“Happiness is a how; not a what. A talent, not an obect.” – Hermann Hesse
Years ago I discovered one of the most interesting picture books I’ve even seen. It’s Topsys & Turvys by Peter Newell, first published in 1902. A Topsy & Turvy is a picture (drawings in the book) that shows one scene when viewed right side up but shows another scene when viewed up-side down. In the book, Newell annotates each drawing with a creative couplet, one line for each view. In all, Newell’s book contains 74 Topsy & Turvy pictures.
Intrigued by the book, its pictures and Topsy & Turvy pictures in general, I set off on goal of creating my own Topsy & Turvy picture. I quickly found this task to be very challenging, but I persevered and created a few Topsy & Turvy pictures of my own. Recently, I animated some of my original drawings (with Adobe Flash) so that they will turn upside-down on request. I have included two interactive Topsy & Turvy puzzles below.
For each Topsy & Turvy picture, just select “click here” to turn the picture. The first is called “Little Johnnie”.
The second Topsy & Turvy picture is called “Tricky Nik”.
I hope you enjoyed these original Topsy & Turvy pictures. Challenge yourself and others to come up with an original Topsy & Turvy, it’s fun and rewarding. I will preset more in future posts. Please pass these onto others who may enjoy them and remember, please click LIKE below if you like them!
In order to use the interactive portion above, you need to have Adobe Flash enabled.
Tags: Topsy Turvy