Lucille Clifton's Everett Anderson

The other day I searched online for Lucille Clifton’s poem “Blessing the Boats.” The sparse words and vivid imagery it evokes somehow lifts me when I’m a little bit blue. While online I discovered that Clifton wrote more than 16 children’s books, including a series of eight books about a character named Everett Anderson.

Like her poetry, the words of her children’s book resonate with honesty and brevity.

After my journey on the web, I felt compelled to visit my local library to find some of her children’s books. I checked out One of the Problems of Everett Anderson; Everett Anderson’s Nine Month Long; Everett Anderson’s Friend; Everett Anderson’s Year; and Everett Anderson’s 1, 2 3.

In One of the Problems of Everett Anderson, the main character is faced with a difficult dilemma. When Everett’s friend Greg comes to school with bruises, he agonizes about what to do. The story sensitively deals with the confusing issue of abuse for a young child.

Artist Ann Grifalconi, who has illustrated six other books in the Everett Anderson series, renders warm colorful images in what appears to be pastel. Expressive eyes and gestures support the pensive story.

Grifalconi’s illustration skills radiate in other books in the series also including her use of simple line drawings in Everett Anderson’s Friend, that challenges a young boy’s conception of having a girl as a buddy, and the richly detailed pencil drawings in Everett Anderson’s Nine Month Long, a story that draws upon a child’s anxiety about a new addition in the family.

Lucille Clifton is a distinguished poet, writer and educator and served as poet Laureate of Maryland. She is currently Distinguished Professor of Humanities at St. Mary’s College of Maryland.

Posted in June, 2008

A Telling Evening with Alice McGill

One summer afternoon I visited with professional storyteller, Alice McGill in her home in Maryland. We sat down and ate a hearty dinner with her husband, and she talked about many things including growing up in a small farming community in Scotland Neck, North Carolina with her seven siblings. She reminisced about how storytelling and reading were some of her favorite activities as a young girl and how she was often asked to tell stories by family members. McGill, who is also an award winning author, has traveled extensively throughout the United States, Canada, South Africa and the West Indies to collect and tell stories.

After dinner Alice invited me upstairs and shared some photos of her family with me. I was struck by a beautiful photo of her on the wall taken decades ago by a professional photographer. Very artfully composed, the photo accentuated Alice’s flawless skin, large striking eyes and high cheekbones. She told me about her career as a print model and actress. She shared her portfolio of black and white images with me. I was fascinated.

It’s been many years since Alice and I met at a Washington Children’s Book Guild meeting in Washington, D.C. and have since participating in several book events in the metropolitan area together. I was excited to include the cover of one of her books Here We Go Round, in the painted mural I created at the Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial library in dontown Washington in the children’s division.

Towards night fall, Alice showed me her children’s book Way Up and Over Everything, a long-ago story passed on through many generations in her family, and told to her as a child by her great grandmother. The picture book recently received the Junior Library Guild’s Spring 2008 Premier Selection Award. Additionally she told me, the Horn Book just gave Way Up and Over Everything a starred review.

I left Alice’s home that evening feeling so lucky to have shared an evening with such a gifted and spirited friend.

Posted in June, 2008

Determined Fifth Graders Get Published

While browsing my local bookstore one day, a bookseller called my attention to a book published by some fifth graders in Virginia called The Adventures of Danny and Spike Underground written by Sean Pickering and Scott Morrill, and illustrated by Dylan Peacock, all classmates in a school in Aldie, Virginia.

"Perfect", I thought. This would be great to send to my nephew in Chicago who's been writing like crazy these days and very anxious to get published. To actually hold a book in his hands written, illustrated and published by kids his age would surely give him a boost, I thought.

Apparently, the book all started with Sean, the main writer, and a sentence written when he was in second grade. "I'm Danny and I'm a regular boy", he wrote. This simple sentence grew into a fantasy story about kids, talking dogs and a magic subway ride that captures the imagination of kids. The colorful cover illustrated by classmate Dylan is imaginative. The illustration within the circular design in the center, surrounded by bold black patterning, brings readers in.

Driven to get their book published, the classmates put their money together to get five initial copies printed. Later their parents pitched in and paid for more copies.

The 78-page book has sold more than 500 copies since it came out in October. One day it sold more than even Harry Potter, a local bookseller told me. Since then the boys have had newspaper interviews and have done numerous book signings throughout the region. Not bad for three young boys determined to get their book idea, developed in the back of a school bus, to print.

Posted in May, 2008

A Walk In Your Shoes

I was lucky to work recently with at-risk high school students in a unique program at Pyramid Atlantic Art Center called Telling Your Own Story. In this after-school program Gilchrist Center for Cultural Diversity youth volunteers and students learned how to use their own personal experience in combination with visual art to produce autobiographical art works. The program was developed by the Arts and Humanities Council of Montgomery County, in collaboration with several non-profit organizations.

The students created artists books made from their own shoes, as an invitation to viewers to walk a mile in their shoes. Students were prompted to bring in shoes that had an interesting story behind them and painted, glued, stenciled and collaged images on them. They also created small accordion books with images from their stories.

I watched the students faces light up as storyteller and artist Ellouise Schoettler told her story of her visit to Egypt many years ago and held up the sandal that she wore. She later taught the students how to tell their own autobiographical stories. I brought in my Salsa shoes and talked about ways that I could decorate them with hot peppers and sequin and shared my stories about dancing.

At first the students seemed puzzled about exactly what we wanted them to achieve. Many of them hadn’t had much experience with art. Some of them struggled with words, since many spoke English as a second language. But after a few sessions we broke down many of the barriers and shyness and they freely shared aspects of their lives.

Posted in May, 2008