Colour the stars by Dawn McMillan (author) and Keinyo White (illustrator) opens with :
Isaac and Luke sat together on the stream bank, the water washing over their feet, the bush standing guard behind them.
"Do you know about colours, Luke?" asked Isaac.
Think about that seemingly simple question : "Do you know about colours?".
How do you "know" colour? Do you "know" a colour by how something is visually represented? Do you "know" a colour by how it makes you feel when you see it? Do you "know" a colour by how something of a particular colour smells? Do you "know" what colour something is by the way it sounds?
[spoiler alert -- stop reading now if you don't want to know the story's twist]
What does colour mean to a blind person? In this story, Luke is blind. He says that he doesn't really know what people mean when they talk about colours, but that it is okay because he doesn't need colours.
The friendship between the two boys is key here, Isaac wants to share with Luke that colours aren't just visual, they are a feeling. Together they explore what colour feels like. For instance, if I said "sunshine", what colour do you think of?
Two highlights of this story for me are : the way in which Isaac explains the colour red, and then when Isaac explains about stars, "tiny pieces of yellow [...] against the black", Luke says quietly that he knows what black is. I got goosebumps.
Then Isaac shuts his eyes, and he realises that the world isn't just about colours, it is also about listening and sounds, and about the feelings that link in with those sounds. Luke responds that in his world, this is how it is, filled with sounds and feelings.
For me, this picture book is a great example of how an author's words meld perfectly with an illustrator's representation of the story. The author has written a story of two boys' friendship, and the illustrator has captured the sensations of this story perfectly.
Get hold of a copy of this book (it's available in English and Te Reo Māori), read it to a child you love, and then start a discussion about what colour "feels" like to them, it might surprise you with what you learn.
