Before Shrek made it big on the silver screen, there was William Steig's Shrek! , a book about an ogre who leaves his swampy childhood home to see the world. In this modern classic from Caldecott and Newbery Medal winner William Steig, Shrek, a horrid little ogre, goes out into the world to find adventure and along the way encounters a witch, a knight in armor, a dragon, and finally marries the most stunningly ugly princess on the planet.