Vincent Can’t Sleep by Barb Rosenstock

Vincent Can’t Sleep: Van Gogh Paints the Night Sky by Barb Rosenstock, illustrated by Mary Grandpre. Knopf, 2017.

“At present, I absolutely want to paint a starry sky.”

“It often seems to me that the night is much more alive and richly colored than the day.”

“If only you pay attention to it you will see that certain stars are lemon-yellow, others pink or a green, blue and forget-me-not brilliance. And . . . it is obvious that putting little white dots on the blue-black is not enough to paint a starry sky.”
~Vincent van Gogh

The themes of this book, Vincent van Gogh’s sleeplessness and his famous painting of a starry night, are inspired by the artist’s actual, frequent bouts with insomnia and of course, by his art. The insomnia, which was probably a symptom of his mental illness, plagued him throughout his life, from boyhood. In this story, biographer Barb Rosenstock sees the inability as a source of inspiration and productivity for the talented and prolific artist. “Vincent’s personality shines through his art—–with each energetic brushstroke and wild color choice, he brings the night to life.”

I have enjoyed learning more about van Gogh and his art ever since last year when a speaker at a retreat I attended made Vincent van Gogh and his art come to life, so to speak. It often takes a true fan, a person who loves a certain artist or poet or writer, to introduce me to whole new world of that person’s art or poetry or fiction. An educated enthusiast can show me a way into another artist’s work that I just can’t find on my own. A friend in college introduced me to the poetry of T.S. Eliot, poems that I originally found confusing and esoteric, and I have enjoyed Eliot ever since. This speaker at the retreat last year introduced me to van Gogh, and I have been running into him, van Gogh, that is, ever since, in many unexpected ways and places.

Vincent Can’t Sleep is yet another gateway that will open up the world of Vincent van Gogh’s art for children, and even adults. Mary Grandpre uses van Gogh’s backgrounds and styles to create her own art for this luminous picture book. It is a tribute to van Gogh, and yet the artwork in it is new and fresh and beautiful in its own right.

Just as the makers of the film about van Gogh, Loving Vincent, used Vincent van Gogh’s art to create something new, the author and illustrator of this book about van Gogh have given me new insights into the man and his work. I didn’t know that he had insomnia, and I didn’t know the quotes about his use of color and paint to create pictures of the night sky. By the way, I highly recommend the film, Loving Vincent, for adults who, after reading this picture book, are interested in learning more about van Gogh and his art.

If you are interested in purchasing ($5.00) a curated list of favorite picture book biographies with over 300 picture books about all sorts of different people, email me at sherryDOTpray4youATgmailDOTcom. I’m highlighting picture book biographies in March. What is your favorite picture book about a real person?

Joan Proctor, Dragon Doctor by Patricia Valdez

Mar12

Joan Proctor, Dragon Doctor: The Woman Who Loved Reptiles by Patricia Valdez, illustrated by Felicita Sala. Knopf, 2018.

In case you’re not current on your famous herpetologists, Joan Proctor was a British expert on amphibians and reptiles who became a curator of reptiles at the Natural History Museum, then a part of the British Museum, just after World War I. In 1923, Joan Proctor was appointed to the post of curator of reptiles at the London Zoo. She designed the Reptile House at the zoo, studied and cared for the reptiles housed there, wrote articles and scientific papers about her findings, and presented her observations and research before the Scientific Meeting of the Zoological Society of London in 1928. All of these accomplishments were done without a college degree and in spite of the chronic illness that kept Ms. Proctor from ever attending college.

Ms. Proctor was particularly interested in and fond of Komodo dragons, especially a Komodo dragon named Sumbawa with whom she took daily walks through the zoo. For any child who is an animal lover, or a fan of reptiles, lizards and snakes, this book would be a treasure.

The book mentions but does not emphasize the fact that Joan Proctor was something of a phenomenon in her day. In a time when middle and upper class women did not work outside the home at all, much less with snakes and lizards in the zoo, Joan Proctor’s work was novel and ground-breaking. The newspaper articles referenced in the bibliography carry titles that indicate that journalists were both curious and a bit shocked by her work:

“English Woman Charms Snakes: Joan Proctor, 25 Years Old, Has Charge of Reptiles in the London Zoo.” The Winnipeg Tribune, August 15, 1923.

