Dear Corinne, Tell Somebody! Love, Annie: A Book About Secrets

by Mari Evans

Corinne's friend Annie is alarmed when Corinne suddenly becomes withdrawn and, through a series of letters, gets her to reveal her frightening secret, but then she must convince Corinne to tell someone who can help

47 pages, Hardcover

First published October 1, 1999

About the author

Mari Evans attended the University of Toledo and later taught at several other schools, including Purdue University, West Lafayette, Ind., and Cornell University, Ithaca, N.Y. She began five years of writing, producing, and directing for an Indianapolis television program, “The Black Experience,” in 1968, the same year her first poetry collection, Where Is All the Music?, was published. With her second collection, I Am a Black Woman (1970), she gained acclaim as an important new poet. Her poem “Who Can Be Born Black” was often anthologized.

Her later collections include Nightstar: 1973–1978 (1981), whose poems praise blues artists and community heroes and heroines, and A Dark and Splendid Mass (1992). Continuum, published in 2007, contains classic poems from Evans's previous collections as well as new work inflected by the same unique insight into African American life that defined her earlier oeuvre. In her works for young readers, Evans often touched on difficult topics such as child abuse ( Dear Corinne: Tell Somebody, 1999) and adolescent relationships ( I'm Late: The Story of LaNeese and Moonlight and Alisha Who Didn't Have Anyone of Her Own, 2005). Evans's plays include River of My Song (produced 1977) and the musical Eyes (produced 1979), an adaptation of Zora Neale Hurston's Their Eyes Were Watching God. She edited the anthology Black Women Writers (1950–1980): A Critical Evaluation (1984) and published Clarity as Concept: A Poet's Perspective (2006), a collection of essays commenting on African American politics and family life.


Oxford Companion to African American Literature: Mari Evans

Reviews

[Kip · Rating 4 out of 5]

An important, accessible approach to abuse from a reliable source.

[Pauline Destinugrainy · Rating 4 out of 5]

Corrine bersahabat dengan Annie. Suatu hari Annie mendapati Corrine menghindari dirinya dan tidak mau berbicara dengannya. Annie bingung, dan berusaha mendekati Corrine. Tapi Corrine seperti tidak tersentuh. Akhirnya Annie mengirimkan surat kepada Corrine . Beberapa kali Annie mengirimkan surat, tapi Corrine tidak juga membalasnya. Annie tidak putus asa. Bahkan Annie meminta bantuan Suster Price untuk meyakinkan Corrine.

E-book ini adalah fiksi yang ditulis dalam bentuk kumpulan surat-surat Annie, Suster Price, dan Corrine. Dari surat-surat tersebt, kita bisa membaca bahwa Corrine terlibat dalam masalah serius berupa child abuse. Corrine tidak berani bercerita, sehingga permasalahannya terus berlarut-larut. Corrine akhirnya merasa tidak berharga, dan dia tidak mau lagi berbicara dengan sahabatnya, Annie.

Seringkali jika seorang anak menjadi korban kekerasan, apalagi jika dilakukan oleh orang terdekat, anak tersebut akan menutup diri dan menyimpan lukanya sebagai suatu rahasia. Buku ini mengajak kita untuk menjadi teman yang perhatian, dan mau menolong teman yang mengalami masalah tersebut. Perhatian itu harus diberikan secara terus menerus, sampai si anak mendapatkan perlindungan.

Walaupun buku ini ditujukan bagi anak-anak berusia 8-12 tahun, tapi buku ini juga bisa dibaca bersama orang tua, atau bahkan bersama teman-teman dan guru. Dan saya rasa, orang dewasa pun harus membaca buku ini.