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This Is the World: A Global Treasury
INDIEFAB Book of the Year Awards -- 2014 Finalist
A compilation of abridged versions of M. Sasek’s most popular children’s travel books. From London to Hong Kong, Sydney to San Francisco, readers will delight in this charming journey through the world’s great cities. With deft strokes of his paintbrush and a witty voice to match, master illustrator and storyteller M. Sasek captured the essence of the world’s major capitals and brought them to life for an entire generation of young readers. Now, more than fifty years later, those same readers are passing these stories down to their children and their children’s children, and Sasek’s This is series has officially reached iconic status. Collected here for the first time in one affordable volume are some of Sasek’s most beloved adventures. From Notre Dame in Paris to a trolley car in the hills of San Francisco, with stops for sausages in Munich and a yacht race in Sydney, this book takes children and adults alike on a whirlwind trip to some of the world’s greatest destinations. An inspirational travelogue that introduces readers to the art, architecture, music, food, and traditions of multiple cities and countries, This is the World is the perfect book for international commuters and would-be travelers of all ages. This anthology includes excerpts This is New York, This is Paris, This is Greece, This is London, This is Australia, This is Texas, This is Munich, This is Rome, This is Britain, This is Hong Kong, This is Israel, This is San Francisco, This is Edinburgh, This is Venice, This is Washington D.C., and This is Ireland.
A compilation of abridged versions of M. Sasek’s most popular children’s travel books. From London to Hong Kong, Sydney to San Francisco, readers will delight in this charming journey through the world’s great cities. With deft strokes of his paintbrush and a witty voice to match, master illustrator and storyteller M. Sasek captured the essence of the world’s major capitals and brought them to life for an entire generation of young readers. Now, more than fifty years later, those same readers are passing these stories down to their children and their children’s children, and Sasek’s This is series has officially reached iconic status. Collected here for the first time in one affordable volume are some of Sasek’s most beloved adventures. From Notre Dame in Paris to a trolley car in the hills of San Francisco, with stops for sausages in Munich and a yacht race in Sydney, this book takes children and adults alike on a whirlwind trip to some of the world’s greatest destinations. An inspirational travelogue that introduces readers to the art, architecture, music, food, and traditions of multiple cities and countries, This is the World is the perfect book for international commuters and would-be travelers of all ages. This anthology includes excerpts This is New York, This is Paris, This is Greece, This is London, This is Australia, This is Texas, This is Munich, This is Rome, This is Britain, This is Hong Kong, This is Israel, This is San Francisco, This is Edinburgh, This is Venice, This is Washington D.C., and This is Ireland.
234 pages, Hardcover
First published September 2, 2014
1 person is currently reading
268 people want to read
About the author
Miroslav Sasek
30 books77 followersMiroslav Sasek (born Miroslav Šašek) (1916-1980) is an author and illustrator from Czechoslovakia. He is best known for a series of books for children titled This Is...
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Displaying 1 - 24 of 24 reviews
August 22, 2021
22 August 2021
Read yet again for my 365 Kids Book challenge. You can see all the books on their own shelf. Even as I am trying to catch up on my backlog of reviews in order to clear the TBR shelves for monsters, murder, and suchlike for the two months of All Hallow's Read and Halloween Bingo, I walked out of my libraries yesterday with more books than I could carry into the house in one trip.
Despite the objections I have to it, I do keep coming back. And when I do I usually end up wandering off on a side trip through maps or wikipedia. Today I went down the rabbit hole of biofluorescence because of the platypus. It's funny: I notice that Australia has a lot of that trademark box city from above portraits and a lot of animals and hardly any culture at all.
Now I'm really curious about what got left out of all of them.
***
14 November 2017
Culture: You're soaking in it. What's wrong with this sentence:
***
18 March 2016
When I was a child we had a copy of This is London. In the London book there is a picture of a man, in a park, up a tree, and he's sawing off a tree branch: the one that he's sitting on! How quaint that seems now. I'd love to have all the original books, or reprints of same, in theory. I'm worried that the judicious choice of snippets for this book might have some possible basis in the idea of excising images or text that would be broadly offensive now. There is an emphasis here on Anglophone interests, and nothing, I think, on the native people of any location [Actually, there is a reference to Australian Aborigines, who mostly live in cities, "in more remote areas others still live as they may have done in traditional times, with their legends, their dances, their wood carvings and their bark painting." Based on that example, it's probably better not to include anything he might have said about indigenous people anywhere]. Really, it can't deserve the word "world" without anything from South America, Africa, or Asia, excepting Hong Kong which was still British at the time.
Anyway, I loved it. The art is so sixties, and so cool, even now it remains distinctive and attractive. His cities of tiny boxes are still cool. It may be a safe nostalgia, but it was good.
