Across So Many Seas by Ruth Behar

Across So Many Seas, the story of four twelve year old Sephardic Jewish girls from different time periods, felt very . . . educational. I didn’t mind the didactic tone of the story, and I was somewhat fascinated by the saga of the Sephardic Jewish experience from Spain to Turkey to Cuba to the United States (Miami). We tend to know and read more about Ashkenazi, Eastern European Jews and Judaism than we do about the Sephardic Jewish people, who came from Spain after the 1492 expulsion of the Jews under King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella (yes, Columbus’s sponsors). These Sephardic Jews spoke a Spanish-derived language called Ladino and either became conversos (converts to Catholicism) under threat of death, or left Spain as refugees, going to Italy and Turkey and other places to find freedom to practice their Jewish faith.

The first story in Across So Many Seas features Benvenida, a Jewish girl living in Toledo, Spain in 1492, during the Spanish Inquisition and the expulsion of the Jews. Benvenida’s family is forced to leave Spain, and they end up living in Turkey where the sultan has promised them freedom of religion. Again the story feels as if the author has a lesson to teach: “Here’s a story, children, to teach you about your history and heritage. Listen, while I make it into a tale for your edification.” Benvenida, who speaks and thinks like a miniature adult, never seems like a real person, only a vehicle for the teaching of history. But still, I was interested enough in the history to keep reading.

The other three girls in the story are Reina (Turkey, 1921), Alegra (Cuba, 1961), and Paloma (Miami, FL, 2003). These three are grandmother, mother, and daughter, and their tales are full of more displacement and emigration, as each girl experiences her own story of travel across the seas. Only Paloma seems to have a stable home where she can make free choices for herself without having to labor under the prejudice of others and the expectations that her family has for proper Jewish girls.

The author, Ruth Behar, comes from both Ashkenazi and Sephardic Jewish ancestry. The book is based in part on the story of Ms. Behar’s Abuela, her paternal grandmother, who came to the United States via Turkey and Cuba and who was of Sephardic heritage. It’s a lovely tribute to Ms. Behar’s heritage and to her grandmother, and I enjoyed learning more about this stream of history. But be warned that the book is heavy on the history and light on believable characterization, dialogue, and plot.

I Can’t Said the Ant by Polly Cameron

Apr11

This ridiculous rhyming story by Polly Cameron is a lark. Originally published in 1961, it’s the story of how the ant tries to help Miss Teapot who has fallen off the counter. The ant calls on everyone to help–all the kitchen foods and implements, and each one answers with a rhyme and and some helpful advice. With teamwork, they manage to rescue Miss Teapot, and “can’t” turns to “can”.

I Can’t Said the Ant is, alas, no longer in print. However, it’s fairly easy to find a copy of this book in a paperback edition. I’m not sure a hardcover edition was ever published, despite the fact that one hardcover copy is available on Amazon for an exorbitant price. Just get the paperback and enjoy the rhyming game that begins in your home when you read it.

The book is subtitled “A Second Book of Nonsense.” That subtitle made me wonder, of course, about the first book of nonsense by this author, and I found it with a little search online: A Child’s Book of Nonsense: 3 copycats, 3 batty birds, 3 crazy camels, a quail, and a snail by Polly Cameron, published in 1960. I’m not about to pay over $50 for a copy of the first book, which I’ve never seen, but I did find a couple of other books by Ms. Cameron on vimeo that I might check out:

The Dog Who Grew Too Much

The Cat Who Thought He Was a Tiger

"Thank you," said Miss Teapot, 
"You've been good to me. 
Polly, put the kettle on. 
We'll all have tea."

I Can’t Said the Ant is one of the books listed in my Picture Book Preschool book. Picture Book Preschool is a preschool/kindergarten curriculum which consists of a list of picture books to read aloud for each week of the year as well as a character trait to introduce, a memory verse, and activities, all tied to the theme for the week. You can purchase a downloadable version (pdf file) of Picture Book Preschool by Sherry Early at Biblioguides.

