1. Anxiety
2. Art motifs
3. Belonging
4. Collage
5. Compassion
6. Empathy
7. Fantasy
8. Friendship
9. Home
10. Identity
11. Imagination
12. Kindness
13. Mystery
14. Responsibility
15. Sadness
16. Visual literacy

In typical Shaun Tan fashion, ‘The Lost Thing’ has an indeterminant audience. The book is both simple and complex. It is written in a matter-of-fact way, with a young boy directly addressing the reader and inviting a response. Described as a ‘what I did over summer’ story, the hand-lettered text appears on strips of note paper. On a deeper level, the story is about homelessness, bureaucracy and apathy about society’s social conditions.

The book is visually complex. There is no white space. Crowded scenes feature multi-layered images and unrelated text and diagrams. There is much to ponder, for example, visual allusions to well-known artists. Such references are not essential for young readers to respond to the underlying story – finding a home for a lost being. They do however add a level of sophistication aimed at older readers.

The book is large in size, providing space for the intricately detailed artwork in warm gold, rust and brown reflecting an uncaring city. There are jokes and asides and an almost-missed subtitle, ‘a tale for those who have more important things to pay attention to’.

The storyline is simple. A boy ventures out to collect bottle-tops for his collection and runs across a sad and lost thing. They play together and at day’s end, the thing has nowhere to go. The boy’s family rejects the thing but the boy spots a newspaper advertisement advising a place to put ‘lost things’. Once there, the boy is warned: this is a place for ‘forgetting, leaving behind, smoothing over’. Led to another place, they discover an assortment of ‘lost things’ together in happy abandonment across a double vertical page. The thing seems happy so the boy leaves. Later he comments that he sees less of lost things nowadays. Maybe fewer are lost. Maybe he has stopped noticing.

‘The Lost Thing’ is a multi-award winning book, widely translated and transformed into different formats.

In 2011, Shaun Tan and Andrew Ruhemann received an Oscar at the US Academy Awards for the best animated short film, adapted from his book and using the same title.

1. ABC One Plus One: Jane Hutcheon interviews Shaun Tan, 28 Jul 2022 https://www.abc.net.au/education/one-plus-one-an-interview-with-author-shaun-tan/13992832
2. Shaun Tan’s website, ‘The Lost Thing (Book)’ provides Tan’s insights into his story and illustrations https://www.shauntan.net/the-lost-thing-book
3. Copyright Agency Reading Australia, teaching resources for years 7/8 with an essay by Gary Crew https://readingaustralia.com.au/essays/the-lost-thing/
4. ACMI School Program and Resources, Shaun Tan’s ‘The Lost Thing’ including both book and film and various teaching resources https://www.acmi.net.au/education/school-program-and-resources/shaun-tans-lost-thing/
5. Interview by Lilian Darmono with Shaun Tan regarding the film adaptation of ‘The Lost Thing’, 19 Jan 2011 https://motionographer.com/2011/01/19/the-lost-thing-interview-with-shaun-tan/
6. Publishers Weekly review of ‘The Lost Thing’ by Shaun Tan, 31 January 2005 (reviewer unidentified) https://www.publishersweekly.com/9781894965101
7. Markotic, Nicole, ‘Disability and Belonging in Shaun Tan’s The Lost Thing’, Jeunesse Young People Texts Cultures, 6(2): 54-71, 2014 https://www.researchgate.net/publication/276349385_Disability_and_Belonging_in_Shaun_Tan's_The_Lost_Thing
8. NSW Department of Education, Unsworth, L. 2013, ‘Point of view in picture books and animated movie adaptations’, Scan 32(1) https://education.nsw.gov.au/teaching-and-learning/professional-learning/scan/past-issues/vol-32--2013/point-of-view-in-picture-books-and-animated-movie-adaptations