“Girl Manages Reptile House in London Zoo.” Mount Carmel Item, December 28, 1929.

“Snakes Alive, and a Lady Who Loves Them. London’s Curator of Reptiles.” The Advertiser, Adelaide, Australia. January 4, 1930.

Unfortunately, Ms. Proctor died young, at the age of thirty-four, from complications due to her chronic illness. But her work and inspiration live on in this timeless picture book biography of a talented and fearless lady who defied expectations to pursue the study and career that she loved. And the book has quite a bit of information about Komodo dragons for readers who are particularly interested in them. (They are rather amazing creations, but I wouldn’t want to take one walking, no matter how tame he was.)

Out of School and Into Nature by Suzanne Slade

Mar4

Out of School and Into Nature: The Anna Comstock Story by Suzanne Slade, illustrated by Jessica Lanon.

“From the time she was no higher than a daisy, Anna was wild about nature. She loved to hold it close in her fingers, she wanted to feel it squish between her toes, which was why she ran barefoot all summer long, raised slimy tadpoles into pet toads, and climbed tall trees instead of sitting in their shade.”

Anna Botsford Comstock was an artist, conservationist, teacher and naturalist during the first half of the twentieth century. She enrolled at Cornell University in 1874, in an era when women were not encouraged to go to college or to study science and nature. Her Handbook of Nature Study, published in 1911, became a standard text for teachers, and she was the first female professor at Cornell University.

This picture book introduces children and adults to the nature-loving Mrs. Comstock and her passion for the importance of nature study as a part of a child’s education. The book includes beautiful nature paintings of everything from butterflies to spiderwebs to sunflowers to stinkbugs, and it would be an inspiration to anyone just starting out to do “nature study” with children.

Out of School and Into Nature also features several quotes from Mrs. Comstock herself concerning the vital importance of children interacting with nature:

“Nature study cultivates in the child a love of the beautiful.”

“The nature story is never finished. There is not a weed or an insect or a tree so common that the child, by observing carefully, may not see things never yet recorded.”

In the parlance of Charlotte Mason educators, this picture book about “The Mother of Nature Education” is indeed a living book, as is Comstock’s own Handbook of Nature Study. Let this simple but beautiful book be an introduction to Anna Botsford Comstock and her ideas about nature study, and then move on to her book and share the book and the joys of nature with a child you know. You will both be the richer for having done so.

The Boy Who Drew Birds by Jacqueline Davies

Mar1

The Boy Who Drew Birds: A Story of John James Audubon by Jacqueline Davies, illustrated by Melissa Sweet.

This picture book, only 32 pages, does not attempt to even summarize the entire life of artist and naturalist John James Audubon, but it does tell of one particular episode in the life of young Audubon as he was just beginning his life’s work in the study of birds. And that’s what I learned from the book: Audubon didn’t just draw birds, but he also studied their habits and features and habitats as a scientist would.

Audubon grew up in France and learned about birds from his father. He came to America mostly to avoid having to serve in Napoleon’s army. Ms. Davies’ book tells of how John James Audubon experimented and proved a theory about birds: that many birds return to the same nest each year after migrating, and their offspring nest nearby. He confirmed this theory by banding some of the birds he was observing with a silver thread. He was the first person in North America to band a bird.

This picture book story would be wonderful introduction to Audubon’s work, but of course, the next obvious step is to look at Audubon’s paintings and drawings and become familiar with Audubon, the artist. According to the author’s biographical note in the back of the book, “His revolutionary paintings pleased two audiences: scientists, who were drawn to their accuracy, and ordinary people, who simply enjoyed the beauty of his birds.”

Melissa Sweet, who illustrated this lovely picture book, says she was inspired by another aspect of Audubon’s art: “his handwriting and the quality of the handmade papers he used.” Sweet’s art is just that, sweet, and very much in tune with the setting and the cadence of Audubon’s amateur love for birds, which became something much more than amateur, indeed a profession and an art that continues to delight today.

