The Bunyip of Berkeley's Creek by Jenny Wagner illustrated by Ron Brooks

"Late one night, for no particular reason, 

something stirred in the black mud 

at the bottom of Berkeley's Creek."

Do you recognise these words from this classic Australian Picture book? To me they are almost as magical as those well known story words - Once upon a time ...

This week all over Australia we are celebrating Children's Book Week. This celebration has two parts. Events in schools and school libraries and the announcement of the CBCA Book of the Year winners.  In 1974 the winner was this truly special book - The Bunyip of Berkeley's Creek by Jenny Wagner illustrated by Ron Brooks.

Why do I love this book?  There are so many reasons.
Illustrations - the way the sizes and framing build from a small centred square to a double page spread and back down to the small square image at the end. I love the way this matches the path of the story from the bunyip emerging from the billabong, then moving through the bush to ask about his identity and then back to the billabong again.

Now take a look at the front cover - it should remind you of our Australia coat of arms.

Identity - at its heart this is a book about identity. Who am I? asks the Bunyip. He receives a variety of answers but none are really satisfactory until he finally meets another bunyip.  I love the way our little bunyip perseveres with his question even in the face of the most horrible answer from the man (with no imagination) who declares bunyips "simply don't exist".

Voice - reading this book aloud is a joy.  The repetition of the key question What am I? begs to be read with different emphasis. WHAT am I? What AM I? What am I?  He asks this question six times. The platypus provides an answer but the Bunyip presses on. What do I look like? Finally when the man says he does not exist the Bunyip repeats sadly "What a pity," he murmured. What a pity, what a pity."

Beauty is in the eye of the beholder - "No one can see me here. I can be as handsome as I like" he declares. He unpacks his bunyip bag which contains his bunyip comb and mirror. Like the swagman from Waltzing Matilda, the bunyip puts his billy on to boil. Then, in a perfect bookending of the plot, the text from the beginning is repeated "Late that night, for no particular reason, something stirred in the black mud at the bottom of the billabong."

Mood - this moves from optimistic, to hopeful, to devastated, to resignation and back to happiness all in a 32 page picture book!

You can listen to a part of the story here read by Nick Cave for The Storybox Library.  With an older class it might interesting to compare The Bunyip of Berkeley's Creek with the 2018 winner from the same category - A Walk in the Bush.  Here is a detailed review of The Bunyip of Berkeley's Creek from the UK. I was interested to read the 1977 Kirkus review which seems to have completely missed all the amazing features of this truly special book.

Here is a student made trailer which gives you a good sense of the story if this book is new to you.

You can read more about Bunyips here.

In 1994 Australia Post issued a stamp with an image from The Bunyip of Berkeley's Creek.

Take a look at this post from my friend at Kinderbookswitheverything where she shares her lesson content reading this book to her youngest students from K-2.