1943: Books and Literature

Dec5

French pilot and author Antoine de St. Exupery publishes The Little Prince, the story of a pilot who crashes and meets a little boy from outer space.

Quotes from The Little Prince:
Voici mon secret. Il est très simple: on ne voit bien qu’avec le cœur. L’essentiel est invisible pour les yeux.
“Here is my secret. It is very simple: It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye.”

Les hommes ont oublié cette vérité, dit le renard. Mais tu ne dois pas l’oublier. Tu deviens responsable pour toujours de ce que tu as apprivoisé.
“Men have forgotten this truth,” said the fox. “But you must not forget it. You become responsible, forever, for what you have tamed.”

“You risk tears if you let yourself be tamed.”

Also in 1943, Oxford scholar C. S. Lewis makes a series of radio broadcasts that will be adapted as a book, Mere Christianity.

Quotes from Mere Christianity:
“God made us: invented us as a man invents an engine. A car is made to run on petrol, and it would not run properly on anything else. Now God designed the human machine to run on Himself.”

“If I find in myself a desire which no experience in this world can satisfy, the most probable explanation is that I was made for another world.”

Also published in 1943:
A Tree Grows in Brooklyn by Betty Smith.
Perelandra by C.S. Lewis.
The Abolition of Man by C.S. Lewis.
Being and Nothingness by Jean-Paul Sartre.

Popular in 1943:
The Robe by Lloyd C. Douglas. One of my favorites. Marcellus is a proud Roman citizen and soldier until he encounters Jesus in Palestine and is forever changed.
Guadalcanal Diary by Richard Tregaskis. In the summer and fall of 1942, American Marines landed on the South Pacific island of Guadalcanal and fought their way across the island. Tregaskis, a journalist, tells the story of Guadalcanal in a primary source account.
Our Hearts Were Young and Gay by Cornelia Otis Skinner and Emily Kimbrough. Two American college age women tell the tale of their 1920 tour of Europe.

Christmas at Home and Abroad, 1943

Dec5

In 1943, Bing Crosby has another hit Christmas song with “I’ll Be Home for Christmas,” written by Kim Gannon, Walter Kent and Buck Ram. The soldiers fighting the war all over the world and their families at home listened to this song and “White Christmas” and longed for the end of the war with all the troops safely at home.

1943: Events and Inventions

Dec5

January 31, 1943. The German Sixth Army surrenders to the Russians at Stalingrad after the Russian winter an snow decimates the Germans and saps their will to fight.

April, 1943. German troops massacre the remaining Jews inside the Warsaw ghetto in Poland, those who haven’t already been sent to extermination camps at Auschwitz and other locations. About 60.000 Jews were still in the ghetto at the beginning of April, and these survivors resist the German butchery with fierce resistance. But the Jews defiance is doomed to failure and largely unreported in the rest of the world. Read Mila 18 by Leon Uris for a complete fictional account of the bravery and tragedy of the Jewish resistance inside the Warsaw Ghetto.

May 12, 1943. The German and Italian armies in North Africa surrender to the Allies.

June 10, 1943. Hungarian hypnotist and journalist, Ladislao Biro,in Argentina with his brother Georg, a chemist, patents a revolutionary new writing instrument, the ballpoint pen. In 1950 Marcel Bich bought the patent from Bíró for the pen, which soon became the main product of his Bic company.

'German Panzer IV Tank' photo (c) 2009, Simon - license: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/

July 13, 1943. After a huge tank battle at Kursk in the Soviet Union in which 1500 German and Soviet tanks fight at close range, the Germans are driven back and Adolf Hitler himself orders a withdrawal.

July 9, 1943. U.S. troops invade Italy at the tip of Sicily, and on July 22 the troops reach and take Palermo in the northwest corner of Sicily. German defenders of Sicily retreat into Italy, and the Sicilians for the most part welcome the Americans.

'Conference of the Big Three at Yalta' photo (c) 2008, Marion Doss - license: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0/July 25, 1943. King Victor Emmanuel III and the Fascist Council reject and overthrow Benito Mussolini in Italy and replace him with Marshal Pietro Badoglio. Two days later, Badoglio dissolves the Fascist government and tries to negotiate a peace with the Allies while still trying to placate the Nazis who are scattered in force throughout Italy. Mussolini goes into hiding.

August 2, 1943. The Allies bomb the port of Hamburg, Germany, reducing its shipyards and factories to rubble.

October 13, 1943. Italy surrenders to the Allies and declares war on its former ally, Germany.

November, 1943. Allied leaders Churchill, Roosevelt and Stalin meet in Tehran, Iran to coordinate war strategy and plan for the aftermath of the war.

