I was ten when I first realized that writing stories was something a person could do, and I became completely hooked with the magic of storytelling. That Christmas, my family received an Apple IIe computer, and I used it to start writing my books. The program I used was called the Bank Street Writer. In a way, I feel as though twenty years ago I began training as a writer under the auspices of this institution, and today is my graduation day.
I'm thrilled that Goose Girl has been honored with the Josette Frank Award. This book began the summer break from graduate school. My brain was fried, and I realized that at some point reading had ceased to be as wonderful as it had been when I was 10 and 12 and 15. That was a tragedy! I wanted to write something that could fill that void. I turned to the Grimm's tale of the goose girl because it had always been a favorite, so strange and lovely and brief that I yearned to know more. This was a story that had survived centuries, and if I was going to devote two years of my life writing a book, I wanted it to be a story that was really worthwhile.
Of course, the actual process is always trickier than it seems when we say, Hey, I'm going to write a book! Naiveté must be a prerequisite for being an author. While struggling through the first draft, I was surprised to find that my biggest challenge was the main character, Ani. In the original fairy tale, there!=s not much to the princess. She does what she's told and seems as passive as fictional girls come. My first temptation was to do what some other writers had done<breve>give the girl a sword, wanderlust, and feminist sensibilities, and send her off to do battle. It was a hard temptation to resist, but ultimately I felt like I needed to be true to the original story. It told of a girl who was not prepared for the challenges set before her, who struggled and felt weak, but found her own kind of strength.
I was so worried what the reaction would be to Ani and was stunned and elated to find that readers embraced her. It seems we would all like to be the one who steals a sword and rides out seeking adventure, but many of us have those parts that are afraid, ready to stay safe and cozy if not forced out the door. But when truly challenged, we find depths and resources we never imagined. I believe in the fairy tale happy ending. To me it's not about being the prettiest girl at the ball or enacting a just death upon the wicked-- it's about surviving, finding our very real strengths, finding our place in the world, and living happily every day.
Thanks to Amy Lu Jameson, Victoria Wells Arms and Bloomsbury for believing in the strength of stories. And thank you, Bank Street Children's Book Committee, for this amazing honor.
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Yesterday I Had the Blues
Written by Jeron Ashford Frame, Illustrated by R. Gregory Christie
(Tricycle Press)
by Jeron Ashford Frame
Thank you so much for honoring me with the Claudia Lewis Poetry Award. It is especially meaningful to me because, until recently, I hadn't realized that I'd actually written a poem! Ever since a rather disastrous poetry unit in ninth grade, when I learned that poetry was "not my thing," I'd stuck pretty much to prose, churning out term papers and essays and articles through college and graduate school. Then as a curriculum editor, it was instructional copy and the occasional fun little story. When I got the idea for Yesterday I Had the Blues, it was in the rhythm of the blues genre, in the drawn-out vowel sounds and punctuated consonants, the pace of the story varying according to which color I was working with. It was a story with rhythm, a story with an aspect of musicality. But a poem? The word didn't even occur to me.
I wrote Yesterday I Had the Blues for a specific purpose. My sister was in art school at the time and was taking a course in children's book illustration. She needed something to illustrate. So I said, let me see what I can come up with. As I worked with the concept, the words, and the rhythm, the visual aspect of the story was always in the forefront. Were particular phrases "image-laden" enough to inspire an artist--and the reader, too, for that matter? Well, my sister got an A. And Gregory Christie, the illustrator for the published edition, created the most amazing pictures, intertwining color and mood and movement with the words, so that the end result is more than just a story with pictures. I think, maybe, it's poetry!
As my children have gone through elementary school and middle school to high school, I've been tremendously pleased with how educators today are integrating skills and subject matter. During one month, for example, the entire school researched, read about, wrote about, looked at, drew, tasted, smelled, touched, climbed, crawled through, built, listened to and sang about the rain forest. This is learning. And this is also poetry.