Born on This Day: Phyllis McGinley, Housewife Poet

Mar21

Phyllis McGinley, b. March 21, 1905, was a woman who wore many hats: poet, essayist, editor, schoolteacher, children’s book author, mother, wife, homemaker (not all at the same time!). She was not just a poet, but a 1961 Pulitzer prize-winning poet, the first to win the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry for a collection of “light verse”. Feminist writers and poets minimized her accomplishments and her poetry, saying that she “sold herself” (Sylvia Plath) and that she “did nothing to improve or change the lives of housewives” (Betty Friedan). Ms. McGinley responded by proudly calling herself “a housewife poet”. In exchanges with her feminist critics, she maintained her own dignity and humility and preference for a touch of humor in dealing with serious subjects, saying:

“Our bodies are shaped to bear children, and our lives are a working out of the processes of creation. All our ambitions and intelligence are beside that great elemental point.” And “a lady is smarter than a gentleman, maybe, she can sew a fine seam, she can have a baby, she can use her intuition instead of her brain, but she can’t fold a paper in a crowded train.”

More about Phyllis McKinley and some of the books she wrote:
The Most Wonderful Doll in the World by Phyllis McGinley.

The Headmistress at The Common Room on Phyllis McGinley and her writing.

The Book Den: Lest We Forget, Phyllis McGinley (1905-1978)

Phyllis McGinley on fathers

Other books in my library by Phyllis McGinley:
The Horse Who Lived Upstairs: In which a discontented horse named Joey lives on the fourth floor of a city apartment building.

The Horse Who Had His Picture in the Paper: In which Joey tries to become a hero so that he can get his picture in the newspaper like Brownie the police horse.

All Around the Town: In which the alphabet is used to spell out the essential elements of life in the city—in the 1940’s, a poem for each letter of the alphabet.

Kitty on the Farm, or A Name for Kitty: In which a little boy receives a brand-new kitten but must search for the perfect name for his new pet.

The Plain Princess: In which a spoiled and unattractive princess learns the true source and meaning of beauty.

Other children’s books by Mrs. McGinley that I would like to take a look at:
Blunderbus (1951)
The Make-Believe Twins (1953)
The Year Without a Santa Claus (1957)
Boys Are Awful (1962)
How Mrs. Santa Claus Saved Christmas (1963)

I would also like to read her adult book of stories of the (Catholic and a few non-Catholic) saints called Saint-Watching.

1961: Books and Literature

Feb13

The National Book Award goes to The Waters of Kronos by Conrad Richter.
Some other nominees were:
John Knowles for A Separate Peace
Harper Lee for To Kill a Mockingbird
Wright Morris for Ceremony in Lone Tree
Flannery O’Connor for The Violent Bear It Away
John Updike for Rabbit, Run
Interesting choice with that sort of line-up.

To Kill A Mockingbird by Harper Lee wins the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction.

Ivo Andric wins the Nobel Prize for Literature. (Who’s he?)

Published in 1961:
James and the Giant Peach by Roald Dahl. I’m not a Dahl fan, but this one and Charlie and the Chocolate Factory are still quite popular.
Stranger in a Strange Land by Robert Heinlein. I read some Heinlein when I was a teenager, including this one, I think, but I don’t remember much about it. I do know that Heinlein’s book is the origin of the term “grok” that became somewhat popular in the 60’s and 70’s, In Stranger in a Strange Land, “grok” literally means “to drink” and figuratively means “to comprehend”, “to love”, and “to be one with”. “I grok you” means “I get it” or “I’m with you.”
Catch-22 by Joseph Heller. Set during World II, the title also introduced a new term to popular parlance: “catch-22”. The catch-22 is explained to be how any pilot requesting a psych evaluation hoping to be found not sane enough to fly, and thereby escape dangerous missions, would thereby demonstrate his sanity. If you’re sane enough not to want to fly combat missions, the army air corps says you’re sane enough to fly them.
The Phantom Tollbooth by Norton Juster. We read Phantom Tollbooth aloud last year in school. I highly recommend it.
The Moviegoer by Walker Percy. Eldest Daughter really appreciates Walker Percy. I’m not there yet. I just don’t grok him.
The Agony and the Ecstasy by Irving Stone. On the other hand, I think Irving Stone is underestimated as a writer. I remember liking this one, a biographical novel of Michaelangelo, and Lust for Life, about da Vinci. Stone also wrote one of my favorite nonfiction history books, Men To Match My Mountains, about the opening and settlement of the far western United States.
Mila 18 by Leon Uris. Wonderfully compelling novel about the Warsaw Ghetto during World War II.

1961: Events and Inventions

Feb8

January 3, 1961. President Dwight Eisenhower announces the severing of diplomatic and consular relations with Cuba.

January 17, 1961. Imprisoned former prime minister Patrice Lumumba of Republic of Congo is executed by firing squad. The CIA, the Belgian authorities in Congo, and the president of Congo, President Tshombe, may all have been involved in Lumumba’s death. “We are not Communists, Catholics, Socialists. We are African nationalists.” ~Patrice Lumumba.

