Title Peter and the Wolf Series --- Author Walt Disney Illustrated By Walt Disney Publisher Random House - 1974 First Printing Random House - 1974 Category Children Warnings None Main Characters Peter, Sasha, Sonia, Ivan, the wolf Main Elements Anthropomorphic

Retells Sergei Prokofiev's fairy tale of a Russian boy who captures a wolf with the help of a bird, duck and a cat.

I had an LP record which had Sergei Prokofiev's composition. I loved listening to it, the duck as the oboe sticks in my mind. And of course the cat as the clarinet and the bird as the flute, you can picture each of the animals moving about as the music plays. But I'm here to review the book put together by Disney based on the music. The story starts with Peter's grandfather warning him not to go out into the woods in winter because the wolves are hungry. Peter decides to take his toy gun and capture a wolf. Along the way he meets up with Sasha the bird, Sonia the duck and Ivan the cat. While Ivan would very much like to eat Sasha, they animals decide on a truce when the ravenous wolf appears. Working together they capture him, much to the surprise of some hunters, and of course Peter's grandfather. The art style dates the Disney book, but I think it suits the storie very well.

So while every child should know the story of Peter and the Wolf, and while the book version is all very nice and all, the thing I remember years after I last heard it is the music. I wish I still had an LP record player so I can listen to it again. Looks like I'll have to track it down on CD, the one downside of changing technology!