J u s t P u b l i s h e d
THE DUNDERHEADS
Illustrated by David Roberts
"Never," shrieked Miss Breakbone, "have I been asked to teach such a scraping together of fiddling, twiddling, time-squandering, mind-wandering, doodling, dozing, don't-knowing dunderheads!"
This was her first mistake--the insult. Mistake Number Two: No eye for talent. Further miscues follow, inspiring the group to attempt a caper that requires all their sundry skills: Spider's climbing, Pencil's drawing, Hollywood's movie knowledge, Wheels' cycling...Will they succeed?
Illustrated by wickedly witty Brit, David Roberts,
The Dunderheads takes one of folklore's oldest motifs--the team of questers holding a royal flush of talents--and carries it forward to the contemporary playground. Prepare to meet a well-oiled grammar-school machine that no teacher should ever bet against.
Starred reviews in Publishers Weekly, BCCB, and School Library Journal
A Borders Best of 2009 pick
"Cleverness in spades." --
Booklist
Candlewick Press
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"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
The community read programs in
Hillside, IL,
Appleton, WI,
Allen, TX,
Natick, MA, and the island of
Nantucket are the latest to choose
Seedfolks--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, and suitability for adults as well as students has led
Seedfolks to be used in One Book programs round the country:
VERMONT used the book as its One-State One-Book choice throughout 2005. 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 2005 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.
The Garden--an Oscar-nominated documentary about the country's largest community garden
In the wake of the 1992 riots in Los Angeles, 14 acres were opened to cultivators in one of the city's poorest neighborhoods. The land bloomed and became a vital source of food. Then the city changed its mind.
The Garden follows the twists and turns of what happened--a story that's still unfolding. The DVD has just become available at
thegardenmovie.com. Highly recommended!
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E V E N T S
Spring 2010 performances of Zap will be given in:
Eau Claire, WI, Memorial High School, March 4-7
Mississauga, ONT, Meadowvale Secondary School, April, dates TBA
Monroe, CT, Masuk High School, May 8-9
Renaissance School for the Arts in Appleton, WI will give the Wisconsin, Western Hemisphere, and Solar System premiere of my play Logomaniacs this spring, a portrait of 26 real-life word nuts, living and dead, one per alphabet letter. Don't know what a lipogram is? A Hobson-Jobson? Zaum? Esperanto? Language inventors, mad diarists, men who wage war over a single book or give their life to writing a novel without the letter "e"--Logomaniacs is a hymn to our instinct for play and capacity to get lost in the symbolic worlds we create. The play will be presented in abridged form, dates TBA.
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Photo by Laurie Harbeson
WESLANDIA --
The Musical
Composer Frumi Cohen has brought
Weslandia to the stage! The tale of a grammar school outcast who founds an alternate civilization in his backyard has now been infused with her toe-tapping, lyrical, irresistible music. The 55-minute musical is available both as a large-cast student production and as a touring play for 3 males and 3 females. You can get more information and hear samples at
frumicohen.com .
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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. Do your children or students 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. 
