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Beverly Cleary
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From: WMMayes at aol.com <WMMayes>
Date: Mon, 7 Aug 2000 14:53:23 EDT
Please forgive if this shows up more than once--I keep getting it bounced back to me.
Amidst all this reverie for Ramona, let me put in a word for Henry Huggins:
I moved to a new town and a new school in March of my eighth grade year. This was the tenth school I had attended, and the first in California, and I was not in the best of moods. Friends were neigh unto impossible to come by, and I knew we wouldn't be living in this place for long, so there was no incentive to try. My classes didn't directly correspond with the classes I was taking in my old school, so one period a day I was assigned to the library. I had read a lot of the books there, but had, for some reason, never encountered Cleary. (This is in 1971)
I read the books "in order," being a compulsive child, and was smitten with Henry, and especially Ribsy, from my first introduction to them. Beezus was a friendly rival and Ramona a minor character who annoyed me greatly, but, oh how I adored Henry Huggins. I admired his tenacity, his clear vision of right and wrong, his work ethic, his relationship with his parents, and, most of all, his love of his impossible dog. That fabulous, normal, solid neighborhood of Klickitat Street was better than Homer Price's Centerburg, better than wherever it was that Danny Dunn went to school (memory fails me), even better than the magical world Edward Eager concocted for Jane, Mark, Katherine, and Martha. I wanted to live there, and I wanted to be Henry's friend.
Thanks to Beverly Cleary, I was. Years later, as the sales rep for her publisher in the area in which she lived, I had the delight of meeting Mrs. Cleary and escorting her to events where she was met by adoring children, each and every one a Ramona fan. Though I have come to appreciate (and even love) Ramona, my heart belongs to Henry and his dog, and I was able to tell their creator so, an event that brought me no small joy.
Today, in my travels, I speak to thousands of children about their favorite books and writers. Mrs. Cleary's name is right up at the top of the list, as it has been for years. Some things never change, thank goodness!
Walter M. Mayes a.k.a. Walter the Giant Storyteller WMMayes at aol.com
"Love, Food, Clothing, Shelter...Books!"
Received on Mon 07 Aug 2000 01:53:23 PM CDT
Date: Mon, 7 Aug 2000 14:53:23 EDT
Please forgive if this shows up more than once--I keep getting it bounced back to me.
Amidst all this reverie for Ramona, let me put in a word for Henry Huggins:
I moved to a new town and a new school in March of my eighth grade year. This was the tenth school I had attended, and the first in California, and I was not in the best of moods. Friends were neigh unto impossible to come by, and I knew we wouldn't be living in this place for long, so there was no incentive to try. My classes didn't directly correspond with the classes I was taking in my old school, so one period a day I was assigned to the library. I had read a lot of the books there, but had, for some reason, never encountered Cleary. (This is in 1971)
I read the books "in order," being a compulsive child, and was smitten with Henry, and especially Ribsy, from my first introduction to them. Beezus was a friendly rival and Ramona a minor character who annoyed me greatly, but, oh how I adored Henry Huggins. I admired his tenacity, his clear vision of right and wrong, his work ethic, his relationship with his parents, and, most of all, his love of his impossible dog. That fabulous, normal, solid neighborhood of Klickitat Street was better than Homer Price's Centerburg, better than wherever it was that Danny Dunn went to school (memory fails me), even better than the magical world Edward Eager concocted for Jane, Mark, Katherine, and Martha. I wanted to live there, and I wanted to be Henry's friend.
Thanks to Beverly Cleary, I was. Years later, as the sales rep for her publisher in the area in which she lived, I had the delight of meeting Mrs. Cleary and escorting her to events where she was met by adoring children, each and every one a Ramona fan. Though I have come to appreciate (and even love) Ramona, my heart belongs to Henry and his dog, and I was able to tell their creator so, an event that brought me no small joy.
Today, in my travels, I speak to thousands of children about their favorite books and writers. Mrs. Cleary's name is right up at the top of the list, as it has been for years. Some things never change, thank goodness!
Walter M. Mayes a.k.a. Walter the Giant Storyteller WMMayes at aol.com
"Love, Food, Clothing, Shelter...Books!"
Received on Mon 07 Aug 2000 01:53:23 PM CDT
