Creature of the Week: Barbapapa

Dear Reader, 

I feel like I begin every article like this but I have a bit of an unconventional creature for you today! While I have looked at a creature that was fully fictional before, the Jabberwock was at best a background element of its own story. The Barbapapas are the stars of their story, which have shined for a long time and have scarcely dimmed. The first time Barbapapa appeared was in 1970, when he emerged from the earth. Like his namesake, cotton candy (or, in French, ‘dad’s beard’ if taken literally), he was a pink blob that could easily reshape himself. His first book begins with a series of rejections; he is rejected from the garden which he grew under for being too large to fit within the house, then rejected from the zoo they sent him to for being too small to fit between the bars of his enclosure. After using his shapeshifting ability to help people, he is able to return to the garden, living in a separate (frankly claustrophobic) house. It is a standard story for many kids' books but there was an obvious aspiration as indicated by it ending with “Good-bye!” instead of a more conclusive “the end” with the image of a second Barbapapa that still lay dormant under the soil. In the second book, the second one was revealed to be Barbamama. Together, they lay seven eggs, which hatch into the barbachildren (this is not a word they use), with very self-explanatory names:  Barbabelle, Barbalala, Barbabright, Barbazoo, Barbabravo, Barbalib, and Barbabeau (my favorite). Outside of that cast the Barbapapas are often accompanied by humans and other animals. Franck, the child who watered Barbapapa, was his first companion and Barbapapa is constantly followed by a flock of birds. The Barbapapas often use shapeshifting to help in emergencies and as a way of communicating themselves. Barbabeau changes his shape to whatever he’s painting, Barbazoo changes into the animal he's following, and Barbalala's tail forms into the instrument she wants to play. One thing I find really cute is that when Barbapapa sees Barbamama his tail forms the outline of a heart. 

The Barbapapa family has long surpassed its creators, and it is hard to find any information about Talus Taylor or Anette Tyson at all. Despite this, whatever can be scrounged seems to have had a great impact on Barbapapa’s creation. Taylor was a biology teacher and that can be seen in the various gadgets and gizmos Barbabright has. Tyson was an architecture student so the buildings that occupy the books are extremely pretty. Their differing cultural backgrounds, specifically that fact that Taylor was American, were also a significant aspect. Barbapapa was created because Taylor didn’t understand why a child was repeating “Baa Baa” over again and Tyson revealed that it meant cotton candy. Taylor’s background in biology also caused the books to have many environmentalist themes. The Barbapapa are essentially plants who emerge out of water with the tip of a watering can. They are also allies of nature, being accompanied by various woodland animals. The books are very anti-industrialist, showing how the Barbapapa’s own acts of manual creation trump those of machines. In one story, the Barbapapas are disappointed by the juice made for them by one of Barbabright’s machines, so they stomp the juice themselves and are much more satisfied. The best example of this, and my favorite Barbapapa story is “Barbapapa’s New House.” In it the Barbapapas renovate a large house to live in, only to get evicted with the rest of their neighborhood. The buildings in the neighborhood get torn down by construction vehicles and the Barbapapas are forced into a cramped apartment. They decide to escape and build their own house with their shapeshifting powers. Eventually the same construction vehicles come to tear even that down, but the family fights back and gumming up the machines so they can keep their home. The series has since been recontextualized and evoked by many ecologists, who praise it for depicting the protection of the environment against industrial forces. 

The Barbapapas, because they shape themselves into whatever form they like, embody self-expression, surrounded by constraining forces around them. They are forced into constraining environments, like the zoo cage in the first story, or the apartment in “Barbapapa’s New House.” However, they are always able to escape those places, and find somewhere they can be happy, which is a very valuable message for kids to learn.