We create so many opposites in life, draw lines between so many either-or's. Prose or poetry, left brain or right brain, words or pictures. But those lines are merely human-made. We near-sighted people actually have an advantage. We can see things in two different ways: clearly and impressionistically. One of my favorite Christmas traditions, after putting up the decorations, is to sit back, take off my glasses and look at the Christmas tree. The lights are as big as dinner plates! They blur together and yet they also break up into hundreds of separate particles of color.
Thank you, Claudia Lewis and the members of the Bank Street College of Education community, for helping me to blur the lines by which I defined my writing. This award is truly inspiring. Thank you.
by R. Gregory Christie
It is so very hard to verbally describe a simple thing in a way that other people can really understand it. Due to the many diversities involved, what is construed as being simple to one individual is very complex to another. There are different forms of culture, age, experience, language and circumstance. These various dynamics tend to complicate my task as a children's book artist. However they are important enough to acknowledge while conveying the verbal in to the visual.
Take for example snowflakes fluttering to the ground. Try to explain your great tale to someone in Malaysia or the West Indies. Inadvertently, let them explain to you about biting into a rambotan, cainito or star apple. It's all so simple and natural to each individual culture but unless there's a person to transform these cultural delights in to human delights, things seem to get complicated. I tend to be very visual with my descriptions, a "turn right at the Mc Donalds ,make your way down to that Banco Popular in Union square then turn left" type of thing. Or a man that relies upon universal sensations to get my point across. I'd describe a snow flutter as a big bag of feathers floating down all around you (but with a continuously enveloping atmospherical flow.) A Malaysian rambotan? Depending whom I'm talking to, as a hybrid of an oversized grape intermixed with an undersized pear. Visuals and status quo type sensations will get one very far with describing one's point. In any creative venture that I embark upon, I try to tap into the essence of what I'm describing by using abstractions which embrace the viewer while at the same time challenging them.
With regard to the visuals of Yesterday I Had the Blues, I felt a need for balance. I wanted to be whimsical with the palette and family depiction in order to compliment the main character's very real emotional state. I consider the style to have elements of cartooning with touches of impressionism and realism. I take each project on for different reasons but this one was more about finding a way to communicate a manuscript which I found to work on two levels. Primarily as an adorable tale. A child complaining about pink butterfly clips one day and raving about oatmeal cookies on another was such an adept depiction of puerility it gave me a lot to visually create from. Even more importantly to me was the second level of this manuscript, a child's ability to abstractly communicate his emotional state.
Known as the "quiet kid" for a good part of my life, I eventually became the "quiet artist" in time. My art became something very serious for me at the age of five because it was my conduit to the outside world. It was a means for my eyes and ears to communicate that which my mouth could not. To this day I am learning to be social. Learning to verbally communicate my feelings to anyone interested. The spoken word is not my natural way to connect to the world. So upon first reading the manuscript I saw the therapeutic value in this project. A chance to help a little one to find a way to communicate what's inside of them. Yesterday I Had the Blues goes along with a personal ideology to only do books that will connect people to culture and history.
Congratulations to Jeron and thank you very much to all the supporters of this wonderful manuscript turned children's book.
and
The Way a Door Closes
Written by Hope Anita Smith, Illustrated by Shane W. Evans
(Henry Holt Books for Young Readers)
by Hope Anita Smith
It's a pleasure to be here. I want to thank the Bank Street Committee and everyone for this honor. They asked me to talk about how I came to write this book and so I wanted to share with you, where this book came from. The impetus for it, so to speak, is based on a poem that I wrote called "Wisdom." I won't tell you about it, I'll just read it. I always hate when authors or poets get up and say, "This was a poem that I wrote when I was in California, in the high desert and the sun was beating down on my face . . ." I think a good poem should speak for itself.
Wisdom (copyright © Hope Anita Smith)
It's called divorce
and what it means is
you'll probably never have your favorite sneakers
when you need them
because they will be
there
in your other room
on the other side of town.
And you won't be able to play ball
on Sundays with the guys
because Dad will have this really sad look in his eyes
that says,
"I only get to see you on weekends.
This is our time.
You can play ball anytime."
And you'll have to be polite
to a lot of ladies and men
who will smile
and try to make you believe
that you're the kid they've always wanted.
