Line #25 Literature/FrogAndToad


1	[[quoteright:350:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/frog_and_toad.png]]
2	[[caption-width-right:350:Once upon a time there were two good friends, a frog and a toad...[[note]]Toad on the left and Frog on the right.[[/note]]]]
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4
5	A series of children's books by Arnold Lobel, concerning the adventures of Frog and Toad, who are friends.
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7	The series consists of:
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9	* ''Frog and Toad are Friends'' (1970) (Caldecott Honor award)
10	* ''Frog and Toad Together'' (1972) ([[MediaNotes/NewberyMedal Newbery Honor]] award)
11	* ''Frog and Toad All Year'' (1976)
12	* ''Days with Frog and Toad'' (1979)
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14	There is a musical adaptation called ''Theatre/AYearWithFrogAndToad''. The stories were animated for Creator/TheBBC schools programme ''Words and Pictures''.
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16	There are two [[AnimatedAdaptation Animated Adaptations]]. The first, made by Churchill Films in 1985, used Claymation and adapted two ''Frog and Toad'' books. Frog and Toad were voiced by [[SopranoAndGravel Will Ryan and Hal Smith]]. Creator/AppleTVPlus created a second adaptation in 2023, and uses traditional 2D animation with the voices of Creator/NatFaxon as Frog and Creator/KevinMichaelRichardson as Toad.
17	----
18	!!This series provides examples of:
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20	* AmbiguouslyGay:
21	** Frog and Toad have several moments where they act more like partners than friends. However, their orientation and the nature of their friendship is forever shrouded in ambiguity because Arnold Lobel died of AIDS complications before he could get the chance to elaborate on the nature of Frog and Toad's relationship.
22	** [[WordOfStPaul Lobel's daughter Adrianne]] has commented that her father came out as gay a few years after he wrote the first Frog and Toad book; she theorizes that writing the book, with its close friends of the same sex, was the beginning of that process for him.
23	* TheAtoner: Toad, being more prone to losing his temper than Frog, is equally prone to try to find a way to make amends for his mistakes, be it giving Frog his coat after they spend the day looking for a lost button or being extra kind to his seeds after he yells at them.
24	* BarefootCartoonAnimal: Frog and Toad wear jackets and trousers, but no shoes. Interestingly, when they go swimming, Toad wears a bathing suit but Frog does not.
25	%%* ButtMonkey: Toad.
26	* CaretakerReversal: In one of the books, Toad tries to cheer up Frog because he's sick, but tires himself out from the effort. By the time Frog is feeling better, Toad is so exhausted that the two switch places.
27	* CarnivoreConfusion: Frog and Toad themselves are only shown eating human foods such as cookies, ice cream, and sandwiches. However, ''being'' eaten by predators is a legitimate fear for them.
28	* CivilizedAnimal: Frog and Toad live in human-like houses, wear clothes, and eat cookies and ice cream. However, they are also realistically scaled against other animals and objects in their environment, and fear predators such as snakes and hawks.
29	* ConformingOOCMoment: At the end of the chapter "The Swim" in ''Frog and Toad Are Friends'', Toad reluctantly comes out of the water, [[EmbarrassmentPlot revealing his embarrassing swimsuit]]. A turtle, some lizards, a snake, a field mouse, and Frog laugh at him, which is strange since Frog is often more sympathetic to Toad's plights.
30	* CrazyPrepared: Toad tries to enact this trope by gathering several items with which to rescue Frog, whom Toad imagines to be in great danger. [[spoiler:Frog is just fine.]]
31	* DidntThinkThisThrough: In "Ice Cream," Frog comments that some ice cream would be just the thing to cool down on a hot summer's day. Toad rushes to the local store and purchases two cones, but fails to accommodate for the sun melting them; by the time he returns to Frog, he's not only covered in melted chocolate, but has picked up various detritus along the way. Once Frog helps him wash off, they realize that they should [[CouldHaveAvoidedThisPlot go to the store together and eat the ice cream there.]]
32	* ADogNamedDog: Frog is a frog. Toad is a toad. According to John Clark Matthews, who animated the stop-motion adaptation, he once asked Lobel why he didn't give them actual names. Lobel didn't respond well to the query.
33	-->'''Matthews''': There was a pause while his furnace heated up. [[BerserkButton Then he exploded]]: "Yeah, sure! Frank the Frog! Tom the Toad! Sid the Snail! (etc!)" I felt like a small bug with a tiny brain. But mostly he was a sweet guy-- if you didn't ask too many questions.
34	%%* TheEeyore: Toad.
35	* ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin: It's the story of a frog and a toad who, per the title of the first book, are friends.
36	* GreenAroundTheGills:
37	-->Toad said, "Frog, you are looking quite green."\
38	"But I always look green," said Frog. "I am a frog."\
39	"Today you look very green even for a frog," said Toad.
40	* HeterosexualLifePartners: Frog and Toad are stated multiple times to have a great friendship, do favors for one another, and stick together through thick and thin. It helps that, beyond Frog mentioning a mother and father from his childhood, there's no reference to any other family or friends beyond a few other woodland creatures they chat with.
