Alphabet Books

Formerly manifest in hornbooks and primers, alphabet books remain essentially intended for juveniles.  In pop-ups, these alphabet books often combine the concept of letter forms with related basic literacy fundamentals like colors and word forms.  As elaborate paper sculptures, pop-up alphabet books have also found a devoted following among adults.

Marion Bataille.  ABC3D.  New York:  Roaring Brook Press, 2008.

The motion caused through handling is essential in appreciating this book—movable parts, pop-ups, and visual dynamics all combine to represent the twenty-six letters of the alphabet.
Marion Bataille is a French book designer.  ABC3D represents her first American release and was awarded Bank Street Best Children’s Book of the Year and the 2010 Meggendorfer Prize.

Ronald King.  Alphabeta Concertina.  Guildford, Surrey:  Circle Press, 1983.

Constructed in double accordion fold format, with the paper cut at each fold to form pop-up letters.
[Jane Webster Pearce Collection].

Scott McCarney.  Alphabook 3.  Rochester, N.Y.:  S. McCarney, 1986.

Bound dos-à-dos in accordion fold format; editioned in fifty copies.
[Jane Webster Pearce Collection].

Keith Moseley.  The Bible Alphabet.  Nashville:  Broadman & Holman, 1998.

Chuck Murphy.  Animal Babies A to Z.  Los Angeles:  Intervisual Books, 2007.

Murphy combines pull-tab and pop-up mechanisms in a single construction, a compound feature uncommon in “movable book” design.

David Pelham.  ABC Fun:  Applebee Cat’s Activity Alphabet.  New York:  Dutton Children’s Books, 1997.

Jan Pieńkowski’s ABC Dinosaurs and Other Prehistoric Creatures.  New York:  Lodestar Books, 1993 (Intervisual Books).

Paper engineering by Rodger Smith and Helen Balmer.

Dean Walley’s The Action Alphabet:  Fun from A to Z.  Kansas City, Mo.:  Hallmark Children’s Editions, 1972.

Illustrated by Don Fusco; paper mechanics by Dick Dudley.