But it's not all bad.
For the first time in a long time
you can take your hands
away from your ears at night
and fall asleep
to street sounds
and distant music on radios
instead of the tune of yelling and doors slamming
that sounded like a lullaby gone wrong.
And Mom and Dad will feel so bad about what they're doing to us
it'll be just like Christmas
every day
for a little while, anyway.
So don't worry
you'll be O.K.
I got your back, little brother.
So from this poem began the beginnings of The Way a Door Closes. I had set out to write a collection of poems that just dealt with feelings; and, my editor, Christy Ottaviano, in her infinite wisdom, led me down the road to telling a story. I couldn't figure out exactly how I was going do that in poems. I've heard writers say, "I didn't write the book. The book wrote itself. The characters spoke to me." I thought that was the most ridiculous thing I've ever heard. Until you are writing a book and that's what happens to you. CJ came to me and started telling me his story.
CJ introduced me to his family in the very first poem, Golden, and I got to meet all these wonderful people. I was able to put my grandmother in this book in the character of CJ's grandmother. My grandmother was a very strong woman; she was the backbone of our family and I think that comes across very well in this book. She was a spiritual woman. She sang every day. She believed that when it rains you have to turn off all the TV's and sit in the dark. When it was thundering and lightening, she said God was talking. So we all had to be quiet and listen.
I felt a very great sense of responsibility to CJ and this family. I introduced a father who is, I think, a wonderful man; he loves his family, he loves his children. Yet there's something so devastating about losing your job and not being able to provide for those that you love. In a moment of misjudgment, he leaves the family. There is a choice to be made about whether he is going to stay away or if he is going to return. As a person who's not had great experiences with fathers, I finally figured out why CJ was not a Claudia or a Carol Jane and why he is in fact Cameron James. I found it very difficult, in my selfishness I think, to give a female character a wonderful father when I hadn't had one. It was so much easier to write it from the perspective of a boy. I could embrace CJ's father when it wasn't from a girl's point of view. I found that very interesting. If you had said to me, "Write a story about a boy whose father leaves," I would have said, "But I know nothing about being a boy. I don't know how to write it." Actually, as I've been working on the second book, which is a companion to this one, I've bought tons of books. You wouldn't believe how many books there are about girls; how they feel and what they think, but very few about boys. I want to write about what it is like when boys fall in love. It's not the same as it is with us. Women are very direct when we fall in love. It's a whole other ball game with men! Like the book Men Are from Mars, Women Are from Venus explains, it's a different way of thinking. I didn't want to impose my feelings about what I thought love would be like for CJ. And so I had to do my homework and talk to young men to figure that out.
So all of this is basically how I came to write The Way a Door Closes. I wanted the father to come home. I wanted to send a message out to African-American boys, as well as children in general whose parents are separated, who will someday be fathers themselves. When you make mistakes, you can right them. You don't have to go out and start a whole new family, counting the first as a loss. You can say, "I'm sorry." As adults we have a hard time saying I'm sorry to children. And I think it's something we have to learn to do because it is not a sign of weakness; it is a sign of great strength.
In closing, because I have so many friends here, I'm going to share a song with you. This song is for everyone who has ever wanted to write. It's about the process. And it goes like this: (To the tune of Billy Hill's Glory of Love) :
You've got to write a little, fight a little,
And even stay up nights a little,
Then they say, you see,
That's the way to be a writer.
You've got to schmooze a little, read the news a little,
And even get the blues a little.
Then they say, you see,
That's the way to be a writer.
Here's the bridge:
I sit all day all by myself
With only words for company.
And with some luck, a little elf,
Comes and writes them down for me.
You just submit a little, read Kidlit a little,
And even say ? My goodness, a little,
Then they say, you see,
That's the way to be a writer.
Thank you.
by Shane W. Evans
Hello to all.
I am proud to be a part of a book and an author so very deserving of all of the praise that is being bestowed. I knew when I first read the words of Hope Anita Smith that this was a special piece. I was struck with visuals like a dream and for me as an artist that triggers the catalyst for my creation and imagination. From the moment I read I was swept up into the story and couldn't put it down. Fascinated by the characters and the presentation of the characters by the author.
