H A N S
C H R I S T I A N
A N D E R S E N
A W A R D
N O M I N A T I O N
The U.S. Board on Books for Young People has named Paul Fleischman the United States' Author Award nominee for the 2012 Hans Christian Andersen Award, the premier international award for children's books. The award is given every other year to an author and illustrator for a body of work judged to have made lasting contributions to children's literature. Chris Raschka is the U.S. nominee for the Illustration Award. Winners will be announced during the Bologna Book Fair in the spring of 2012, with the awards bestowed by the Queen of Denmark at the International Board on Books for Young People congress in London in August 2012. Sid Fleischman was the U.S. author nominee in 1994.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
THE DUNDERHEADS
BEHIND BARS
Illustrated by David Roberts
Stars of their classroom after outwitting Miss Breakbone, the Dunderheads take a crack at Hollywood fame--only to land in a mystery not in their plans. Lights, cameras, and thievery collide in a summertime caper requiring all their sundry skills, illustrated once more by the wickedly witty star of pen and ink, David Roberts.
The Dunderheads (2009) won the PEN Center USA Literature Award for Children's and Young Adult Literature, the Horace Mann Upstanders Book Award, and was shortlisted for the Kate Greenaway Medal.
April 2012 / Candlewick Press
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
L O G O M A N I A C S !
Paul Fleischman's new play for adults receives its premiere
Ladies and gentlemen--step inside and prepare to behold a freak show like no other!
A parade of 26 word obsessives, one surname for each letter of the alphabet...Men who don't simply use language to communicate, but who lose themselves for years among its labyrinths--playing like children, collecting, dissecting, seeing mathematics and music where you and I see simply letters...Builders of verbal wonders as colossal and rarely glimpsed as the overgrown pyramids of the Mayas...Each man's tale more astounding than the last...Every one of them true!
SEE Daniel Nussbaum's retelling of Genesis via vanity license plates!
MARVEL at George Perec's novel written without the letter
e!
GAWK at Flann O'Brien's exhaustive, acid-tongued Catechism of Cliche!
WEEP at Ludwig Zamenhof's poignant attempt to end war through his invented language!
A hymn to our instincts for play and creativity, performed in the style of a carnival sideshow with music composed by Annette LeSiege, Actors Shakespeare Company presented
Logomaniacs December 9-19, 2010 at New Jersey City University in Jersey City.
Unfamiliar with isograms? Hobson-Jobsons? Zaum? Keep watch here for further productions.
Read a review
here.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
"O n e B o o k"
P r o g r a m s
C h o o s e
S E E D F O L K S
Watsonville, CA is the latest city to choose
Seedfolks for its community reading program. The book is a collection of vignettes by 13 characters describing the first year of a community garden in a Cleveland immigrant neighborhood. Its short length, multicultural cast, suitability for adults as well as children, and availability in Spanish (see below) have led it to be used in One Book programs around the country.
VERMONT used the book as its One-State One-Book choice. There were discussions, dramatizations, readings on Vermont Public Radio, and the participation of dozens of groups--from the Friends of Burlington Gardens to the Vermont Refugee Resettlement Project--in communities up and down the state. For information on Burlington's splendid community gardens and views of my visit, click here.
RACINE, WI gave away copies of the book, encouraging readers to leave them in public places when finished, posting comments and following the book's journey via BookCrossing.com. Discussions in Spanish, a screening of Greenfingers, writing and virtual gardening at a women's prison are a few of the many activities that took place. The book was chosen as well for the statewide reading program, Read On Wisconsin.
TAMPA, FL gave away more than 15,000 copies of the book and used it in conjunction with Martin Luther King, Jr. Day, encouraging citizens to volunteer in an array of community improvement projects.
NEWBURGH, NY connected the book to a month-long multicultural celebration of words, art, and dance, with concerts and classes on everything from found sculpture to African drumming. The local newspaper serialized the book in both English and Spanish.
The book has also been read by communities in California, Massachusetts, Illinois, Wisconsin, Florida, and Utah.
"Dear Paul Fleischman: I've bought 20 copies of Seedfolks and given them away."
--PETE SEEGER
The book has been used in connection with
school gardens at every level, performed by community theaters, and used in school-wide and district-wide reads. I've posted an
article--included in the new paperback edition--on
how the book came to be written. Click
here for a newspaper article on how
a New York teenager put the book into action. An
audio of the book is now available from
Audio Bookshelf. If you're interested in using
Seedfolks in a school or community reading program, contact HarperCollins at authorvisits@harpercollins.com. Click
here to download HarperCollins'
teacher's guide to the book.
"The size of this slim volume belies the profound message of hope it contains."
--CHRISTIAN SCIENCE MONITOR
Seedfolks in Spanish
Translated as
Semillas, Seedfolks is now available in a Spanish paperback edition from Scholastic's
Lectorum Publications.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
C O M P O S E R S
L I V E !
Joyful Noise: Poems for Two Voices may be the only Newbery book never to be translated into another language--but composers rushed in where translators feared to tread. Quite a few have set selections from the book to music over the years, captivating works I can now share with you. Did you think all composers are dead or that questions have only one right answer? Listen to these very different treatments of the same poem.
The first is the work of
Shirley Hoffman Warren, one of five
Joyful Noise poems she set to music, all performed at SUNY in New Paltz, NY, where she lives. "I often strive for a slightly off-balance feel," she says--wonderfully evident here. To hear more of her work, visit her website at
www.washalee.com .
The second was composed by Brian Holmes and was recently performed by the Peninsula Girls Chorus in Burlingame, CA. To learn and hear more, go to myspace.com/brianwholmes.
-330-exp.jpg)
