Publishing house "Melik-Pashaev" exists relatively recently. Despite the "retro name", it was created in the recent 2008 crisis year. Since then, books have been created here for children from birth to 10 years old with wonderful illustrations. What are the books that can instill in children an artistic taste and sense of beauty? The writers and artists working on the books of the publishing house "Melik-Pashayev" know for sure the answer to this question.
History of creation and logo
The publishing house "Melik-Pashaev" was created by two co-founders. This explains their close attention primarily to illustrations.
Maria Melik-Pashaeva is a painter, illustrator, participant in a large number of exhibitions, a collector of children's books, a specialist in handwritten fonts.
Tatyana Rudenko - book designer, founder of the creative workshop at the Tretyakov Gallery. She worked for many years in the publishing house "Book" as an art editor.
Why is such a seemingly “non-childish” name and logo chosen? The fact is that initially the publishing house was chamber and was intended for a narrow circle of intelligentsia. The project was funded by the Melik-Pashayev family. The surname is sonorous. Alexander Melik-Pashaev is the conductor, whose name is widely heard, Alber Melik-Pashaev is the head of the Teatron children's studio. All this led the creators in favor of choosing just such a “retro-name”.
Reprints of Favorite Books
Readers of old favorite books greet invariably a warm welcome from readers. Most of the reviews about the brainchild of the book house are requests to republish works that were loved in childhood, with the same illustrations, but in modern quality. Gradually, “Melik-Pashaev” began to be perceived as a publishing house, giving the ageless classics a new life. And this is justified: quite a few reprints have been published. Tatyana Rudenko considers this to be one of the aspects of her work: she sees her work as publishing well-illustrated books for preschoolers. And it doesn’t matter if it is a reprint or some previously unreleased literature. The main thing is that the child likes the book. And it’s quite difficult to understand which book the baby will love, because the authors are adults, and parents buy books. But publishers see their task in this. "Retro for the sake of retro, for the sake of commerce we do not publish," says Maria Melik-Pashaeva.
"Melik-Pashayev" is a publishing house that reprinted books by such great masters as Vladimir Lebedev and Yuri Vasnetsov, Lev Tokmakov and Nikolai Radlov, Vladimir Konashevich and many others. In the collection of the publishing house "Melik-Pashayev" the books of Korney Chukovsky, Nikolay Nosov are in the version in which they were remembered and once loved by modern adults.
Funny pictures
Separately, I want to note a series of books on the magazine "Funny Pictures". Collected together the best Soviet illustrations for the magazine will certainly interest a child 3-5 years old and will cause nostalgic moods for most mothers, fathers, grandparents. Ironic and funny, instructive and instructive, "Funny Pictures" were created over the years by the best illustrators of the Soviet Union, now they have been restored, and plots that are comprehensible to a modern child have been selected.
The children's book has two equal authors - a writer and an artist
Harmoniously combining the work of a writer and an artist is not an easy task. If, when the book was reprinted, this task was already carefully carried out and tested by time, then when choosing an artist for a new book, the publisher collects a whole consultation. After all, the "correct" drawing for a children's book is paramount. For example, it should be detailed in such a way that the child understands the essence of the subject. At the same time, there should not be excessive detailing, which many modern books focused on parents sin.
The book, according to the leaders of the publishing house, should be exactly as it was conceived by the author and artist. You cannot change its format, increase or decrease the number of pages. Although it sometimes flies a pretty penny.
Another publishing concept is not to make artificially created series. All books of the "family" should be conceived by artists initially, and not just be inserted into a common frame and the same format.
Best Seller Translations
"Melik-Pashayev" is a publishing house in which very high demands are placed on translators. For example, when translating one of the books, Percy’s character name was transformed into Uncle Willy because Percy in Russian is very similar to “Persian,” which can cause confusion in the baby’s head. In general, close attention to detail is what sets the books of the publishing house Melik-Pashayev apart from many other Russian publications.
During its existence, the publishing house "Melik-Pashaev" has published the following series of foreign books:
- Beaver Castor.
- Karlchen.
- Meow cat.
- Watchman Willie.
- History in pictures.
- Sea adventures of Tim.
- My cat.
- Bear Bruno.
- Mulle Mek.
- Zebra Zoo.
- Ernest and Celestine.
Books for babies - pictures with captions
A Russian adult reader does not always want to buy picture books distributed in the West: they have so little text, only pictures. But the child needs exactly this, when under each illustration two or three lines of text. He will review the book without parents many, many times.
One of the first works of the publishing house "Melik-Pashaev" was the story of William Bush about Max and Moritz, which was at the origins of a children's book. "Melik-Pashayev" retold this old German fairy tale, focusing only on pictures. In the post-Soviet space, Harms’s translation is known: “Plikh and Plukh”. The publishing house decided to provide an opportunity to the contemporary author Andrei Usachev to compete with the great poet.
Many readers complain about the high cost of books by this publisher. But given the gigantic work that is done to create each book, how much attention is paid to each “little bit”, it becomes clear why this happens and why their books so often become the most beloved in many families.