Hurricane Dancers - Poetry

Bibliography

Engle, Margarita. 2011. HURRICANE DANCERS: THE FIRST CARRIBBEAN PIRATE SHIPWRECK. New York: Henry Holt and Company.
ISBN 978-0-8050-9240-0.

Plot Summary

            HURRICANE DANCERS: THE FIRST CARRIBBEAN PIRATE    SHIPWRECK is a historical fiction novel, written in free verse comprised of six parts. The novel is told from the perspectives of the five main characters, four of whom are historical figures: Quebrado a young fictional slave boy on the pirate ship, Bernardino de Talavera the first Caribbean pirate, Alonso de Ojeda a brutal, slightly irrational conquistador who is Talavera’s hostage on the ship, Naridó a Ciboney Indian fisherman and Cancubú a Ciboney chieftain’s daughter. The novel progresses in a chronological fashion telling the story of Talavera’s ship wrecking on the island of Cuba during a hurricane and the impact that has on each of the main characters.

Critical Analysis
          Through the use of poetic language Margarita Engle presents characters in the novel HURRICANE DANCERS: THE FIRST CARIBBEAN PIRATE SHIPWRECK who each have a distinct voice: Quebrado the spirit voice, Naridó the voice of the sea, Cancubú the voice of love, Talavera and Ojeda the voices of slavery and violence.   
          Engle provides two notes in this novel. The first, located at the beginning of the book is entitled Historical Setting. This note briefly affords the reader information on the circumstances that led to Spain's conquest of much of the Caribbean in the late fourteen and early fifteen hundreds. The second is a Historical Note at the end of the novel. This Note expounds on the characters, events, culture, language and literature that were the genesis of this book.   
          There are no illustrations in the novel apart from the black and white palm trees that mark the beginning of each of the six sections; however these few drawings do evoke the strength of the wind and set the scene for the poems. The imagery is created by the poetry itself. The character's voices are transmitted to the reader through the strength of the vocabulary, creating strong pictures. The scents, the winds, the sounds of the sea and air are all metaphorically present. Love denied is manifest in Cancubú’s voice of desperation and despair. The reader is able to experience the destructive power of the hurricane, the dances of the native peoples and Quebrado’s joy at being able to ride his horse in freedom all through the force and resonance of Engle’s words. The words evoke sadness, fear, the loss of power, love and so much more. It is through the words that we get a sense of the characters emotional condition.

Quebrado, Ojeda and Talavera are the three primary voices heard in the novel. Naridó and Cancubú are secondary voices, with Cancubú being heard the least. Each of the three primary characters are realistic, fully developed, and the story flows well between their three points of view. The story grows out of the characters, and the language represents not only the time frame but also the dialects particular to the native Indians. Engle's novel is an evocative journey back to the time of the Pirate and the Conquistador.

Review Excerpts
BOOKLIST Starred review 2011: “Engle… offers another accomplished historical novel in verse set in the Caribbean.”
KIRKUS review 2011: “the stories… they work together elegantly; the notes and back matter make this a great choice for classroom use.”
Connections

·       This book could be paired with both fictional and biographical accounts of other Caribbean pirates.

·       For a class project older readers could be given one of the historical characters in the book and asked to write a short essay about that person. Their real life could be compared to the book’s portrayal of them.

·       Other novels in verse that deal with historical events include WICKED GIRLS: A NOVEL OF THE SALEM WITCH TRIALS by Stephanie Hemphill ISBN 0061853283 and THE APPRENTICE’S MASTERPIECE: A STORY OF MEDIEVAL SPAIN by Melanie Little ISBN 1554511909.

Monday on the Mississippi - Poetry

Bibliography

Singer, Marilyn. 2005. MONDAY ON THE MISSISSIPPI. Ill. by Frané Lessac. New York: Henry Holt and Company.
ISBN 978-0-8050-7208-2.

Plot Summary

            MONDAY ON THE MISSISSIPPI by Marilyn Singer is a book of poems that, over the course of a week, takes the reader on a journey down the Mississippi river. The poems chart the path of the river from Lake Itasca, Minnesota to its end at the Mississippi river delta in Louisiana. Each of the poems is a snapshot of American life, and when you combine all the poems they create a larger picture of the varying life on the Mississippi.

