1. Animal welfare
2. Anthropomorphism
3. Bears
4. Bullying
5. Cruelty
6. Empathy
7. Freedom
8. Hope
9. Kindness
10. Peace

Elizabeth Stanley creates a moving story about the mistreatment of bears in different parts of the world. The opening line sets the scene: ‘There was once a large brown bear who dreamed of a different life of freedom.’ Yet this is not her life. She is the captive of Haluk, her keeper, who ‘comes clattering at the door of her cage, shouting and swearing and smashing his long wooden rod against the iron bars that surrounded the bear’.

Visiting Greece in 1979, Elizabeth Stanley was disturbed by the captive dancing bears, a common sight across Europe for centuries. To give an insight into this practice and to generate readers’ empathy, she endowed the bear in her story with anthropomorphic attributes. The bear dreams of a life of freedom enjoying forests and mountain streams, fishing with her partner and raising cubs. When Stanley travelled to Istanbul in 1983 for further research, she discovered that the practice of dancing bears had been outlawed in Turkey the day before she arrived.

The elongated landscape format for ‘Deliverance of Dancing Bears’ provides scope for the detailed and crowded village settings with bears performing. Five of these double pages are wordless revealing the bear’s life of freedom while one features the dramatic confrontation between the villagers and Haluk, the bear keeper. Stanley’s artwork, using intensely coloured pastels, stands out against the highly textured canvas background. Colours are vibrant with various shadings of colour that convey the emotional content while inviting the viewer to reject the practice of dancing bears.

‘The Deliverance of Dancing Bears’ was recreated as a stage production by the Barking Gecko Theatre Company in 1996. The book received multiple awards including:
Honour Book, Picture Book category, 1995 CBCA Awards
Shortlisted, WA Premier’s Award, 1995
Shortlisted, Wilderness Society Environment Award, 1995
Shortlisted, K.O.A.L.A. Award, 1996
Shortlisted, Y.A.B.B.A. Award, 1996
Henry Bergh Children’s Book Awards (ASPCA) in the two categories of
Fiction Environment and Ecology plus Illustration, 2003

1. Publishers Weekly review 17 Feb 2003 of ‘The Deliverance of Dancing Bears’ https://www.publishersweekly.com/978-1-929132-41-6
2. Kirkus review 20 May 2010 of ‘The Deliverance of Dancing Bears’ https://www.kirkusreviews.com/book-reviews/elizabeth-stanley/the-deliverance-of-dancing-bears/
3. Elizabeth Stanley’s website includes reviews and commentary on ‘The Deliverance of Dancing Bears’ http://www.elizabethstanley.com.au/reviews.html
4. Wikipedia, World Animal Protection is an international non-profit animal rights organisation whose vision is ‘a world where animals rights matter and animal cruelty has ended’ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_Animal_Protection
5. Bear Conservation ‘Dancing bears’ http://www.bearconservation.org.uk/dancing-bears/