Have you been so bad as to read “The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn” or “To Kill a Mockingbird“? Harbor a secret copy of Judy Blume’s “Forever” in your closet? Let your impressionable children read a Harry Potter book? Or, heaven forbid, read a picture book about two male penguins who adopt an egg to your poor preschooler?!
You, my friend, are in serious trouble. You have been the unwitting participant or enabler of reading a book that has been banned.
And this week you are encouraged to celebrate it!
Yes, this is Banned Books Week - a national celebration of the freedom to read.
According to BannedBooksWeek.org, “It was launched in 1982 in response to a sudden surge in the number of challenges to books in schools, bookstores and libraries. More than a thousand books have been challenged since 1982. The challenges have occurred in every state and in hundreds of communities. Click here to see a map of book bans and challenges in the US from 2007 to 2009.”
That penguin book for preschoolers? “And Tango Makes Three,” by Justin Richardson and Peter Parnell is once again one of the 10 most-challenged titles over the past year. Why? Reasons cited are: anti-ethnic, anti-family, homosexuality, religious viewpoint, and unsuited to age group.
The 2009 celebration of Banned Books Week is being held from September 26 through October 3, but you can be a rebel all year round - now go read something someone doesn’t want you to read!
“Where the Wild Things Are” was a book that I read in my own childhood and a fellow bibliophile I used to work with (thanks Leslie) made sure my child got the chance to read it, too, by including it in a baby shower gift. The “Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs” book came a little late for me, but my librarian mother introduced it to my girl and she and I both enjoyed it.
Now, bringing a book to the movie screen has always been fraught with danger. Everyone who has read a book has their own ideas about how the characters look, so casting can get a lot of fan input or backlash (Tom Cruise as Lestat anyone?). Storylines often get changed to meet a perceived desire of audiences to always have happy endings (think “Breakfast at Tiffany’s” and “The Scarlet Letter“). Sometimes entire characters are dropped or added, which frustrated me in “Angels and Demons,” despite the fact that I can understand things need to be edited sometimes to squeeze an entire book into a couple of hours of screen time.
That difficulty of making the in-depth short is probably the most common cause of changes that frustrate book lovers who see the movies based on them. But what of short childrens’ books that need to be expanded to make them long enough for a movie? Does that make it any easier for adaptation? I’m thinking not based strictly on my own mixed feelings about these two new movies.
It appears that they have expanded Cloudy primarily by adding a story in front of the story - giving the audience a tale of how the food first came to fall from the sky in the town of Chewandswallow - and I think this will work nicely.
But, from what I can tell from the fantastic Wild Things trailers, the 10 sentences of the original story are getting a lot of filler in between them - thus potentially changing the story a bit more. The live-action attempt at The Grinch Who Stole Christmas tried doing both and I don’t think the results were very spectacular there.
Either way, I will probably see both movies. Not needing an excuse to watch kids’ movies, after all, is one of the perks of this mommy gig, right? And, while I will definitely enter the Wild Things theater with trepidation and concern that the book will never read the same for me again, I bet this trailer makes you want to see more, too.
When I recently saw this list of worst mothers in literature, it got me wondering who are the good mothers I’ve read about? And the first thing I realized as I let that roll around in my head a bit was that I really needed to get back to reading more “grown-up” books!
Seriously, almost all of the moms that popped into my mind were from childrens literature. Nice mothers like one of my favorites from “I Love You Stinky Face” (and the traveling mommy’s friend “I Miss You Stinky Face“) by Lisa Mccourt.
Then I thought of the heroic Mrs. Frisby from “Mrs. Frisby and the Rats of NIMH.” But, that was a bit of a cheat since I haven’t actually read the book - just took my daughter to the local cinema that was doing a free showing of the movie “Secrets of NIMH” last month.
Then, in more young adult literature, I thought of Sally Jackson the self-sacrificing and loving mother of the title character in the Percy Jackson and the Olympians series. They’re a little advanced for my girl, but as a big Greek/Roman mythology fan, I found them a great read - in preparation for when she’s older, you know, so I’ll know if they’re ok for her to read. <wink>
The closest I could come to a good mother in a book that’s probably not in an elementary school library was August Boatwright from The Secret Life of Bees. She’s not a biological mother, but certainly filled that role for young Lily Owens in a way no one could top. I haven’t actually seen how Queen Latifah did playing her in the movie because I didn’t want to compare it to the book.
But after that, I started drawing a blank! A quick Google search for “mothers” and “literature” seemed to turn up more lists of bad mothers than good, so maybe I’m not the only one wracking my brain. Do you guys have some favorite “good mothers” in the books you’ve read?
