Zetta Elliott's Blog, page 100

on a roll

Next on my dreambook wish list: Ethiopian angels…

Half of my book's pages now have potential illustrations—everything's taped in until I figure out what I really want to do and what else is available… 

dreambook

Went to an art store today and found absolutely nothing that I wanted.  So I came home and tried to figure out how to make a "wish list" for this book.  Of course, I want a bunch of shiny, golden, glittering things—rhinestones, gold thread, copper foil…and that led me to search online for images of illuminated manuscripts.  I found this image from a medieval psalter, and simply cut out Mary Magdalene telling the good news to Jesus' disciples (sorry, Mary!).  It was the border I was after, and don't you know it looks perfect against the wine-colored paint on the first page of my book!  But then I also found an awesome website that provides images of vintage Xmas cards…and now I have a bit of a crisis because I really like this blue image, but the other string of camel-riders is heading in the right direction, is the right color scheme, and gives the impression of a caravan, which is what I want.  But it's the kind of dilemma I don't mind fretting over!  I've got an image for almost every page of my book, which means I can now focus on creating beautiful borders and embellishments.  I want this to be a book that would enchant children—with something special on every page…wondering if I can find orange scent for the fruit in this tree (a tapestry by William Morris):

The wheels are turning…

 

art therapy

I was working myself into a snit but before the tears could fall, I started to cut and paste.  Well, surf and print and cut—no pasting yet.  That's how I'm gradually building illustrations for my book.  I'm not sure what to do about the text; I could use watercolors to paint the white paper, or I could try printing text on transparencies…not sure I'm up for writing out the text in gold ink, but that's also a possibility.  For now I'm looking for symbols that represent my story—camels crossing a desert, a tall ship sailing the high seas, etc.  I loved this desert scene until I realized that the text reads: "From places high and low, across deserts and over seas, let the faithful follow that glorious star…"  So a blazing yellow sun won't do.  Grabbed my handy scissors and tried to picture how the camel riders would look against a piece of midnight blue velvet…or some fancy textured wallpaper…or dreamy swirls like Van Gogh's Starry Night…sometimes art can do what egg nog and self-pity cannot.  Moments ago I got an email that assured me all is *not* lost…art lets you be inside yourself without being totally self-centered.  Know what I mean?

 

snap, crackle, flop!

Ok, time for me to 'fess up about my DIY book project.  Last time I posted about it, I was preparing to apply crackle paste to my beautifully painted pages.  I *thought* the heavy white crackle paste would magically vanish over the three-day wait period, leaving my pages with a colorful cracked surface.  Uh…no.  And you can see that I wasn't entirely sold on the idea at the time of application—I tried to spare four of my painted pages, but got them smeared with paste just the same.  I returned from Toronto and my lovely storybook looked just the same as when I left—the crackle paste dried, it *did* crack, but it didn't vanish.  So I'm now in the process of RE-painting the entire book.  And that's not so bad because I can adjust some of the colors and now I *do* have a cracked, colorful surface for most of my pages.  Next step: choosing a font and searching for downloadable images online…

We Could Be Brothers

Most readers know Derrick Barnes as the author of the popular Ruby and the Booker Boys series.  He's also the author of the YA novel, The Making of Dr. TrueLove.  But did you know Derrick has a middle grade novel that just came out last month?  If you're thinking of buying books for holiday gifts, you should consider this new release for the boys in your life.  Here's a summary from the Scholastic website:

Robeson Battlefield and Pacino Clapton meet in detention, where they discover they both had scuffles with the same person, Tariq. Although the boys have different mannerisms (Robeson is more respectful of the girl sharing detention with them) and lifestyles (Pacino lives in a sketchy part of town; Robeson lives in a huge well-to-do house), they become friends. As the tension with Tariq intensifies, Robeson is conflicted about what to do. His father insists on nonviolence. But Tariq will have none of that. And the final confrontation is fast approaching.

I borrowed a copy of the book from the library—does your library have a copy yet?  Take a moment to find out and ask for it to be ordered, if necessary.  Then support your local bookstore and get them to order some copies, too!  Derrick took time out of his busy schedule to answer a couple of my questions:

More and more I'm realizing just how diverse boys are and because of this diversity, there really isn't one solution for the problems boys face.  Tell us about your decision to represent a range of black boys–and a range of responses to school violence/bullying.

