That year also saw the outbreak of the Spanish Civil War. It seemed that their publisher was only mildly enthusiastic about it and so only one-and-a-half-thousand copies were originally published. For this reason, its initial release was rather modest. Published by Viking Press in 1936, the release of Ferdinand came during the era of the Great Depression. 'Once upon a time in Spain there was a little bull and his name was Ferdinand'
Banned in Spain, burnt by Hitler and continuously dissected and deconstructed, The Story of Ferdinand remains, to this day, a fascinating example of the power of picturebooks. In no time at all their picturebook was being labelled as subversive and it was stirring up all kinds of international controversy. What was even more surprising was the reaction that the simple story was getting. Two years later the book had sold more than twelve times that amount. Indeed, they even joked that their publication had the potential to go on and sell twenty-thousand copies.
Yet once the words were combined with Lawson's beautiful black-and-white etchings, the pair felt quite satisfied with the outcome. Leaf was himself rather modest about the work remarking once that he had written it in less than forty minutes.
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