, trying to feel the pulse of life. To draw a river, I have to become the river… I dedicated years to this journey, endlessly working with the fragments I saw, searching for hidden wonders and treasures.»
In Marc Martin’s book, the power of children’s imagination transforms an ordinary river into an endless journey: cities, jungles, sunlit fields, forests with deer, and the ocean. The girl floats along the river in a small boat, and on each spread a new landscape unfolds before her. Martin uses collage, colored pencils, and paint to create depth and texture, while the horizontal pages make the river continuous, turning the boat and the girl into part of a larger whole, where the ocean with whales and schools of fish seems just within reach.
«Secret River», illustrated by Leonard Weisgard, was first published in 1955, after the death of Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings. The story follows a girl named Calpurnia from a poor family, who, during the Great Depression, sets out with her puppy in search of a mysterious river to help feed her village. The river aids her, and she returns home with enough fish for everyone. When Weisgard was working on the book in the late 1940s, there were unspoken restrictions on depicting Black characters in American children’s literature. Although the text does not mention Calpurnia’s race, the artist imagined her as Black, and to avoid censorship, he painted on coffee-stained paper.
In 2009, a new edition of the book was published with illustrations by Leo and Diane Dillon.
