ABSTRACT
This chapter explores that most of the children, even the very young, were aware of, and responded to, tensions within Zoo and that this was one of the features of the book they found so challenging and absorbing. The image of the gorilla is one of the most powerful in Zoo. This dignified, thoughtful, wise-looking gorilla seems young at the top of the picture and older at the bottom, depicted against a structure which could be a cage or a window, but also forms the shape of a cross. One of the reasons the children were encouraged to work at an analytical level in examining Zoo is that they were emotionally involved with the book. Zoo describes as a prime example of an ironic picturebook as Kummerling-Meibauer explains: Ironic meaning comes into being as consequence of a relationship, dynamic, performative bringing together of the said and the unsaid, each of which takes on meaning only in relation to the other.