I always start from two points of reference or points of motivation.  I must: 1) attempt to tell stories and create characters that are not currently present, demographically or culturally, and 2) counter the negative or incomplete images that exist in children's lit or popular culture.  As an artist/author that feels extremely blessed to have this opportunity, I take my social responsibility very seriously; I have the ability to create the Robeson Battlefields and Pacino Claptons of the world that will debunk the one dimensional negative imagery of Black boys and present us as real-life sons, brothers, nephews, scholars, gentlemen, dreamers, doers, and compassionate difference-makers.

It's the holiday season and lots of people are buying books as gifts—who's the ideal recipient of your book?

I wrote WE COULD BE BROTHERS for Black boys. Midway through the manuscript it became evident to me that the two universal themes from this book are social responsibility and brotherhood, themes that could be beneficial for anyone, regardless of age, gender, socioeconomic status, or race.

I wrote this book for the parents and educators who are constantly searching for literature that uplifts the spirit, that stimulates positive thinking, and presents Black boys as the protagonists/lead characters that they can identify with.

I also wrote this book because I am humbled by the literary legacy of authors like Walter Dean Myers and Julius Lester who, through their books, give boys, especially African American boys, the gift of learning to read and loving to read.

I heart Xmas!

I hope you've been keeping up with the Smugglivus festivities over at The Book Smugglers.  My post is up today—no list of favorite books, no excitement over upcoming releases…just my unabashed love of the holidays!

The holidays are a moment to contemplate the meaning of redemption and renewal, and we access these ideas through narrative. Every Christmas eve I watch the 1951 version of Scrooge starring Alistair Sim—I recite the lines I now know by heart (penned by Dickens, one of my favorite authors). And I time it so that the film ends right at midnight; my last thought before going to bed is of the miser Ebenezer's spiritual transformation, and I wake on Christmas Day to the pealing of bells in Brooklyn. Giving is an important part of Christmas, but I refuse to shop—I try to give things that I've made by hand, and otherwise I donate to charity on a loved one's behalf. That hasn't gone over so well in my family; there wasn't much cheer the year I gave everyone personalized haiku…

Kekla's coming, too!

Our holiday book party at Daddy's Basement Bookstore is going to ROCK! Kekla Magoon, author of the award-winning middle grade novel, The Rock and the River, will be joining the literary festivities!  Be there or be square…

silver lining

Exciting news!!  Neesha Meminger, author of Shine, Coconut Moon, will be releasing her second YA novel—Jazz in Love—under her own imprint, Ignite Books, at the start of the new year!  I love it when talented writers take their future into their own hands…if YOU would like a review copy of Jazz in Love, simple visit Neesha's blog and leave a comment with your address.  Here's the summary from the back of the book:

Jasbir, a.k.a. Jazz, has always been a stellar student and an obedient, albeit wise-cracking, daughter. Everything has gone along just fine–she has good friends in the "genius" program she's been in since kindergarten, her teachers and principal adore her, and her parents dote on her. But now, in her junior year of high school, her mother hears that Jazz was seen hugging a boy on the street and goes ballistic. Mom immediately implements the Guided Dating Plan, which includes setting up blind dates with "suitable," pre-screened Indian candidates. The boy her mother sets her up with, however, is not at all what anyone expects; and the new boy at school, the very UNsuitable hottie, is the one who sets Jazz's blood boiling. When Jazz makes a few out-of-the-ordinary decisions, everything explodes, and she realizes she'll need a lot more than her genius education to get out of the huge mess she's in. Can Jazz find a way to follow her own heart, and still stay in the good graces of her parents?

