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Re: KT's question
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From: AAngel_at_aol.com
Date: Tue, 22 Nov 2011 11:25:21 -0500 (EST)
I've been speaking to writers about the narrative voice in nonfiction a lot lately and the question of how much to include about the lives of historical figures comes up again and again. I tend to point toward teacher and author Hermione Lee's definition of biography. She believes biography captures snapshots of a person's life while also capturing a complete life. In capturing that complete life, I do believe the art of a picture book allowed writers to focus on a complete spirit without always including details of an entire life while a middle grade or young adult biography must cover more ground. I can point to Gary Golio's lovely biography of Jimi Hendrix (Jimi: Like Rainbow) as a perfect example of creating a snapshot and capturing a complete spirit. Readers see young Jimi drawing with colored pencils and then capturing the sound of the rain on a one-stringed ukulele. Jimi's untimely death is not part of the story but is an end note in a picture book. My own biographies for young adults (and Russell Fre eman's and Elizabeth Partridge's biographies) face tough issues head on. I write about Amy's high school rebellion against her mother because it was a very real rebellion that informed her writing. In my biography of Janis Joplin, I didn't shy way from Janis's drug abuse and sexuality, rather it's an opportunity to help teens understand an historical period and the culture of the 60's in a way that might also allow teens a chance to take away a cautionary tale. I believe that, when writing a biography it's critical to capture our heroes' creative and intellectual genius even as we capture the flaws. These nonfiction stories help readers, many of whom are so hyper-critical of their own lives, recognize that they, too, can use their talent, their art, the intellects and their hearts to change the world, to rise up and become the heroes in their own messy lives. I think readers can learn to change the world, to fight for choices that are better than their heroes' if they're given the stories with honest consequ ences. Finally, in those biographies where a death is captured, I believe there is an added lesson in the way readers must try on grief. This is an opportunity to learn what grief feels like and to gain insight into coping with grief, and perhaps even take away the message that we can all live our lives fully despite the inevitability of death.
Ann Angel
Mount Mary College aangel_at_aol.com angela@mtmary.edu _www.annangelwriter.com_ (http://www.annangelwriter.com/) 414-258-4810, ext. 295
Recent Publications: Sudden Flash Youth: 65 Short-Short Stories (Persea Books, October 2011) Janis Joplin: Rise Up Singing (Abrams/Amulet Books 2010) w 2011 YALSA Excellence in Nonfiction Award, w 2010 Council for Wisconsin Writers Kingery/Derluth Nonfiction Book-Length Award w 2011 SCBWI Crystal Kite Award w 2012 Texas Library Association TAYSHAS High School Reading List w Booklist Top Ten Arts Books for Youth November, 2011 w Wisconsin Library Association Read-on Pick 2011
w Booklist, Top 10 Biographies for Youth, June 2011
A Reader's Guide to The House on Mango Street by Sandra Cisneros (Enslow 2010) Silent Embrace, Perspective on Birth in Adoption (Catalyst Book Press 2010) Such a Pretty Face, Short Stories about Beauty (Abrams/Amulet 2007) Amy Tan, Weaver of Asian-American Tales (Enslow 2009) Robert Cormier, Writer of The Chocolate War (Enslow 2008)
In a message dated 11/22/2011 9:28:48 A.M. Central Standard Time, nsawicki_at_nyc.rr.com writes:
Like KT, I have enormous respect for Betty Carter but as a former publisher of children's books, I would feel I had suckered the audience if I had published biographies of Lincoln, King, etc., without mentioning their assassinations. More important , both were assassinated because of their principles, and to ignore their assassinations would diminish the courage with which they lived their lives. Better a biography not be published for a certain age group if one feels an aspect of the subject's life should not be addressed.
Way back when I published biographies of Gertrude Stein and F. Scott Fitzgerald for teenagers and the writer wanted to omit Stein's relationship with Toklas, as well as Fitzgerald's drinking ( Zelda's, too) but he was persuaded to do otherwise. My point being, in publishing nonfiction for children and teenagers, no matter the age group, when one decides this/that is not acceptable, the nonfiction borders on fiction.