There’s a Dover coloring book, called Audubon’s Birds of America Coloring Book that would be a fantastic go-along with this story. And of course, nothing substitutes for a nature walk and finding your own birds to observe (and draw) in the wild.

Marvelous Mattie by Emily Arnold McCully

Feb28

Marvelous Mattie: How Margaret E. Knight Became an Inventor by Emily Arnold McCully.

I first heard of Margaret Knight as a minor character in Christopher Healy’s book A Dastardly Plot, the first in his new series Perilous Journey of Danger & Mayhem about a late nineteenth century girl and her mother, both of whom are inventors. The girl, Molly Pepper, is a fictional character, but the characters and events that swirl around her madcap adventures are not all fictional: Edison, Tesla, Alexander Graham Bell, and of course, Margaret E. Knight.

Margaret Knight was born February 14, 1838. Young Margaret began inventing useful things when she was a child, always sketching ideas and using her tools to build things. Ms.Knight grew up in near-poverty, her father deceased, and went to work in a cotton mill at the age of twelve. As an adult, Ms. Knight had many inventions and over twenty patents to her name by the time of her death in 1914, earning her the title in the popular press of the “Lady Edison.” She had to defend her work in court as a man who tried to steal her ideas said she “could not possibly understand the mechanical complexities” of her own machine, a machine that made flat-bottomed paper bags. But Margaret was able to demonstrate her capabilities in the courtroom, and she won her case.

Another picture book biography about Margaret Knight, in the Great Idea Series by Monica Kulling, is titled In the Bag! Margaret Knight Wraps It Up. I haven’t read this second picture book bio, but it looks good. I think either book would be a lovely way to kick off Women’s History Month in March or to begin a study of inventors and inventions anytime of the year. Then, as an activity or experiment, try folding and cutting a piece of paper to make a paper bag with a flat bottom, and imagine building machine that would make these paper bags for widespread use.

Abe Lincoln’s Other Mother: The Story of Sarah Bush Lincoln by Bernadine Bailey

Feb12

Well, today is the anniversary of the birth of perhaps America’s most beloved president, Abraham Lincoln. (Only George Washington, whose birthday is also this month, rivals Lincoln in fame and veneration.) So, although I didn’t plan it, I picked a good day to have finished reading this biography of Lincoln’s stepmother and to post some thoughts on it.

This Messner biography is written for upper elementary and middle school readers, perhaps high school, although today’s young adult readers might find it a bit too unsophisticated for their tastes. The book certainly idealizes Sarah Lincoln and her stepson, Abe, while characterizing Abe’s father, Thomas Lincoln, as somewhat lazy and lacking in ambition. In this lightly fictionalized biography, Sarah Bush Lincoln is the backbone and foundation of the Lincoln family, careful to respect her husband, but always encouraging him to do more, provide more, and work harder. Abe Lincoln is the child prodigy, hard worker, and studious young man that Sarah Lincoln is proud to encourage and support.

It all makes for a very readable and interesting introduction to the life of Abraham Lincoln, and the book shows the importance of the influence of a good parent on the lives of the children. Although Abe Lincoln is the focus of Sarah’s attention and love in the book, the other Lincoln children also grow to be capable adults under the tutelage of their hard-working mother and despite the example of their rolling stone of a father. Well, mostly they grow up to be responsible adults. The book indicates that the youngest of Sarah’s three children from a previous marriage, John Johnston, is not very dependable as an adult. I looked up John on the internet and found this letter that Abraham Lincoln wrote to his step-brother in 1851, about nine years before Lincoln became president. So, I’m guessing that the author of this biography of John’s mother got John’s character pegged just about right.

I also read the Wikipedia article about Abe’s father, Thomas Lincoln, and from I can glean there, Ms. Bailey’s portrait of Thomas rings fair and true. At any rate, this biography, at a little more than 200 pages, gives a brief but tantalizing view of Lincoln’s childhood and early adulthood, of his relationship with his family, especially Sarah Bush Lincoln, and of his rise to prominence. The book would be inspiring to mothers and to children as they read of the obstacles that Sarah Lincoln overcame to provide a loving home and decent provision for a husband and five children. And the book also shows the persistence and loving-kindness of Lincoln himself as he cared for his step-mother at home and even after he left home until the end of his life.