During the Q&A part of our NCTE/ALAN panel in Orlando last month, Michael Cart of Booklist asked which of the panelists were Canadian and how did our Canadian-ness impact our writing about race? (that's how I remember his question, at any rate).  Neesha and I were sitting next to one another, and I glanced at her before launching into a tirade about the lack of black-authored books available to young readers in Canada and how this contradicts Canada's image as a multicultural society.  Neesha talked about growing up in a place where you can buy samosas at the corner store and then living in the US where very little is known about Asian cultures.  And, of course, I urged her to tell how the temple bombing in Shine was based on her personal experience living next to a Sikh temple in Toronto that was also fire-bombed.  Canada's full of immigrants who left former British colonies, and so there's often a shared colonial culture as well—in some ways it connects us, and in other ways it keeps us passive, I think.  When I got back from my trip to Canada last month, I sat down and wrote an article for a literary journal that wasn't due for another two weeks; the theme was past/present/future, and not surprisingly I found myself writing about the books I read as a child in Toronto.  I went OFF about the racist, elitist, imperialist clap trap that is The Phoenix and the Carpet by E. Nesbit, even though I couldn't quite remember whether or not we actually read the book in class.  All I remember is the BBC adaptation of the book that we watched on a TV that was rolled into our 5th-grade classroom on a cart, but could it be much better than the book with its appalling illustrations of grass-skirt wearing "savages"?  Maybe they cut that scene out of the film—or maybe I just blocked that viewing experience out of my memory.  This website suggests that the scene in question, "Queen of the Island," was left in—but what did the savages look like?  In fairness to Ms. Nesbit, she doesn't describe them as African in the book, though her illustrator depicts them as such.  I guess that's who came to mind at mention of nearly naked, "coppery brown" islanders living in huts in a tropical part of the world.  The "queen" in question is actually their cranky Irish cook who accidentally accompanies the four white children (and the talking phoenix) on one of their adventures with the magic flying carpet.  When the "savages" see the cook, they believe her to be their appointed queen and so she decides to stay with them rather than return to a position of servitude in London.  She may be Irish but she's still a white woman, you see, and so she can't reasonably be left alone on an island with a bunch of half-naked brown men…so before the novel ends, the children return with a kind-hearted white burglar and he instantly marries the cook, saving her from "a fate worse than death."  I re-read the book today and had no desire whatsoever to read the rest of the trilogy.  I don't think I could endure Mitali Perkins' experiment of viewing classic children's books with "fresh eyes."  Could this book somehow be salvaged and useful to today's kids?  Well, if the objectionable scenes are removed, then we're left with an equally unacceptable option: erasure of PoC altogether.  The choice shouldn't be between erasure or distortion.

Why was this story even selected for a 5th grade class in Canada in 1981?  I was the only black student, but there were three Asian boys in the class and the Indians in the novel don't fare much better than the "savages."  For three years now I've visited JHS 13 up in East Harlem; the sixth-grade class is led by Sheryl Mayers, a fellow Canadian who grew up in the same part of the city (Scarberia).  During my last visit, when I reached the point in my presentation where I talk about Ezra Jack Keats, Sheryl raised her hand and shared with her students that as a child, Snowy Day was the only book she read that had a black character as the star of the story.  So I know my experience isn't some kind of aberration; I strongly suspect it was (and is) the rule.  I wonder whether her experiences as a student in Canada impact the way she teaches today…somebody ought to make a film about all the black folks who leave Canada and make a life for themselves in the US.  We're a special branch of the diaspora…

win a copy of TEENIE!

Debut author Christopher Grant will be joining us at Daddy's Basement for our Holiday Book Party on December 13th!  Come on out to hear Christopher read and enter a raffle to win a copy of Teenie before its release date (December 28th)—and, of course, you can pre-order your copy from the bookstore…just in time for Kwanzaa!

tonight ~ Sonia Sanchez!

Sonia Sanchez: Reading & Book Signing


Reading & Book Signing featuring acclaimed poet Sonia Sanchez. She will be reading from her latest – "I'm Black When I'm Singing, I'm Blue When I Ain't and Other Plays" A Collection of Plays by Sonia Sanchez edited by Jacqueline Wood Duke University Press 2010. This event is FREE and open to the public. Sponsored by the English Club, the Department of English, and the Center for Black Literature at Medgar Evers College, CUNY.
Sonia Sanchez—poet, activist, scholar—was the Laura Carnell Professor of English and Women's Studies at Temple University. She is the recipient of both the Robert Frost Medal for distinguished lifetime service to American poetry and the Langston Hughes Poetry Award. One of the most important writers of the Black Arts Movement, Sanchez is the author of sixteen books. From: http://soniasanchez.net/.
Date: December 2, 2010
Time: 5:00 PM – 7:00 PM
Medgar Evers College
1650 Bedford Avenue
Brooklyn
Bedford Building, Founders Auditorium
718.804.8883
http://www.mec.cuny.edu
Admission: Free!