The Night Before Christmas

Authors: Clement Moore & Tomie dePaola

For National Curriculum Early Years | Interest age: from c 3 years | Christmas | Picture books | Poetry (Children's / Teenage)

Published on 1^st October 2009 by Oxford University Press in the United Kingdom.

Paperback / softback | 32 pages, colour illustrations throughout
277mm x 214mm x 2mm | 152g

Here is a delightful poem that tells the story of the night before Christmas, when Santa Claus arrives with his reindeer and clambers down the chimney to fill the stockings by the hearth. The text and pictures combine to capture the feeling of magic and excitement, and give a real sense of warmth and Christmas spirit. Tomie dePaola has set the poem in the 1840s, using his own home in a small New Hampshire village as a model. The borders to the pages are based on designs from New England quilts, giving the book a wonderfully nostalgic feel.