Monica Edinger's Blog, page 93

My Year at the Huffington Post

I started blogging at the Huffington Post last August and I've enjoyed writing for their broader audience; experimenting with interviews, slide shows, and videos; and figuring out what will be of particular interest. Looking back through my archive, a few posts stand out to me for one reason or another.

Not surprisingly, celebrities and controversies got the most attention:

What to Do About Classical Books that Are Racist
There's Good News and Good News About Picture Books
My Response to Neil Gaiman's Modest Proposal
Did Snookie Bump Children's Book Award Winners from the Today Show?

I've appreciated having a chance to get the word out about authors and books, these among many others:


What is David Macaulay Up To?
A Book About Children's Books for Book Loving Adults
Anita Silvey's Book-A-Day Almanac
Along Came Spider: Michael Sims' The Story of Charlotte's Web
Diana Wynne Jones: An Appreciation

Then it is fun to to do the occasional oddball post, say:


Jane Austen Goes to the Super Bowl with Rosanne Cash
Top Ten Reasons to See How To Succeed in Business Without Really Trying


And, finally, I have taken the opportunity to occasionally hold forth as a teacher:


School's Back; So's Homework
Bye-Bye Summer Reading Blues
A Young Teacher

As I move into my second year blogging at the Huffington Post, I'm intrigued by the directions new book editor, Andrew Losowsky, may take it. Here's an interview with him:

My Return to Sierra Leone: Tacugama Chimpanzee Sanctuary

While Sierra Leone isn't filled with the sort of wildlife many associate with Africa, is does have quite a bit.  We always heard about elephants, but I never met anyone who every had seen one.  Sadly, even when I was there, poaching was causing havoc on the elephant population and that has only gotten worse in the ensuing years.  Monkeys, baboons, and chimps were more commonly seen, sometimes sadly as meat.  In 1988 Bala Amarasekaran and his wife Sharmila were traveling upcountry when they saw a baby chimp for sale.  They took him, named him Bruno, and so began their mission to save the chimps of Sierra Leone. Today  Tacaguma is an impressive sanctuary with thoughtful and caring professionals considering how best to help the chimpanzees of Sierra Leone.  Through the war and beyond they have persevered.  You can learn more of the dramatic history here.

I was incredibly fortunate in being able to visit the Sanctuary during my time in Sierra Leone.  It is a beautiful place and the thought and care taken with the chimps is impressive.  At this time one group is just about ready to be sent back to the wild, but first a proper and safe place for them must be found — not so easy given the prevalence of poachers.  The individual chimps all have remarkable stories, many of them available on the site here.  Bruno, however, is no longer among them.  In a dramatic incident he and a group of chimps escaped and, while some have returned, he is not one of them.

Here are some of my photos of the Sanctuary.

Some Sure-Fire Last Minute Summer Reading Suggestions

Check out this video Betsy Bird and I did over at the Huffington Post featuring a passel of tried-and-true titles for kids still finishing out their summer reading (and also for those back in school).

Protection

Good Boston Globe article on the protection impulse: "When we shield our children from scary stories, who are we really trying to protect?"  via Kay Kosko on child_lit.

Thinking About Beverly Cleary's Books

Beverly Cleary's books belong to my childhood. I well remember enjoying and identifying with Beezus as we both had annoying little sisters. Yes, Ramona was cute and pert and spunky, but I went for the stories featuring her older sister and her friend Henry most of all. And growing up in the 50s and 60s Midwest, I saw plenty of similarities to my life and that of the children in those early books. I was all grown-up by the time Ramona the Brave came out and assumed that it meant less to me than the others because I was no longer identifying with the characters as I had as a kid. Now an intriguing consideration of Cleary's books by Benjamin Schwartz in The Atlantic, "My Ramona"  has me reconsidering that stance. For Schwartz makes a most interesting observation, positing that there is a shift in style and quality with the publication of Ramona the Brave. A very interesting piece, well worth reading.