These Messner biographies are quite well written and fascinating. So far I have read and reviewed five of these biographies, including this one about Sarah Lincoln, and I read two more that I didn’t manage to review. So, I’ve read seven in all. And I recommend all seven of those I’ve read in this series.

The Little Giant: Stephen A. Douglas by Jeanette Covert Nolan
The Doctor Who Saved Babies: Ignaz Philipp Semmelweis by Josephine Rich.
Antonin Dvorak: Composer From Bohemia by Claire Lee Purdy
Eloquent Crusader: Ernestine Rose by Yuri Suhl
First Lady of the Theatre: Sarah Siddons by Molly Costain
Mr. Lincoln’s Master Spy: Lafayette Baker by Arthur Orrmont.

The Little Giant: Stephen A. Douglas by Jeanette Covert Nolan

Jan25

Stephen Douglas is known now mostly for the debates he had with another famous fellow, Abraham Lincoln. I took a break from my reading of Doris Kearn Goodwin’s massive tome, Team of Rivals, to read a few other books, including this much more brief biography of Stephen Douglas, who was Abraham Lincoln’s rival indeed, but not a member of what Goodwin calls Lincoln’s “team of rivals”.

Douglas was unlike Lincoln in many ways: middle class background, a compromiser, supporter of popular sovereignty, indifferent to the evils of slavery, a judge and a lawyer, and a promoter of the growth and expansion of the United States at all costs. Douglas was short and stocky and sensitive about his height. Lincoln came from poverty and from a frontier background. He was tall and lanky and athletic. He believed that the Union could not grow or even endure half-slave and half-free. He wanted slavery to be contained until it eventually died of its own accord. Lincoln was a country lawyer, never became a judge, but he did become president—over a broken and un-United States.

In other ways the men were much alike. Both made their reputation on the law circuit in Illinois, traveling from place to place, representing their frontier clients in land disputes and other frontier matters, sometimes sleeping two to a bed in crowded inns before moving on to the next court session in the next town. Both believed in the Union, and both claimed to oppose slavery. And both men were known for their public speaking skills which they used to become politicians, U.S. representatives, and eventually presidential candidates.

The book is more about Douglas than Lincoln, but the comparisons are inevitable and run throughout the book. In fact, this same book was originally published in 1942 as The Little Giant: The Story of Stephen A. Douglas and Abraham Lincoln, but retitled and republished in 1964 with this title, Lincoln’s name left off. The two books are the same as far as I can tell.

There is an appendix in the back of the book with excerpts from the Lincoln-Douglas debates, a fascinating primary source document. Just as the abortion debate in our time is actually more nuanced than just pro-abortion versus anti-abortion and yet it comes down to that in the end, the debate in the 1850’s was more complicated than just anti-slavery versus pro-slavery. This look at the man, Stephen Douglas, and the debates which defined his times is a good discussion starter, and a way to look at our times and the debates and issues that will be remembered from our politics and culture. Stephen Douglas was personally opposed to slavery, but he did not want to impose his views on others. And now he is remembered as the pro-slavery candidate.

The Kings of Big Spring by Bryan Mealer

Jan23

The Kings of Big Spring: God, Oil, and One Family’s Search for the American Dream by Bryan Mealer, author of The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind.

I’m a West Texas girl, not a native of Big Spring but rather of San Angelo, which is about 87 miles southeast of Big Spring on US Highway 87. Bryan Mealer’s extended family and family heritage remind me of mine, lower middle class or poor, mostly, with dreams and sometimes actual accomplishments of striking it rich. However, while my family runs mostly to teachers and retail workers and farmers and insurance salesmen, Bryan’s family seems to have had its fair share of businessmen and high rollers, truck drivers and dirt and cattle haulers. And then there was the oil business, boom and bust and everything in between. I never heard of anyone in my family working as a roustabout or an oil field worker or even anyone involved in the oil business in any way. Bryan’s family members, however, were impacted in many ways by the ups and downs of the oil business.