An exclamation for greatness was stamped on this text for me when I met the author in person. So gracious and humble, which to me represents a true potential and existence of greatness. I find only in humility can growth take place. Anita to me is like a quick growing seed, her first published literary piece is just notion of the strong works to come. She is BOUND to be a long giving tree that will bear the tastiest of literary fruits. SO BE READY TO HARVEST!
Although I am not there in person I am certainly there in spirit.
So in the spirit of KUDOS from illustrator to author, in my absence please give (NOT A ROUND of applause)... but a round of fingersnaps...
I have always thought this sounded more like rain... so let all of your goodness rain down on this great seed that has brought for us this wonderful fruit, The Way The Door Closes!
CONGRATULATIONS ANITA!
For:
Hana's Suitcase
By Karen Levine
(Albert Whitman & Co.)
Thank you for the wonderful honour you have given me today. I am truly thrilled to receive the Flora Steiglitz Straus Award. I only wish I could be there to receive it. But the day after tomorrow, I'm leaving for Germany and England to share Hana's Suitcase with children and adults there.
Hana's Suitcase is a story that reaches over 70 years of history, three generations and three continents. It is the story of Hana Brady- who was born in Nove Mesto, Czechoslovakia on May 16, 1931 and died in a gas chamber at Auschwitz at the age of 13. It's the story of Fumiko Ishioka, a remarkable young woman, so dedicated to sharing the story of Hana with Japanese children that she spent a year searching for it. And it's the story of George Brady, Hana's brother, the only member of his family to survive the Holocaust. It's a tragedy, a mystery, and a tale of perseverance and hope. And it all came together because of an old brown suitcase.
I first read of Hana's Suitcase in December of 2000 in a community newspaper. My heart started to beat. I fell in love with the story instantly.
This was a different kind of Holocaust story. It had at its centre a terrible sadness, one we all know too well. But it had a modern layer to it that lifted it up, that had connection, and even redemption.
Fumiko runs a small holocaust education centre for children in Tokyo. She receives a loan of some artifacts connected to children from the museum at Auschwitz, One of the objects--the only one with a name and a birthdate on it--is the suitcase. Encouraged by the children who come to the centre, she spends a year scouring the world for the story behind the suitcase. Her search--full of pitfalls, setbacks, coincidences and miracles finally leads her to Toronto and George Brady, Hana's surviving brother.
I've worked in public radio--for the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation--for 24 years. I knew right away that I wanted to make a radio documentary about Hana's Suitcase. I did. And it aired in January 2001.
After it aired my friend Margie, who is a publisher and the daughter of survivors, called me and said I had to turn the story into a book. But I'd never written a book before and I had a full time job, and I have a son who was then six. But the story wouldn't leave me alone. Six months later, I started to write. And the book got done.
The response from children-- and their wonderful teachers and librarians - has been astounding. George Fumiko and I are all inundated with letters. Children respond to a whole range of things in this story. They respond to the simple story of one child. They respond to the truth of it, the photographs, the mystery, the idea that kids--like the children of Small Wings in Japan-- can DO something to make the world a better place. The idea of "holocaust fatigue", so much talked about now, has no meaning for them. They connect the experience of Hana, George and Fumiko to their own lives. They are shocked to learn that racism can have deadly consequences. They say they'll appreciate their siblings differently, and maybe behave differently in the schoolyard when someone is treated badly simply for who they are.
The suitcase and an exhibition about Hana travel constantly all over Japan where the book has sold over 100,000 copies. By the end of this year it will be out in 26 countries.
But here's the greatest thrill. George's daughter Lara told me about how terribly George suffered with nightmares about his sister, for as long as she could remember. With the discovery of the suitcase and the publication of Hana's story, George's nightmares have stopped. His sister's death and life now have tremendous meaning-- beyond his memory-- and are tools in the fight against anti-semitism, racism, against intolerance of all kinds. And Hana Brady has finally realized her dream of becoming a teacher.