My Return to Sierra Leone: Bunce Island

Of the many infamous slave castles that existed along the coast of West Africa, Sierra Leone's Bunce Island is the most historically significant for the United States. While the slave traders at others of these dreadful places were sending captives throughout the Americas, the 17th century British traders of Bunce Island were specifically targeting, warehousing and then shipping thousands of Africans to the Southern Colonies of what is now the United States. Rice farmers in Georgia and South Carolina especially were looking for captives from the Rice Coast, an area that included what is now present-day Sierra Leone. Traditional rice farmers, they were much desired.

Anthropologist Joseph Opala, with whom I served in the Peace Corps, has researched the Sierra Leone – United States connection for over thirty years. In addition to Bunce Island, he helped to show links between the Gullah and Sierra Leoneans and continues to be an important scholar and advocate for Sierra Leone and the country's historical connections to the United States. Even more connections are coming to the fore as many African Americans are learning through DNA testing that their ancestors came from Sierra Leone, very likely through Bunce Island. Say actor Isaiah Washington who, after learning of his Sierra Leonean DNA, gained his Sierra Leonean citizenship and contributes financially and emotionally to the country as well as to the development of Bunce Island as a historic site for visitors.

Having a chance to experience Bunce Island myself a few weeks ago after having read and learned so much about it was a remarkable experience. I'd been to Senegal's House of the Slaves years ago and was certainly very moved by that experience, but found Bunce Island even more moving.  The overgrown ruins of walls, towers, captive pens, graves, and other vestiges of the horrors of what happened there made experiencing it firsthand something I won't ever forget.

The fort's outer wall

Facing out defensively are a bunch of cannons

A wall of the interior house. our guide Amadu Massally told us of a visitor who looked out her window, was horrified by the captive pen she saw, and so wrote about it as an abolitionist upon her return to England.

One of the pens for captives

The original jetty from which captives were taken by canoe to the slave ships.

For now Bunce Island is still somewhat off the usual African tourist path (as is Sierra Leone), but hopefully for not too much longer.  Efforts are underway to make it more accessible and a destination as significant as others on Africa's west coast.  You can learn more about Bunce Island here and by exploring the various links here.

What Mal Peet Read to His Kids

I'm a big fan of reading aloud to my class and often post here about what works and why. That's why I also enjoy reading about others' reading aloud experiences and what works for them and why. Today Mal Peet weighs in over at the Guardian with some interesting choices.  (And of course there are some more interesting as well as snarky suggestions in the comments.)

 

 

My Return to Sierra Leone: Freetown

I'd been thinking about returning to Sierra Leone for years, but it took the Friends of Sierra Leone to make it a reality.  I can't thank the organizers for all they did to make a potentially very difficult experience a great one. In addition to worrying about the basics of travel, as the one Returned Peace Corps Volunteer of our group who had served in the country's capital of Freetown I was incredibly nervous about what I would see.  I've already posted about how Krio came back to me.  So, I'm happy to report,  did Freetown. That city where I spent two years of my youth looked incredibly and reassuringly familiar.

Certainly there were differences, only to be expected after so much time.  For one thing, there are many more people now in Freetown.

During the war they fled there and many just stayed. And so, many places that are not really suitable and where no one lived in my day (say a ravine or a watershed) are filled now with simple shacks and people. For someone unused to Africa it would probably look disturbing, but to me it just looked like a larger version of what I knew.

The Cotton Tree is one of the icons of Freetown and it was great to see it proud as ever.

I worked just up the hill and walked past it daily for two years. In front of it is the Law Court looking even better than ever, and then there is State House.  My school and the A.V. Centre where I worked my second year were located just above that and the buildings are still there, now part of the Ministry of Defense complex (so no photos:).  We spent every weekend at Lumley Beach, often at the still-there Atlantic Club, but boy is it different there now!  Back then no Sierra Leoneans every went to the beach, but today happily they do and so the place is packed and busy in a way that it wasn't when I lived there.

The original Peace Corps office building where I went every day is still there. Since we didn't have cell phones (or any phones for that matter) it was our gathering point, the place where we could find each other, go to lunch, and make plans for the evening and beyond. Today it is a law school, but it is painted the same colors as in my day and looks just the same.

As for the new Peace Corps compound, it is near the hospital I stayed in when I got malaria the first time — up on one of the hills and gorgeous.