I’m sure I enjoyed this book as much as I did because it took place, more or less, on my home turf. It was difficult to keep up with all the family members whose stories Mealer tells in his book. But when Mealer writes about his grandfather hauling caliche, I know exactly what that is because I grew up until the age of 11 in a house on a street “paved” with caliche. When he tells about the dust storms and the drought and the people praying for rain, I know exactly what he’s talking about because I experienced all of those things in San Angelo. I never met any oil tycoons, but I knew they were around, and I saw the oil wells, pumping oil out of the ground whenever we drove down the highways of West Texas. Most of all, I knew people just like Mealer’s grandmother Opal, who served the Lord in her Pentecostal church all her life and when she was dying asked the family to sing her into heaven with the old hymns she loved. I also knew a lot of “good ol’ boys” who were married to God-fearing women and eventually got right with the Lord themselves after much prayer and persuasion—and a few who never did.

Mealer’s book takes a kind but truthful look at West Texas culture and West Texas people. There’s a lot more drug use and beer and divorce and domestic violence than I ever experienced in my Southern Baptist upbringing, but maybe I just didn’t know what was goin on under the surface or behind closed doors. I wonder how Mr. Mealer was able to get his family members to be so honest and vulnerable and revealing about their past mistakes and family skeletons, but maybe he has a knack for interviewing people and getting them to open up. The book reminds me of J.D. Vance’s bestseller, Hillbilly Elegy, but it’s even more immediate and recognizable to me because these really are my people. Thanks for the memories, Mr. Mealer.

If you want to read a sample of what is in the book, and some more about the latest oil boom in Texas that isn’t covered in the book, check out this article by Mr. Mealer in the magazine Texas Monthly.

The Doctor Who Saved Babies: Ignaz Philipp Semmelweis

Jan9

I knew that sometime in the nineteenth century someone figured out that disease and germs were transferred to well patients by the dirty, contaminated hands of doctors and nurses and that medical personnel needed to wash their hands before examining a patient. But I didn’t know until I read this biography of the Hungarian doctor, Ignaz Semmelweis, that it was he who researched, discovered, and popularized this simple but revolutionary practice, saving thousands of lives in his own practice, and perhaps even millions through the next two centuries. (Interesting sidenote: In the United States, Dr. Oliver Wendell Holmes also independently discovered and wrote a paper on the efficacy of hand-washing and general hygiene in preventing the occurrence of puerperal fever, but no one believed him any more than they did Semmelweis at first.)

Central European history is a part of this Messner biography (published by Julian Messner publishers mostly in the 1940’s through the 1960’s), as Dr. Semmelweis was born (1818) into the Austro-Hungarian Empire and as an adult took part in unsuccessful efforts to free Hungary from the empire. But the emphasis is on Semmelweis himself and his part in making medical history. The biography doesn’t idealize Semmelweis; his flaws and mental health issues are evident, but not overly emphasized either. Semmelweis was obsessed with what he called his Lehre, his protocol for cleanliness that would keep women during and after childbirth from contracting the deadly puerperal fever. This infection killed up to a third of the women giving birth in hospitals because doctors were unknowingly carrying infection from the autopsy room directly to the maternity ward and because of dirty bed linens and open toilets in the middle of wards.

The biography itself is compelling and highly readable as are all of the Messner biographies I have read. The author takes Dr. Semmelweis from his young adulthood in Hungary, through his medical studies in Vienna, and back to Hungary where he practiced medicine, implemented his Lehre in Hungarian hospitals, and eventually succumbed to overwork, mental illness, and blood poisoning (ironically contracted from a lapse in the care that he usually took to wash and oil his hands before handling cadavers) and died at the age of forty-seven.

However, in spite of his comparatively short life, Dr. Semmelweis left a legacy of life and health to those who give birth or undergo surgery in hospitals. Author Josephine Rich ends her book with this tribute:

“It is almost one hundred years since his death, but the results of his work live on. Somewhere in the world, every minute of the day and night, a baby is born. It lives because a dedicated doctor spent all his lifetime tracking down a disease spread by filth and carelessness. Every mother today owes a debt of gratitude to Ignaz Semmelweis, the doctor who saved babies.”