If a child had difficulty handling the assassination of Lincoln, King, Malcom X, etc., I would not give that child a biography of another figure who had been assassinated. As Marc said in a much better way, it is a matter of matching the right book with the right child. Norma Jean
Date: Tue, 22 Nov 2011 11:25:21 -0500 (EST)
I've been speaking to writers about the narrative voice in nonfiction a lot lately and the question of how much to include about the lives of historical figures comes up again and again. I tend to point toward teacher and author Hermione Lee's definition of biography. She believes biography captures snapshots of a person's life while also capturing a complete life. In capturing that complete life, I do believe the art of a picture book allowed writers to focus on a complete spirit without always including details of an entire life while a middle grade or young adult biography must cover more ground. I can point to Gary Golio's lovely biography of Jimi Hendrix (Jimi: Like Rainbow) as a perfect example of creating a snapshot and capturing a complete spirit. Readers see young Jimi drawing with colored pencils and then capturing the sound of the rain on a one-stringed ukulele. Jimi's untimely death is not part of the story but is an end note in a picture book. My own biographies for young adults (and Russell Fre eman's and Elizabeth Partridge's biographies) face tough issues head on. I write about Amy's high school rebellion against her mother because it was a very real rebellion that informed her writing. In my biography of Janis Joplin, I didn't shy way from Janis's drug abuse and sexuality, rather it's an opportunity to help teens understand an historical period and the culture of the 60's in a way that might also allow teens a chance to take away a cautionary tale. I believe that, when writing a biography it's critical to capture our heroes' creative and intellectual genius even as we capture the flaws. These nonfiction stories help readers, many of whom are so hyper-critical of their own lives, recognize that they, too, can use their talent, their art, the intellects and their hearts to change the world, to rise up and become the heroes in their own messy lives. I think readers can learn to change the world, to fight for choices that are better than their heroes' if they're given the stories with honest consequ ences. Finally, in those biographies where a death is captured, I believe there is an added lesson in the way readers must try on grief. This is an opportunity to learn what grief feels like and to gain insight into coping with grief, and perhaps even take away the message that we can all live our lives fully despite the inevitability of death.
Ann Angel
Mount Mary College aangel_at_aol.com angela@mtmary.edu _www.annangelwriter.com_ (http://www.annangelwriter.com/) 414-258-4810, ext. 295
Recent Publications: Sudden Flash Youth: 65 Short-Short Stories (Persea Books, October 2011) Janis Joplin: Rise Up Singing (Abrams/Amulet Books 2010) w 2011 YALSA Excellence in Nonfiction Award, w 2010 Council for Wisconsin Writers Kingery/Derluth Nonfiction Book-Length Award w 2011 SCBWI Crystal Kite Award w 2012 Texas Library Association TAYSHAS High School Reading List w Booklist Top Ten Arts Books for Youth November, 2011 w Wisconsin Library Association Read-on Pick 2011
w Booklist, Top 10 Biographies for Youth, June 2011
A Reader's Guide to The House on Mango Street by Sandra Cisneros (Enslow 2010) Silent Embrace, Perspective on Birth in Adoption (Catalyst Book Press 2010) Such a Pretty Face, Short Stories about Beauty (Abrams/Amulet 2007) Amy Tan, Weaver of Asian-American Tales (Enslow 2009) Robert Cormier, Writer of The Chocolate War (Enslow 2008)
In a message dated 11/22/2011 9:28:48 A.M. Central Standard Time, nsawicki_at_nyc.rr.com writes:
Like KT, I have enormous respect for Betty Carter but as a former publisher of children's books, I would feel I had suckered the audience if I had published biographies of Lincoln, King, etc., without mentioning their assassinations. More important , both were assassinated because of their principles, and to ignore their assassinations would diminish the courage with which they lived their lives. Better a biography not be published for a certain age group if one feels an aspect of the subject's life should not be addressed.
Way back when I published biographies of Gertrude Stein and F. Scott Fitzgerald for teenagers and the writer wanted to omit Stein's relationship with Toklas, as well as Fitzgerald's drinking ( Zelda's, too) but he was persuaded to do otherwise. My point being, in publishing nonfiction for children and teenagers, no matter the age group, when one decides this/that is not acceptable, the nonfiction borders on fiction.
If a child had difficulty handling the assassination of Lincoln, King, Malcom X, etc., I would not give that child a biography of another figure who had been assassinated. As Marc said in a much better way, it is a matter of matching the right book with the right child. Norma Jean
---Received on Tue 22 Nov 2011 11:25:21 AM CST
