The Newbery Medal winner and runners-up were announced recently. The choices seem even more politically motivated than usual. What do these books have in common?
The 2005 Newbery Medal winner is Kira-Kira written by Cynthia Kadohata, Atheneum Books for Young Readers/Simon & Schuster. Two sisters lie on their backs, watching the stars and repeating the Japanese word for "glittering" - "kira-kira." Like this quiet opening scene, Kadohata's tenderly nuanced novel glitters with plain and poignant words that describe the strong love within a Japanese American family from the point of view of younger sister Katie. Personal challenges and family tragedy are set against the oppressive social climate of the South during the 1950s and early 1960s.
The Voice that Challenged a Nation meticulously explores resonant themes with the masterful structure of a musical composition. Eloquent, economic prose sheds a personal light on one woman's sometimes reluctant role as a symbol in the struggle against racism and her calling to share an llustrious gift.
Lizzie Bright and the Buckminster Boy by Gary D. Schmidt (Clarion Books/Houghton Mifflin). Set in Maine in 1912 and propelled by a tragic historical event, Schmidt's powerfully haunting novel probes a forbidden friendship between a preacher's son and a dark-skinned girl from a nearby island.
How can anyone take ALA seriously?
3 Comments:
The three book awards you mentioned (out of four total Newbery awards) may have a number of things in common. They may, for example, all be charmingly written or beautifully illustrated. But what you're getting at, I suspect, is that, according to the descriptions you've provided, each one appears to contain some explicit or implied critique of racism.
I don't find this particularly troubling, although it could get a little bit monotonous. More troubling is the exclusionary side of political correctness. For example, I doubt that one of my favorite childhood stories, Walter D. Edmond's "The Matchlock Gun", would even get published today, much less win a Newbery.
I wish that the Newberians were as interested in promoting, say, free speech, or freedom of religion, or the right to bear arms, as they are in opposing racism. The latter is a worthy cause, but it's not the only worthy cause in the world.
Yep, that was me too.
Felix
The education department here asks us every year to purchase the Newbery- and Caldecott-award-winning books, so it's annoying to me that these are apparently chosen more for their propaganda value than for their literary merits.
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