A couple years ago, my grandparents gave my daughter a copy of the book “We Help Mommy.” You know, the one from 1959 starring darling little Martha and Bobby as mommy’s biggest helpers?
I was thrilled! I loved “We Help Mommy” as a little girl, and as a newish mom I was so excited to share it with her. I was giddy with excitement about the bonding in store for the two of us.
And then we read it.
How had I managed to forget what this book was about? Martha and Bobby “help” mommy all day as she makes the beds, cleans the house, does the laundry, buys the groceries and prepares the food. Roll, pat. Roll, pat. Making a treat for daddy.
No kidding, my husband was laughing out loud watching my wheels turn as I turned each page. Was this really one of my favorite books as a child? Me, who married daddy because he gets right in there and makes the beds, cleans the house, does the laundry, buys the groceries and prepares the food next to me? How did this happen?
My daughter loved it – “Again!” she said, over and over.
And you know what? I loved it too. Ok, so it’s not quite the way things run around here, but I figure I can start to teach her to be an independent thinker by letting her choose her own books. I love that this thoughtful gift came from her great grandparents, I love that it’s 50 years old, and most of all I love having her crawl in my lap to read a book that I used to read with my mom.
The next time we visited my parents, she pulled open the drawer full of books and out spilled my copy – old, worn and frayed on the corners. Just like the rest of my favorite books.
Diane Cordell is the mother of two adult, married children. In her position as a K-12 teacher/librarian, she interacts with students of all ages on a daily basis - good practice for future grandchildren! You can read more about Diane here. Diane also blogs at Journeysand can be found on Twitter as dmcordell. Click here to read more of Diane’s posts.
Authors Caroline J. Blakemore and Barbara Weston Ramirez have written an engaging guide aimed at helping parents raise a lifelong reader.
Baby Read-Aloud Basicsstarts by explaining the benefits of reading to your child even before they are born to stimulate language development and help pave the way for success in school and in life.
In addition to tips on how to gain and hold a child’s attention, Blakemore & Ramirez include information on the stages of early childhood development and extensive, annotated lists of recommended books.
Chapter 10, “Fun Activities and Tips to Manage TV and Make a Language-Rich Home,” offers reasonable, practical advice about how to provide a balance between media and literature. There are ideas like creating a “reader’s nest” or designating a “read-aloud chair” and suggestions about how to set up a “language play area” for safe, creative playtime.
A copy of Baby Read-Aloud Basics, tucked into a basket of books, would make a wonderful shower gift. Include some childhood favorites of the prospective parents, and you’ll guarantee hours of interactive family fun for years to come.
Win a copy!
We have 5 copies of this book to give away - entering the contest is very simple!
Just leave a comment on this post telling the title of one of your favorite children’s books. Past winners eligible to enter and the contest ends on Monday, July 28th. U.S. entrants only (sorry!). The winners will be selected at random from the entrants.
Kymberli Mulford is the proud mom of a grade-schooler and high-schooler in the Chicago suburbs, and the proud grandmother of her now-grown stepson’s four children. When she’s not shuttling her sons from one activity to another, she works in the world of educational technology – as a district administrator, a learning facilitator, a consultant, and as a blogger at Onionskin. For more of Kymberli’s “mom” posts click here!
I love reading.
Even more, I really love reading to my sons. Somehow, no matter how busy I was when they were too young to read on their own, I just couldn’t say no when they came around the corner with a picture book.
Lucky for me, they have both become great readers. But I still love reading to them, and I’m looking forward to having more time to do that this summer. I can’t wait to get out all of my favorites and go through them again.
Equally interesting to my budding readers, though, were the wonderful websites that provided this same service on the screen. Once Flash animation entered the world of children’s literature online, new voices emanated from the computer and patiently read to my boys (over and over if they wished), expanding their world of narrators to include male voices and dialects and accents that were much more interesting than mine.
Here are a few of my favorites, done with such quality and attention to detail that they are almost as good as sitting on a mother’s lap…
Another great website for pre-readers is Starfall. This can be used as soon as your little one is able to use the mouse on his or her own. There’s no reading required, and the “sparkles” show your child where to click next. Very entertaining, very cute — and a great way to sneak in some letter/sound teaching in a refreshingly fun way!
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A couple years ago, my grandparents gave my daughter a copy of the book “We Help Mommy.” You know, the one from 1959 starring darling little Martha and Bobby as mommy’s biggest helpers?
