Sewing up animation adaptations

In recent years , I’ve laid hands on a few cloth Peanuts books – or at least the panels of fabric offered to make them. Well, today I laid hands on two more – and they actually fit two categories for me. Not only are these two cloth books – they’re adaptations of animated specials.

It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown is adapted as a bit of a highlights reel. Linus explains the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown gets a rock, various people explain that they like Halloween. At the enf of the book, Linus sees the Great Pumpkin coming, but the ultimate disappointment is never revealed. Of course, what does one expect of a cloth book? It’s intended as a decoration or an amusement and chew toy for pre-literate children, not as deep literature.

The I Want a Dog for Christmas, Charlie Brown cloth book isn’t exactly the full text of the hour-long special, either, mind you; it’s just a recitation of the things Rerun would do with a dog, if he had them.

Hey, wait a minute? I Want a Dog for Christmas, Charlie Brown? Really? All due respect to the special, which I quite enjoy… but if you want to adapt a Peanuts Christmas special, the gold standard for such things in both quality and recognition is A Charlie Brown Christmas.

So… maybe they’ll do an  A Charlie Brown Christmas cloth book panel? I really love books adapting A Charlie Brown Christmas, even if I have to sew them myself.

(Honestly, I shouldn’t get my hopes up. If they didn’t do ACBC, it’s likely because they couldn’t get the rights to it; perhaps the deal for one of the extant book adaptations precludes something like this. But still… if they make it, I’ll buy it. Of course.)

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