Another downtown landmark was the basket market.  While in the same location it was rebuild and now, while the baskets and other household items are still available, there is now a second floor with cloth and things more for visitors than locals.  (I had been warned and so was prepared to see differences in the cloth, but I was surprised at the differences in the baskets — not as finely made as the ones I still have from long ago).

Pure nostalgia for many of us was the space that once held the City Hotel.  This iconic place mentioned by Graham Greene and others was where we would spend happy hours on the second floor veranda, flipping the Star beer bottle caps, and watching the bats that colonized the trees on the street (now moved to The Cotton Tree) fly out at dusk.  After reading of its demise, I wrote the following letter to the New York Times:

To the Editor:

I was one of the hundreds of Peace Corps volunteers who whiled away many an hour on the second-floor veranda of the City Hotel in Freetown, Sierra Leone (Freetown Journal, June 26), drinking Star beer and taking in the Graham Greene-like colonial atmosphere while watching the late-afternoon flight of the bats out of the palm trees along the street.

While the City Hotel may be in ruins, the huge old tree known as the Cotton Tree still stands in Freetown, a hopeful omen that this raked-over country badly needs.

MONICA EDINGER

New York, June 26, 2000

So we all had to take a photo of the ghost of it.

One of the places that was especially meaningful to me was my home. It is still there on one of the main roads and I choked up every time we passed it. Also Choitram's Supermarket where I shopped. (One of my friends reminded me that it was the only place we could get ice cream — those bricks of strawberry, chocolate, and vanilla that tasted all the same.)

And so Freetown, where I spend an important part of my life, is looking great.  And, if things continue to improve, hopefully many others will get to see the city as from there you can head out to one of the most beautiful countries in the world.

My Return to Sierra Leone: Krio

My return to Sierra Leone was remarkable. Happily, my anxiety about what I'd experience thirty-five years later was for nought.  I'm still mulling over the best way to communicate the whole wonderful thing.  In the meantime I'm going to do some posts on various things that triggered memories for me. Say Krio, the common language of Sierra Leone.  There are many different tribal languages as well as English, but Krio is a shared language pretty much everyone uses.  When I lived there I used it at the market, when chatting with friends and neighbors, when bargaining with a taxi driver, and so forth. It was a language we Peace Corps Volunteers loved, filled with lovely phrases, expressions, and words. But when I returned to the US I had to use them silently as Americans would have looked at me oddly if I'd voiced them. Eventually, they drifted out of my mind as I never heard them or used them with anyone. Thus it was heavenly to heard Krio again, to have those wonderful words and expressions come back to me, and to begin using them myself.  Here are a few favorites (and since these are phonetic as I'm remembering them, I may be getting them wrong — anyone reading this who can correct me, please do in the comments):

Salone — what everyone calls Sierra Leone
Kusheo  — Hello
Aw de bodi? — How are you?
Osh yaa — That's too bad/sorry
Usai you de go? — Where are you going?
Aw fa du — Oh well/what can you do?
Du ya — please
Gladi — happy
Pikin — child
Padi — friend
Palaver — lots of talk about something
Vex — angry
Sabi — know
Tif — thief
Tenki ya — thank you
Ah de go — Good-bye

Some (Many) Spring 2012 Books I Am Eager To See

Just looked at PW's recent feature on forthcoming spring 2012 books and the following were titles that especially intrigued me for one reason or another.  (This turned out to be very long and I'm sure there are many more I also want to see so…whew!)

ABRAMS

Chuck Close: Faces by Chuck Close and Glue + Paper Workshop LLC.  (I have always admired Close's work and am very intrigued by the potential for interactivity.)
The Sisters Grimm: Book 9 by Michael Buckley.
Huff and Puff by Claudia Rueda, "an interactive retelling of the Three Little Pigs". (I met Claudia years ago at a conference and we've stayed friends — mostly online as she is Colombian.  I have always liked her understated and sly style and am very interested to see what she's done with this familiar tale.)

BLOOMSBURY

In Darkness by Nick Lake, (This may be too old for me, but I'm interested in very interested in the L'Ouverture aspect and how the author links it to contemporary Haiti.)