I am so grateful to all the educators and librarians who work so hard - often in very difficult circustances - to make life-changing connections between kids, writers and books. Thank you again for this great honour.
Given this year to honor Karla Kuskin as exhibited in a collection of her work
Moon, Have You Met My Mother?
By Karla Kuskin, Illustrated by Sergio Ruzzier
by Karla Kuskin
The very idea of a lifetime achievement award is overwhelming. It hasmade me feel really old. That might explain why I am walking out herelike a little old lady, BUT I am not really as old as I appear today.Simpler explanation: The day before yesterday I broke a bone in myfoot. The fifth metatarsal. This is an accident that has to do withwearing clogs and not looking where you're going.
Enough about my foot, I've been asked to read the last poemin Moon, Have You Met My Mother? I love beginning with an ending, and ending with a beginning so let me..er..begin. (At this precise point I looked up and saw two beloved faces that I had not seen since I visited them in England in October. They, and my two wonderful granddaughters have just moved back to New York.) There you are my darling son and my darling daughter-in-law. Let me read to you.
Thoughts that were put into words have been said.
The words were then spoken
and written
and read.
Take a look and go on
we are practically done.
The leftover afternoon light
slips away
on a wind like a sigh.
Watch the day curtains close,
hear the wind going grey
at the edge of the edge
you and I
turn the page
read its message
"The End."
Does the end mean good-bye?
Under the circumstances, it does not. But when I realized that lifetime achievement rhymed with bereavement, I knew I was in good shape. I had the material I needed.
A lifetime achievement award
is not what you suppose.
It is not a cause for bereavement.
Rather it is one of those causes
for applause because
it is not
about fortune or fame.
Instead it provides a frame
for what one has done
underneath the nightly moon,
spinning around in snow or sun.
So no matter the time or season,
a lifetime achievement award
gives you a reason
to feel either weaker or stronger.
For instance, you could just call it quits
knowing you have achieved something,
Or you could continue on doing whatever they gave you the award for,
at least a little bit longer.
To which I added the following lines:
And now, as this award is awarded to me,
I shall continue doing what I do,
standing here with my white, white hair on
in my brand new,
Velcro shoe.
(And at that point I wiggled my injured foot in its big, black, Velcroshoe and the audience response was so satisfying, such loud clearlaughter, that I quit talking all together.)
Thank you very much.
(The verse I did not read goes this way--it is about talking and writing and any creative work, except breaking a bone in your foot. It is also rather specifically about beginnings and endings.)
Without a beginning there wouldn't be an ending.
Without a piece of paper
you wouldn't need a pen.
Consider the beginning
then when you've found the ending
go back to the beginning
and begin again...
again.
by Sergio Ruzzier
Good morning and thank you for inviting me here.
It was not easy for me to find a spot in the children's book world. Ten years ago, when I came to this country, editors and art directors and agents kept telling me that my style was too disturbing, too sophisticated, too European (what an insult), or simply too weird. So, while trying to make a living as an editorial illustrator, doing drawings for The New Yorker, The New York Times and the usual list of publications, I sort of gave up showing my work to children's book publishers.
But then, about four years ago, I had the luck to meet a couple of publishers who didn't seem too disgusted looking at my drawings. One of them was Laura Geringer, who saw a bunch of pen and ink sketches I did of a little cockroach and thought of giving me a chance to work on Karla Kuskin's anthology of poems.
Of course I was honored and delighted, that was an incredible opportunity, but a little worried too, since Laura and Tamar Brazis, who was an editor at Laura Geringer Books at the time, warned me that Karla was going to be very picky about the art, and that she would check every little mark I did. And I was supposed to do 150 drawings.
At the same time, they didn't give me a specific direction to follow, they let me very free. So, I started drawing and it was very easy and pleasant, the ideas would come out naturally after reading the poems.
The time came for Karla to see and approve the drawings, and I was quite nervous.Well, she did want me to change something: she asked me if it was ok for me to add some whiskers to a rabbit in a cooking pot... And that was it.
Thank you all.