Critical Analysis

            Marilyn Singer’s poems depicting the Mississippi River are written in free verse with no rhyme scheme. The lines are short and they create a fast paced rhythm. In several cases the poems themselves are only one sentence long, most are between two and five. The language Singer uses is both emotional and kinetic. The words describe singular moments in not only the people’s lives in each of the places mentioned; but they also evoke the movement of the river as it makes its way from Minnesota to Louisiana. Singer provides an author’s note at the end of the book called ABOUT THE MISSISSIPPI. It describes several of the places visited in the book in greater historical detail and provides a synopsis of natural disasters that have affected, and are continuing to affect the river itself.

            Imagery is a major aspect of Singer’s poetry. Each individual poem, along with Frané Lessac’s creative illustrations, conjures up a snapshot of life at the moment along the river at each particular place. People are hiking along the river, fishing on the dock or taking a tour of a Civil War battlefield all with the Mississippi river as a backdrop. Sensory vocabulary enhances the illustrations to provide a tactile image. An example comes from SATURDAY ON THE MISSISSIPPI: VICKSBURG, MISSISSIPPI, “…the wind grabs the guide’s favorite hat and tosses it into the water. The Mississippi waves it once like a tattered flag then swallows it whole.” The reader can actually imagine the tour guide’s hat being whipped off her head and engulfed by the river. This vocabulary, along with the illustrations, creates an emotional connection to the material. Readers can see themselves experiencing what takes place in the poems.

            Frané Lessac’s illustrations have a distinctive folk art quality to them. They contain rich, bright colors that make them attractive to younger readers. Lessac also pays close attention to detail. In the poem SUNDAY ON THE MISSISSIPPI: NEW ORLEANS, LOUISIANA we can see what the people are eating and drinking in Café du Monde as it relates to the poem, coffee and beignets for which the Café is famous. The money in the street musician’s case is visible, and there are beaded necklaces reminiscent of Mardi Gras hanging from the tree branches. Each of these details not only serves to heighten the reader’s experience, but also makes it more lifelike. These are not abstract images; these are scenes from daily life along the Mississippi.

Review Excerpts

BOOKLIST review 2005: “A waterway as mighty as the Mississippi similarly contains multitudes, and here it supports 14 snapshotlike poems charting the river's progress from its source in Minnesota to its Gulf of Mexico delta. In a folk-art style studded with painstaking details (tiny barge workers in St. Paul, a baby gator in swampy Arkansas), Lessac captures both the changing environment and the water's chameleon-like shifts in color.”

CHILDREN’S LITERATURE JOURNAL review 2005: “A map of the Mississippi River and all the states it flows through is on the title page, while the relevant part of the map is repeated on each of the double pages that focuses on that particular stretch of river. In brief sentences rich with images, each day of a week’s cruise from Lake Itasca to the sea is described on two double pages.”

Connections

·       Have students select one poem from the book, and from that one poem have them select a favorite element and write a poem about it.

·       Teachers can use the poems in this book to instruct students about many different topics: Civil War battles, Mark Twain, riverboats, Martin Luther King and B.B. King are some examples.

·       Other poetry books about the United States include MY AMERICA: A POETRY ATLAS OF THE UNITED STATES by Lee Bennett Hopkins with illustrations by Stephen Alcorn ISBN 0689812477 and TINY DREAMS, SPROUTING TALL: POEMS ABOUT THE UNITED STATES by Laura Purdie Salas ISBN 1429617489.

·       The blog OPEN WIDE, LOOK INSIDE from the University of Richmond discusses how to use Singer’s book, and others like it, to help teach children about geography and social studies. The blog can be found at this URL http://blog.richmond.edu/openwidelookinside/archives/332.

Birmingham, 1963 - Poetry

Bibliography

Weatherford, Carole Boston. 2007. BIRMINGHAM, 1963. Honesdale: Wordsong. ISBN 978-1-59078-440-2.