CANDLEWICK

Ruby Redfort Look Into My Eyes by Lauren Child. (I'm a big Child fan in general as well as of the middle grade Clarice Bean books so am looking very much forward to this one.)
What Color Is My World?: How African-American Inventors Have Changed the Way We Live by Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and Raymond Obstfeld, illus. by Ben Boos and A.G. Ford. (I first heard about this when I sold Africa is My Home to the same publisher and am excited to see it become a reality.)

CHRONICLE

Wordles by Amy Krouse Rosenthal, illus. by Serge Bloch. (Just love books featuring word play.)
The Templeton Twins Have an Idea by Ellis Weiner, illus. by Jeremy Holmes.  (Evidently more word play so…ditto.)

DISNEY-HYPERION

The Kane Chronicles, Book Three by Rick Riordan.  (Final book so do I need to say anything?)
Poems to Learn by Heart, edited by Caroline Kennedy, illus. by Jon J Muth. (I liked the earlier collections and this one, with its focus on memorization, is right up my teacher-heart-alley.)

EDC/KANE MILLER

The No. 1 Car Spotter Book 2: The No. 1 Car Spotter and the Firebird by Atinuke. (I'm such a fan of the author of the Anna Hibiscus books and have already seen the first in this series set in a small village.  Having just returned from West Africa I can tell you they ring true.)

EERDMANS

I Lay My Stitches Down: Poems of American Slavery by Cynthia Grady, illus. by Michele Wood.  (This anthology "featuring the imagery of quilting and fiber arts" sounds fascinating.)

ENCHANTED LION

Little Bird by Germano Zullo, illus. by Albertine. (I just so like what this small press does so am very curious about this award-winning title.)

GROUNDWOOD BOOKS

Out of the Way! Out of the Way! by Uma Krishnaswami. (First published in India, some of my students and I participated in a blog tour for it.)

HARPERCOLLINS

All the Right Stuff by Walter Dean Myers.
Cold Cereal by Adam Rex.  (I so liked Rex's The True Meaning of Smekday so can't wait to see this new middle-grade work from him.)
Earwig and the Witch by Diana Wynne Jones, illus. by Paul O. Zelinsky.  (Two children's lit titans together? — can't wait to see this one.)
The Masque of the Red Death by Bethany Griffin.  ("A steampunk reimagining of Edgar Allan Poe's gothic horror story" has me intrigued.)
Big Nate Goes for Broke by Lincoln Peirce  (My fourth graders are big fans so happy to see this on its way.)
The Fourth Stall Part II by Chris Rylander. (The first in this series was a big hit in my classroom this past year.)

HOUGHTON MIFFLIN HARCOURT

Boat! by Dave Roman, illus. by John Green. ("A comic that blends the angst of being a teen with the thrill of being a boat." This I gotta see.)
Abraham Lincoln and Frederick Douglass: The Story Behind an American Friendship by Russell Freedman.
Pilgrims Don't Wear Pink by Stephanie Kate Strohn. (Since I teach a unit on the Pilgrms I'm curious about this one even though it is set in Maine and may have nothing to do with the historical folk.)
The Beatles Were Fab—and They Were Funny: The Story of Beatlemania by Kathleen Krull and Paul Brewer, illus. by Stacey Innerst. (Oh yeah, yeah, yeah.)
Temple Grandin: How the Girl Who Loved Cows Embraced Autism and Changed the World by Sy Montgomery. (An authorized biography by one of my favorite nonfiction writers. I'm in.)

LEE & LOW BOOKS

Puffling Patrol by Ted and Betsy Lewin. (Set off Iceland, a place I visited a few years back so I'm intrigued.)
When Bill Traylor Began to Draw by Don Tate, illus. by R. Gregory Christie. (Love Traylor's work so eager to see what these two do with him and it.)

LERNER/CAROLRHODA

Hoop Genius: How a Desperate Teacher and a Rowdy Gym Class Invented Basketball by John Coy, illus. by Joe Morse.
No Crystal Stair by Vaunda Micheaux Nelson, illus. by R. Gregory Christie. (About the author's father, a Harlem bookstore owner — can't wait to see this one.)
White Duck: A Childhood in China by Andrés Vera Martínez and Na Liu, illus. by Martínez.

