Brush of the Gods

Lenore Look's Brush of the Gods is a picture book for 5 year olds about a boy whose paintbrush just won't do as it's told.

What happens

Daozi is meant to be learning calligraphy. His teacher is a stern old monk who wants neat, careful strokes. Sit up straight. Brush in line with your nose. Press gently.

Daozi tries. He really does. But worms crawl out of the end of his brush. Then blades of grass. His straight lines turn into trees and his dots turn into pigs and monkeys (the other children giggle, the monk sighs).

So Daozi paints everywhere instead. On temple walls, in teahouses and all along the huge wall round the city. People leave him coins and rice and even a chicken, and he runs the lot straight to the monastery to feed the poor.

Then something very odd starts to happen. The things he paints are so real that they leave! A butterfly flutters off the wall. His camel walks away. Who wouldn't want to see that?

It's a lovely one to read aloud because the sentences are short and they sound so good. "The boy blinked. The butterfly winked." You can almost hear the brush slapping against the bricks.

There's a sad patch in the middle that's worth knowing about. When everything Daozi paints vanishes, his admirers vanish too, and he weeps. Only the ragged beggar children stay by him. It's gentle and it passes, but a tender-hearted little one might want a cuddle there.

Daozi was a real painter. A short note from the author explains that he lived in China more than a thousand years ago, and that this is her own imagined version of his life. That's a nice thing to talk about when your reader asks "did that really happen?"

What to read next

If they love a child who finds something nobody expected in the thing they've been handed, try Kali's Song next. Kali's father gives him a bow to practise for his first hunt, and Kali discovers it makes music.