The Man Who Walked Between the Towers is written and illustrated by Mordicai Gerstein. It is written mainly for 3-4 grade students and I rate this book 4 out of 5 stars.
This book tells the story about Philippe Petit who strung a wire between the two towers of the World Trade Center and walked across in a daring act (See video of it HERE) . He had previously walked between the two steeples of Notre Dame in Paris, where he was from. Since the idea of him doing this seemed too dangerous to the owners of the towers and the police, he had to secretly plan to get the wire up and walk across. Since the buildings were in the end stages of being built, he dressed as a construction worker and snuck in. As he walked the wire when day broke, he was spotted and everyone began to gather around the towers to see. Immediately, there were several policemen on the roofs of both towers, demanding that he come to the end of the wire to be arrested. He danced around on the wire and even lay down. When he went before a judge after being arrested, the judge ordered that he perform in the park for children. The last two pages of the book are somewhat ominous. After describing his act in the park, the next page shows the New York City skyline without the towers (presumably after 9/11) and the last page reads “But in memory, as if imprinted on the sky, the towers are still there. A part of that memory is the joyful morning, August 7, 1974, when Philippe Petit walked between them in the air.”
Since this book is geared toward elementary students, it is pretty acceptable that the author just glazed over the whole day of 9/11 to not distract the reader from the story at hand. However, just simply stating “Now the towers are gone” can lead some students to be confused and wanting to know more. The author could mention September 11, 2001 without going into too much detail. Readers need something to go off of, especially students currently in elementary school who were babies in 2001.  |
| Images of Philippe Petit walking from tower to tower |
The illustrations of Philippe stringing up the wire at night are so great because they remind the reader that the act is taking place under the cover of darkness but still allows them to see everything that is going on. Gerstein does a great job making the city glow beneath them and keeping the foreground dim. Also the way in which the illustrations appear on each page is different: some pages have three long, panoramic illustrations (representing the sunrise as he gets ready to walk the wire), some take up the whole page, and some have two on one page with text dividing them in the middle. It allows the reader to constantly be surprised by what they are seeing next.
Obviously this is a story that is not told very often, so any opportunity to explain a true event like this to children through a picture book is awesome. The way in which the author juxtaposes the loss of the towers and the image of hope and happiness in Philippe in the last two pages is a great way for children to consider the literary elements. They can consider something that is sad that happened in their lives and compare it with something better, but still related. The teacher can also select random acts in history like this one that are free of political or cultural ties for students to discuss. Since it is just so extraordinary, students may have a great time exploring other events like this one in the classroom through a reading and writing activity. The rhythm used in this story can also be discussed in depth. It is not quite a rhyme on every page, but the author does incorporate some sort of pattern in writing style, so students can develop their own writing style and form when writing of another event in history.
Here is a lesson plan for this book that analyzes character traits: http://www2.scholastic.com/browse/collateral.jsp?id=32439
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