LITTLE, BROWN

The Extraordinary Education of Nicholas Benedict by Trenton Lee Stewart.  (A prequel?  My students and I are all agog.)
Why We Broke Up by Daniel Handler, illus. by Maira Kalman. (I've the ARC, but I'm eager to see it with the finished art.)
Riding in My Car by Woody Guthrie, illus. by Scott Menchin.  ("An interactive version of the folksinger's children's song, with flaps, tabs, and pop-ups" sounds like great fun.)

MACMILLAN

 A Year in the Life of the Moonbird by Phillip Hoose. (I want to see anything Phillip Hoose does.)
Rebel Fire, Sherlock Holmes: The Legend Begins Book 2 by Andrew Lane. (Big fan of the first in this series so eager to see this one — which was out in paper in the UK, but I figured I'd wait for the US edition.)
Barnum's Bones: How Barnum Brown Discovered the Most Famous Dinosaur in the World by Tracey Fern, illus. by Boris Kulikov.
Life in the Ocean: The Story of Oceanographer Sylvia Earle by Claire A. Nivola.  (I'm a fan of other work by Nivola so interested in seeing this one.)
The Humming Room by Ellen Potter. ("…inspired by The Secret Garden" one of my classical favorites done by an always inventive writer so most curious indeed.)
Cinder: Book One of the Lunar Chronicles by Marissa Meyer. (Since I've been doing a Cinderella unit since 1990 I'm definitely interested in a "futuristic retelling.")
Sapphire Blue by Kerstin Gier, trans. by Anthea Bell. (Enjoyed Ruby Red and so interested to see where this is all going.)
Leo Geo and His Miraculous Journey through the Center of the Earth by Jon Chad. (Curious to see this "skinny-format comic.")
Green by Laura Vaccaro Seeger. (Always interested in what Laura's doing next.)

MARSHALL CAVENDISH

The Good Braider: A Novel in Verse by Terry Farish. (Curious because it involves someone coming to the US from Sudan.)

NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC

Superman vs. the Ku Klux Klan: The True Story of How the Iconic Superhero Battled the Men of Hate by Rick Bowers.

PENGUIN

Bitterblue by Kristin Cashore.  (At last!)
The Fault in Our Stars by  John Green. (Of course.)
Puppy Bowl: Yearbook by Tracey West.  (Confession: I watch it so I want this.)
Looking at Lincoln by Maira Kalman.
Robbie Forester and the Outlaws of Sherwood Street by Peter Abrahams. (Liked some other kid mysteries he did so interested to see this one.)

RANDOM HOUSE

Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band by John Lennon and Paul McCartney, illus. by LeUyen Pham
Oddfellow's Orphanage by Emily Martin
Chomp by Carl Hiaasen (IMHO, he's getting better with each kid title.)
The Adventures of the New Cut Gang by Philip Pullman (This is a combination of some books he did way back and I'm thrilled they are coming out here this way.)
The Mighty Miss Malone by Christopher Paul Curtis. (About a character from Bud Not Buddy, neat.)
Mr. and Mrs. Bunny—Detectives Extraordinaire! by Mrs. Bunny, trans. from the Rabbit by Polly Horvath, illus. by Sophie Blackall. (Two favorite creators of mine at work.)
A Boy Called Dickens by Deborah Hopkinson, illus. by John Hendrix.

SCHOLASTIC

Irises by Francisco X. Stork


Just Behave, Pablo Picasso! by Jonah Winter, illus. by Kevin Hawkes
Dear Cinderella by Mary Jane Kensington and Marion Moore, illus. by Julie Olson
Here Come the Girl Scouts! by Shana Corey, illus. by Hadley Hooper
Those Rebels, John & Tom by Barbara Kerley, illus. by Edwin Fotheringham
The False Prince by Jennifer A. Nielsen  (The buzz on this is amazing. Will it hold up?)
One Dog and His Boy by Eva Ibbotson. (Saw this in the UK, but figured I could wait.)

SIMON & SCHUSTER

Wolf Won't Bite by Emily Gravett (One of my favorite subversive picture book creators is back with wolves!)


Caddy's World by Hilary McKay (More Cassons!)
Words Set Me Free: The Story of Young Frederick Douglass by Lesa Cline-Ransome, illus. by James E. Ransome