January 31, 1961. The United States sends a monkey named Ham 150 miles into space in a Mercury capsule. Ham safely splashes down and receives an apple as a reward for his performance as the first monkey astronaut.

April 12, 1961. Soviet cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin orbits the earth and becomes the first human in space.

April 19, 1961. The United States sponsors and funds 1500 Cuban exiles in an invasion of Cuba at The Bay of Pigs. The invasion fails, and President Kennedy and Soviet premier Krushchev warn one another not to interfere in the internal affairs of Cuba.

June 16, 1961. The United Kingdom ends its protectorate over the tiny sheikdom of Kuwait, and Iraq claims the territory as part of Iraq. Kuwait successfully resists Iraq and remains independent.

August 13-31, 1961. East German authorities build a huge wall of concrete blocks and electric fences and barbed wire separating East and West Berlin. Since the post World War II partition of Germany, more than two million Germans have fled East Germany into the West.

September 28, 1961. A military coup in Damascus, Syria effectively ends the United Arab Republic, the union between Egypt and Syria.

October 1, 1961. The formerly British Southern Cameroons unites with French Cameroun to form the Federal Republic of Cameroon.

November 18, 1961. U.S. President John F. Kennedy sends 18,000 military advisors to South Vietnam.

December 9, 1961. Tanganyika gains independence and declares itself a republic, with Julius Nyerere as its first President.

The Red Umbrella by Christina Diaz Gonzalez

Oct15

“From 1960 to 1962, the parents of over fourteen thousand Cuban children made the heart-wrenching decision to send their sons and daughters to the United States . . . alone. . . . They would save their children by sending them to the United States. And so, in 1960, a plan was hatched to help Cuban children escape the Communist island. The plan required the secret transport of documents, an underground network, and the courageous actions of people in the United States and Cuba. For the next two years, Cuban children arrived in Miami, Florida, by the planeload in what would eventually be called Operation Pedro Pan.”

From this actual historic event comes the fictional story of Lucia and Francisco Alvarez, Cuban children whose parents send them to the United States to escape from Castro’s revolucion. This book was nominated for the Cybil Awards in both the the MIddle Grade Fiction category and the Young Adult fiction category. Because of the age of the main character, Lucia, who is a 14 year old teenager with teen concerns as the book opens, and because of a couple of (non-graphic) mentions of aggressive sexual behavior, I would say that the book is most appropriate for teens ages 13 and up. However, don’t let that scare you off even if you have strict standards for that sort of behavior in young adult fiction. The Red Umbrella is anything but salacious, and the picture presented of the evils of Castor’s “Communist paradise” is on target and carries a needed message.

It’s easy for adults to forget and for young people to never be told how very repressive and cruel the Communist regimes of Eastern Europe, the Soviet Union, and Cuba were. In Cuba’s case, of course, the repression and tyranny continue to this day. This story, which never descends into political didacticism, will make at least some young people curious enough to find out for themselves how Castro’s Cuba came to be. And that’s a good thing. I love history contained in good historical fiction, and The Red Umbrella is great historical fiction.

Ms. Gonzalez says that this story is based partially on the experiences of her parents and her mother-in-law who were all three as children involved in Operation Pedro Pan. By the third chapter of the book, I was rooting for the children to escape indoctrination by the Cuban Communist regime, and I was soon trying to figure out how it might be possible for the children’s parents to join them in the U.S. Of course, not all of the experiences the children have in the U.S. are positive, but for the most the United States becomes for them The Land of Freedom, even though they miss Cuba and their own Cuban culture and customs.

Other children’s and young adult books about Cuba and Cuban-Americans:
Martina the Beautiful Cockroach: A Cuban Folktale by Carmen Agra Deedy.
The Bossy Gallito: A Traditional Cuban Folktale by Lucia M. Gonzalez.
The Road to Santiago by D.H. Figueredo.
Tropical Secrets: Holocaust Refugees in Cuba by Margarita Engle. Semicolon review here.
The Surrender Tree: Poems of Cuba’s Struggle for Freedom by Margarita Engle.
90 Miles to Havana by Enrique Flores-Galbis.
Flight to Freedom by Ana Veciana Suarez.
Heat by Mike Lupica. Semicolon review here.
Jumping Off to Freedom by Anilu Bernardo.
Where the Flame Trees Bloom by Alma Flor Ada.
Under the Royal Palms: A Childhood in Cuba by Alma Flor Ada.

Semicolon