Library copy
Read yet again for my 365 Kids Book challenge. You can see all the books on their own shelf. Even as I am trying to catch up on my backlog of reviews in order to clear the TBR shelves for monsters, murder, and suchlike for the two months of All Hallow's Read and Halloween Bingo, I walked out of my libraries yesterday with more books than I could carry into the house in one trip.
Despite the objections I have to it, I do keep coming back. And when I do I usually end up wandering off on a side trip through maps or wikipedia. Today I went down the rabbit hole of biofluorescence because of the platypus. It's funny: I notice that Australia has a lot of that trademark box city from above portraits and a lot of animals and hardly any culture at all.
Now I'm really curious about what got left out of all of them.
***
14 November 2017
Culture: You're soaking in it. What's wrong with this sentence:
Platypus looks as if he were forever unable to decide what he wants to be: he has a beak like a bird, he swims under water like a fish, he has fur like a kangaroo, and he lays eggs but suckles his young.
***
18 March 2016
When I was a child we had a copy of This is London. In the London book there is a picture of a man, in a park, up a tree, and he's sawing off a tree branch: the one that he's sitting on! How quaint that seems now. I'd love to have all the original books, or reprints of same, in theory. I'm worried that the judicious choice of snippets for this book might have some possible basis in the idea of excising images or text that would be broadly offensive now. There is an emphasis here on Anglophone interests, and nothing, I think, on the native people of any location [Actually, there is a reference to Australian Aborigines, who mostly live in cities, "in more remote areas others still live as they may have done in traditional times, with their legends, their dances, their wood carvings and their bark painting." Based on that example, it's probably better not to include anything he might have said about indigenous people anywhere]. Really, it can't deserve the word "world" without anything from South America, Africa, or Asia, excepting Hong Kong which was still British at the time.
Anyway, I loved it. The art is so sixties, and so cool, even now it remains distinctive and attractive. His cities of tiny boxes are still cool. It may be a safe nostalgia, but it was good.
Library copy
February 4, 2015
If you don't have the time or the money to travel, take a whirlwind trip around the world with Miroslav Sasek. You will travel from New York to Ireland to Britain to London to Edinburgh (how ironic for me having just finished "44 Scotland Street") to Paris to Rome to Venice to Munich to Greece to Israel to Hong Kong to Australia to San Francisco to Texas to Washington, DC. This edition is an abridged compilation of his most popular works from the "This is" series, reprinted by Universe Publishing. The illustrations are lush and rich. The paper is thick and smells like books from my childhood. I would have adored this book as a child, just as I do as an adult. My only, very teeny, complaint is that some places weren't as fleshed out as others. For example, I would like to have read much more about Israel. I learned a lot from this book. Did you know that the plumes on the bearskins of the Guardsmen at Buckingham Palace indicate the regiment to which they belong? Coldstreams have a red plume, Grenadiers a white one.
If you have or know a child who is interested in world history, you MUST get him/her this book.
If you have or know a child who is interested in world history, you MUST get him/her this book.
July 30, 2015
I love Sasek's art; his approach to color, lines and the space between things is consistently exquisite. So it is wonderful to have his books together here. But it would have been even better to have them appear in the order they were created, so one could enjoy how his work changed over time.
This feels as if the intended audience was for a child (because of the complete lack of text about the making of the original books -- why are some so short?, and the oddly brief list of facts about how the world has changed). However, the sheer heft of the book makes that awkward. Plus, the people (like me!) who loved his works as children are all grown up and want context. Okay, but yes, I still love looking at these pictures. Nearly every spread is both calm and vibrant.
This feels as if the intended audience was for a child (because of the complete lack of text about the making of the original books -- why are some so short?, and the oddly brief list of facts about how the world has changed). However, the sheer heft of the book makes that awkward. Plus, the people (like me!) who loved his works as children are all grown up and want context. Okay, but yes, I still love looking at these pictures. Nearly every spread is both calm and vibrant.
April 17, 2020
This is a great book for those of us affected with wanderlust; I ordered it from Amazon and was amazed at how huge it is. We enjoyed reading about different cities and countries and talking about places we'd like to visit someday. This is a compilation of many of Sasek's books (shortened) written in the 50s; the paintings have a fun, retro look to them, but some of the information is outdated (although corrected with asterisks). Now I'd like to read all the full versions; I wish our library had them!
February 6, 2016
This 223 page book is a treasure! I didn't take a super long time to read either! I loved the journey it took me on. And it just astounds me that most of these countries/city book were written in the last 1950's to the early 1970's and not a whole lot of information is outdated. What is antiquated is found in the back! I have been To Australia, Hong Kong, Italy, Greece, Ireland, Scotland, Edinburgh, Washington DC. San Fransisco, New York, Paris, Munich, and and even Israel today! IT has sparked the travel bug in me! Where to go!! <3
September 18, 2014
A travel book for kids compiled from previously published books by Sasek that appear in abridged forms here. Individual cities are covered alongside countries and even continents.
The information ranges from fun facts to helpful ways of categorizing the size of each place. The writing is good and the retro artwork is beautiful and realistic.