And yet . . . from the CDC: “On average, healthcare providers clean their hands less than half of the times they should. On any given day, about one in 25 hospital patients has at least one healthcare-associated infection.”

This NPR story about Dr. Semmelweis doesn’t agree in all its details with the biography I read, but it does give the basic information about Semmelweis and his Lehr and his struggle to implement it and get other doctors to do the same. If you’re at all interested in medical history or the particular life of Ignaz Semmelweis, I would urge you to track down the book. It’s fascinating. (I have a copy in my library.)

Happy Birthday to Carl Sandburg, b. January 6, 1878

Jan6

In honor and anticipation of Mr. Sandburg’s birthday, I started reading Abe Lincoln Grows Up a few days ago and finished it last night. It’s a different sort of biography, a poetic biography if you will.

“Carl Sandburg’s Abraham Lincoln: The Prairie Years was first published for Lincoln’s Birthday in 1926. Since then, it has become evident that the book lives for people of all ages, but the earlier chapters on Lincoln’s own childhood hold special interest for young readers. Abe Lincoln Grows Up is drawn from the first twenty-seven chapters of the original biography.” ~from the book jacket blurb

This “taken from and adult biography” aspect of the book accounts for its rich vocabulary, not dumbed down at all, and its sometimes smartly subject matter. Sandburg writes about all of the varied cultural facets of the frontier in Indiana, Kentucky, and Illinois where Abe Lincoln grew up, including drunkenness, brawling, death, disease, Indian wars, prejudice, and slavery. And he doesn’t really mince words, although the language is more poetic than graphic.

Maybe some examples, taken at random, would be helpful:

“Abe was the chore-boy of the Knob Creek farm as soon as he grew big enough to run errands, to hold a pine-knot at night lighting his father at a job, or to carry water, fill the woodbox, clean ashes from the fireplace, hoe weeds, pick berries, grapes, persimmons for beer-making. He hunted the timbers and came back with walnuts, hickory and hazel nuts. His hands knew the stinging blisters from using a hoe handle back and for a summer afternoon, and in autumn the mash of walnut-stain that wouldn’t wash off, with all the rinsing and scrubbing of Nancy Hank’s homemade soap.” p. 44.

“He wanted to learn, to know, to live, to reach out; he wanted to satisfy hungers and thirsts he couldn’t tell about, this big boy of the backwoods. And some of what he wanted so much, so deep down, seemed to be in the books. Maybe in books he would find the answers to dark questions pushing around in the pools of his thoughts and the drifts of his mind.” p. 135.

“At Anderson Creek ferry, he saw and talked with settlers, land buyers and sellers, traders, hunters, peddlers, preachers, gamblers, politicians, teachers, and men shut-mouthed about their business. Occasionally there came a customer who looked as if he might be one of the ‘half horse, half alligator men’ haunting the Ohio watercourse those years.” p. 148.

The book is illustrated by James Daugherty, and just as the prose won’t be to everyone’s taste, so the picture are in Daugherty’s style, dark, writhing, pen and ink, almost caricature. It’s not my favorite style, but Daugherty’s talent is evident.

I enjoyed the book, but I’m not sure how accessible it will be to the middle grade or even young adult readers it is meant to engage. The language and the stories that Sandburg tells, many of them handed down from witnesses who heard Lincoln himself tell them, are colloquial and somewhat out of context for the modern reader. Some are more immediate and comprehensible, like the stories of Lincoln’s generosity and his thirst for learning.

For a child who is particularly interested in Lincoln and the stories of his life and times, Abe Lincoln Grows Up would be a treasure, to read and re-read over and over. But I’m afraid that most of those who pick it up just to read about the great president, perhaps for a school assignment, are going to be discouraged by the disjointed and philosophical prose that verges on poetry but isn’t really.

Carl Sandburg won three Pulitzer Prizes: two for books of his poetry and one for the second volume of biography of Abraham Lincoln, Abraham Lincoln: The War Years. His book of children’s stories, Rootabaga Pigeons, published in 1923, emerges from copyright protection this year. Has anyone read these stories, and do you have an opinion?

Semicolon

Books we must have though we lack bread.

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