41	* IgnoredEpiphany: In "Cookies", after he and Toad eat too many cookies, Frog tries to teach about willpower by giving away the rest of them to the birds. Toad walks off and openly announces he's [[HereWeGoAgain now going to bake a cake]].
42	* {{Jerkass}}: The three robins from "The Kite" taunt Toad whenever he tries flying a kite, making fun of him and telling him to give up. Fortunately, Toad gets his kite flying so high that the robins can't catch up.
43	* LowerHalfReveal: In "The Swim", Toad asks Frog not to look while he gets into the water, because he is wearing an OldTimeyBathingSuit. Some other animals come along, and refuse to look away when Toad wants to get out of the water, so he has to reveal his swimsuit to them, and they all laugh.
44	* MistakenForBrooding: In "Days with Frog and Toad", Toad finds a note on Frog's front door saying he wants to be alone. Toad soon sees Frog on an island, looking out in the distance, and he thinks Frog is either moping or angry with him. When he laments having dropped the lunch he made for Frog in the lake, Frog reveals that he is already happy and that he just wanted to be alone to think about how grateful he is about life.
45	* MouseWorld: Despite being anthropomorphized, Frog and Toad are realistically sized compared to the other animals in their setting.
46	* NoPeekingRequest: When the duo goes swimming, Toad asks Frog to look away while he puts on his OldTimeyBathingSuit, and gets in the water. Lots of other animals then come along; Toad gets cold and wants to get out of the water, but the other animals refuse to look away; so they all see his embarrassing swimwear and have a good laugh.
47	* NothingIsScarier: In Toad's dream, he dreams he is the greatest toad in the world. With each act on-stage, Frog gets smaller and smaller until he eventually disappears. Toad realizes he is now alone. He wakes up, and Frog is just fine.
48	* ObsessedAreTheListmakers: In "The List", a story in ''Frog and Toad Together'', Toad makes a list of things to do and sticks to it so rigidly that when the wind blows the list away, he refuses to chase after it because chasing the list wasn't on his list of things to do. Neither of them feel like they can do ''anything'', because they can't quite remember what was on the list. Eventually, when the sun sets, Toad remembers that "go to sleep" was on the list. They write that on the ground, cross it out, and go to sleep right there.
49	* OldTimeyBathingSuit: One story revolves around Toad wearing one of these and trying to not be seen while wearing it.
50	* RedOniBlueOni: Toad is more selfish and irritable while Frog is more relaxed and easygoing.
51	* SeekingTheIntangible: In one book, one of the eponymous amphibians is told that spring is just around the corner. He looks behind literal corners for "spring", and by the time he's ready to give up, spring has already arrived.
52	* ShaggyDogStory: The ending of "The Button", where Frog and Toad go looking for the button that fell off Toad's jacket after believing that they lost it while taking a walk. After finding a number of buttons that aren't his, much to Toad's increasing frustration, Toad finally loses his temper and stomps off home... whereupon he finds his missing button on the floor of his house, having fallen off before the day even started. Toad realizes that he dragged Frog all over the place and threw a fit in front of him over nothing and decides to apologize to Frog by giving Frog his jacket (now adorned with all of the buttons they found).
53	* ShrugOfGod: An in-universe example: Frog refuses to reveal if the scary story he tells in "The Shivers" is true or not.
54	* SickEpisode: "The Story" has Frog getting sick, so Toad decides to let him rest and tries to come up with a story. He walks on the porch, stands on his head, pours water on his head, and bangs his head against the wall to try and think one up. But he ends up getting a headache, while Frog (who now feels better) tells Toad a story, which is all that's described in the chapter.
55	* StealthPun: In the story "The Letter", it's shown that the postal worker for the woodland creatures is a snail. Get it? Snail Mail.
56	* StreisandEffect: In-universe. Toad has Frog ask a turtle to leave the pond they're swimming in because he doesn't want it to see how funny he looks in his OldTimeyBathingSuit. It backfires in that not only does the turtle ''not'' leave when asked, [[NiceJobBreakingItHero but the other animals hear about it and gather round because they now want to see Toad's funny-looking suit.]]
57	* TalkingAnimal: Essentially all the other animals in the stories ''except'' Frog and Toad (who are more {{Civilized Animal}}s). May or may not simply be AnimalTalk, as humans never show up in the series.
58	* TemptingCookieJar: In "Cookies," Frog and Toad try to stop themselves from eating too many cookies. Frog puts them in a box, but Toad points out that they can open the box. After some attempts at making the box increasingly inaccessible (tying the box up with string, putting the tied-up box on a high shelf, and so on), Frog throws the cookies to the birds to [[AnAesop teach Toad about the importance of willpower]]. Toad, however, is sad that they have no more cookies to eat. When Frog points out that they have lots and lots of willpower, [[IgnoredAesop Toad retorts that Frog can keep it all. "I am going home now to bake a cake."]]

Context Literature / FrogAndToad