This big book is such a great gift for PreK-5+.
The information ranges from fun facts to helpful ways of categorizing the size of each place. The writing is good and the retro artwork is beautiful and realistic.
This big book is such a great gift for PreK-5+.
February 16, 2017
This is such a great idea for a children's book. Even as an adult there were some facts about these different cities I didn't know.
Topped off with really creative art and you have a shinning example of a kid's book.
Topped off with really creative art and you have a shinning example of a kid's book.
March 26, 2015
fun but dated.
January 19, 2016
this made me want to travel the world!
January 1, 2017
Lovely compilation of Sasek's work!
June 13, 2024
I don’t normally have three-star books on my personal bookshelf, but this one is basically a five for the illustrations, and the contents—though semi-dated—are appended and still more than a three. (Some of the updates appended are actually quite striking, like the fact that the fisherman shown on the Tiber River is no longer a common sight because the river is too polluted.)
My kindergartner loved when I’d check one of the series out for her at the library, and I like this compilation to expose my little ones to a lot of the famous landmarks and defining attributes of some parts of the world. The series isn’t readily available enough at the library, so I decided to purchase this version purchase, as a good “coffee table book” to generate discussion. Even my 2.5-year-old was flipping through it.
So don’t try this for older kids, and don’t expect every single part of the world. Consider it an introduction.
My kindergartner loved when I’d check one of the series out for her at the library, and I like this compilation to expose my little ones to a lot of the famous landmarks and defining attributes of some parts of the world. The series isn’t readily available enough at the library, so I decided to purchase this version purchase, as a good “coffee table book” to generate discussion. Even my 2.5-year-old was flipping through it.
So don’t try this for older kids, and don’t expect every single part of the world. Consider it an introduction.
July 13, 2024
Beautiful visuals paired with important facts from several states and countries. Nearly perfect, but slightly biased. Final Rating: 4 stars
July 28, 2020
You can find this title in our Bookshop @
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This collection of stories—from M. Sasek’s popular children’s travel series—will take you on an exciting escapade around the world. From London to Hong Kong, Sydney to San Francisco, readers can hop from place to place, uncovering the charm of some of the world’s greatest cities.
Original illustrations combined with his innate talent for bringing cities to life through words, master storyteller M. Sasek will have you itching to hop on a plane! Visit Notre Dame in Paris or join a yacht race in Sydney. Learn about the art, architecture, music, food, and traditions of cities and countries across the globe.
This anthology includes abridged versions of: This is New York, This is Paris, This is Greece, This is London, This is Australia, This is Texas, This is Munich, This is Rome, This is Britain, This is Hong Kong, This is Israel, This is San Francisco, This is Edinburgh, This is Venice, This is Washington D.C., and This is Ireland.
Check out this review (and more) on
---
This collection of stories—from M. Sasek’s popular children’s travel series—will take you on an exciting escapade around the world. From London to Hong Kong, Sydney to San Francisco, readers can hop from place to place, uncovering the charm of some of the world’s greatest cities.
Original illustrations combined with his innate talent for bringing cities to life through words, master storyteller M. Sasek will have you itching to hop on a plane! Visit Notre Dame in Paris or join a yacht race in Sydney. Learn about the art, architecture, music, food, and traditions of cities and countries across the globe.
This anthology includes abridged versions of: This is New York, This is Paris, This is Greece, This is London, This is Australia, This is Texas, This is Munich, This is Rome, This is Britain, This is Hong Kong, This is Israel, This is San Francisco, This is Edinburgh, This is Venice, This is Washington D.C., and This is Ireland.
Check out this review (and more) on
June 28, 2021
M Sasek's illustration is undoubtfully lovely & gorgeous. Good to get overview of the 'This Is' series but might end up wanting the single books, since some chapters in this book are too short (less than 10 pages)
February 2, 2021
This book should be re-named to specify that it is the western world. Besides Hong Kong and Israel- Asia and Africa are entirely left out. This book is NOT the world at all and kids should not be led to believe it is.
Read
July 4, 2017This is what I read to my kids if we are going on a trip to any of the places there. I really appreciate the footnotes, since some information has changed since the original publication.
October 27, 2017
What a lovely book...awesome size and fantastic artwork that not only took me back to childhood a bit but also just made me happy....along with really wanting a bit of travel.
June 22, 2018
Great book for kids and adults. Will be on my “gift” list to some of my favorite kids.
July 5, 2018
Love these, but more readable as individual titles.
July 8, 2018
Interesting.
May 30, 2019
beautiful imagery, many significant landmarks and cultural references.
However is was written and published in 1959-1974, so the details are not all acurate.
However is was written and published in 1959-1974, so the details are not all acurate.
December 29, 2020
I want to visit so many of these places. I even had to take a break because there were so many facts in this book!
May 3, 2023
This has to be the coolest children’s book ever made.
Displaying 1 - 24 of 24 reviews
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