Plot Summary

            Divided into two parts, BIRMINGHAM, 1963 is free verse poetry, based on actual events. The first section is the main narrative poem, depicting different childhood events that took place on the birthday of a fictional African American girl. However, interspersed within those commonplace childhood events are accounts of marching with other African American children protesting for Civil Rights and a description of the horrors of the bombing of the Sixteenth Street Baptist Church by the KKK, which resulted in the deaths of four young girls who were attending Church that day. The second part of the book is comprised of four individual poems each paying homage to one of the girls who died: Addie Mae Collins, Cynthia Wesley, Denise McNair and Carole Robertson.

Critical Analysis

            In Carole Boston Weatherford’s book each of the five poems, the main narrative poem and the four individual poems, are written in free verse. There is no rhyme scheme present because the subject matter does not lend itself to rhyme. The creative purpose behind this type of free verse poetry is to conjure up intense images and create powerful emotions.  For example, from the main narrative poem, “The day I turned ten someone tucked a bundle of dynamite under the church steps and lit the fuse of hate.” Those final five words evoke the sense of impending devastation and portray the true terror that occurred on that day. A second example comes from the individual poem about Carole Robertson, “Carole, who thought she might want to teach history someday or at least make her mark on it.” Again, these well-chosen words show that each of these girls not only had a life, aspirations, and goals for their futures, but also wanted to make a difference in the world. The poems vividly demonstrate the senseless act of violence that took away those dreams.
               The main poem, written from the point of view of a child, facilitates understanding by other children. It allows them to grasp the images and themes being presented. The four ‘In Memoriam’ poems are also written to assist a young reader’s comprehension. The powerful subject matter is portrayed in a manner that focuses more on the senseless waste of human life and potential rather than intense images of destruction. Weatherford's Authors Note at the end of the book provides insight into the themes being represented in the poems. She presents the reader with information not only on the bombing, but on how the bombing fit into the larger picture of the Civil Right's movement.

            The illustrations in the book create forceful juxtapositions. Photographs illustrate the main poem. These photographs help convey the fictional narrator’s sense of being torn between two worlds, childhood and racism. On the right hand sides of every page of the main poem are archival photos of events that took place during the Civil Rights movement. Examples include children and adults marching in protest, KKK members, images of Martin Luther King Jr.’s I Have a Dream speech in Washington DC and photos of the damage at the Sixteenth Street Baptist Church. On the left hand sides, intermingled among the text, are photos of everyday childhood items, Barbie clothes, Bobbie socks, pencils and erasers. With the four short poems at the end, the left hand side of the page simply contains text, while the right hand side shows a photo of the girl against a black background with the words ‘In Memoriam’ on the bottom in gray. This presents a simple, yet powerful reminder of the cost of hate.

 All of the photographs are in black and white and convey a sense of history. There are however, slashes of red on every page of the main narrative poem. They are fragmented lines meant to evoke the destruction and loss of life that occurred on that terrible day. There is also an Author’s Note at the end of the book which delves into the history surrounding the bombing and its aftermath. Also included in the Author's Note is detailed information about the photos.

Review Excerpts and Awards

Lee Bennett Hopkins Poetry Award Winner 2008

Jane Addams Children’s Book Award Honor Book 2008

COOPERATIVE CHILDREN’S BOOK CENTER CHOICES review 2008: “Her spare and deeply affecting narrative poem gradually builds to the church bombing in that city in which four African American girls were murdered. There is a shocking numbness in the matter-of-fact voice of the fictional narrator, a young girl describing significant events in that year.”

KIRKUS review 2007: “Exquisitely understated design lends visual potency to a searing poetic evocation of the Birmingham church bombing of 1963.”

Connections

·       Other books by Carole Boston Weatherford that deal with African Americans and the struggle for freedom include REMEMBER THE BRIDGE: POEMS OF A PEOPLE ISBN 0399237267 and FREEDOM ON THE MENU: THE GREENSBORO SIT INS with illustrations by Jerome Lagarrigue ISBN 0142408948.

·       After reading Weatherford’s book, students would read the inspirational parts of Martin Luther King’s speech and discuss the question ‘What are your dreams?’

·       The Birmingham Public Library has extensive Digital Collections dealing with the bombing which can be used by educators in lessons dealing with the history of this period. They can be found at this website http://www.bplonline.org/resources/Digital_Project/SixteenthStBaptistBomb.asp.