Sunday Salon: Books Read in November, 2011

Dec4

Easy Readers for Cybils:
Good Luck, Anna Hibiscus by Atinuke. Cybils nominee: Early Chapter Books.
Have Fun, Anna Hibiscus! by Atinuke. Cybils nominee: Early Chapter Books.
No. 1 Car Spotter by Atinuke. Cybils nominee: Early Chapter Books.
Tugg and Teeny: Jungle Surprises by J. Patrick Lewis. Cybils nominee: Early Chapter Books.
Almost Zero: A Dyamonde Daniel Book by Nikki Grimes. Cybils nominee: Early Chapter Books. Semicolon review here.
Daisy Dawson at the Beach by Steve Voake. Cybils nominee: Early Chapter Books.
The Greatest Sheep in History by Frances Watts. Cybils nominee: Early Chapter Books. Semicolon review here.
Zapato Power: Freddie Ramos Zooms to the Rescue by Jacqueline Jules. Cybils nominee: Early Chapter Books. Semicolon review here.
Like Pickle Juice on a Cookie by Julie Sternberg. Cybils nominee: Early Chapter Books.
The Case of the Diamond Dog Collar by Martha Freeman. Cybils nominee: Early Chapter Books.
The Tricky Tooth by Fran Manushkin. Cybils nominee: Early Chapter Books.
Clementine and the Family Meeting by Sara Pennypacker. Cybils nominee: Early Chapter Books.
Invisible Inkling by Emily Jenkins. Cybils nominee: Early Chapter Books.
Toys Come Home: Being the Early Experiences of an Intelligent Stingray, a Brave Buffalo, and a Brand-New Someone Called Plastic by Emily Jenkins. Cybils nominee: Early Chapter Books.
Scab for Treasurer? by Trudi Trueit. Cybils nominee: Early Chapter Books.
The Trouble With Chickens by Doreen Cronin. Cybils nominee: Early Chapter Books.
Marty McGuire by Kate Messner. Cybils nominee: Early Chapter Books.
The Snow Queen by Sara Lowes. Cybils nominee: Early Chapter Books.
Marvin Monster’s Monsterific Adventures by Tabatha Jean D’Agata. Cybils nominee: Early Chapter Books.
Sammy Squirrel and Rodney Raccoon To the Rescue by Duane Lawrence. Cybils nominee: Early Chapter Books. Semicolon review here.
Sophie the Zillionaire by Lara Bergen. Cybils nominee: Early Chapter Books.
Splat the Cat: Good Night, Sleep Tight by Rob Scotton. Cybils nominee: Easy Readers.
Max Spaniel: Best in Show by Dana M. Rau. Cybils nominee: Easy Readers.
Butterflies by Nic Bishop. Cybils nominee: Easy Readers.
Dinosaurs Don’t, Dinosaurs Do by Steven Bjorkman. Cybils nominee: Easy Readers.
The Lion and the Mice by Ed and Rebecca Emberley. Cybils nominee: Easy Readers.
Katie Woo Has the Flu by Fran Manushkin. Cybils nominee: Easy Readers.
I Broke My Trunk by Mo Willems. Cybils nominee: Easy Readers.
Happy Pig Day by Mo Willems. Cybils nominee: Easy Readers.
Should I Share My Ice Cream? by Mo Willems. Cybils nominee: Easy Readers. Semicolon review for all three Mo Willems’ books here.
Silly Lilly in What Will I Be Today by Agnes Rosenstiehl. Cybils nominee: Easy Readers.
Patrick in a Teddy Bear’s Picnic and Other Stories by Geoffrey Hayes. Cybils nominee: Easy Readers.
A Green, Green Garden by Mercer Mayer. Cybils nominee: Easy Readers.

Children’s and Young Adult Fiction:
Dave at Night by Gail Carson Levine. Semicolon review here.
The Night of the Burning: Devorah’s Story by Linda Press Wulf.
Choosing Up Sides by John Ritter.
The Storyteller’s Daughter by Jean Thesman.
Chief Sunrise, John McGraw, and Me by Timothy Tocher.
Small Acts of Amazing Courage by Gloria Whelan. Cybils nominee: Middle Grade Fiction. Nominated by Rebecca Herman.Semicolon review here.
Losing Faith by Denise Jaden. Nominated and shortlisted for the INSPY Awards, Literature for Young People category.
Crosswire by Dotti Enderle.
Cry of the Giraffe by Judie Oron. Definitely for older YA.
Orchards by Holly Thompson.
How to Save a Life by Sara Zarr. Review coming soon.

Adult Fiction:
Pattern of Wounds by J. Mark Bertrand.
When She Woke by Hilary Jordan. My review at Breakpoint.
Gifts of War by Mackenzie Ford.

Nonfiction:
Unplanned: The dramatic true story of a former Planned Parenthood leader’s eye-opening journey across the life line by Abby Johnson with Cindy Lambert. Semicolon review here.
The Reading Promise: My Father and the Books We Shared by Alice Ozma.
Tales of an African Vet by Dr. Roy Aronson. Review coming soon.

Poem Written in Response to Today’s Discussion of Postmodern and Emergent Thinking

Dec4

'Door Victualing Yard' photo (c) 2010, Tony Takitani - license: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/2.0/The question cries out for an answer,
The reason to seek is to find.
We knock that the door may be opened,
And not for the echo inside.

If the answer is not forthcoming,
If the seeker does not find a door,
We must look till the light shines upon us,
And knock till the op’ning appears.

In the other direction lies madness,
To believe that there may be a door,
To talk to hear ourselves chatter,
Forever and ever more.

Christmas in Germany, 1915

Dec4

Richard Hannay, the narrator in John Buchan’s spy novel Greenmantle, is an English spy inside Germany at Christmas, 1915, World War I.

“It was the 23rd day of December, and even in war time one had a sort of feel of Christmas. You could see girls carrying evergreens, and when we stopped at a station the soldiers on leave had all the air of holiday making. The middle of Germany was a cheerier place than Berlin or the western parts. I liked the look of the old peasants, and the women in their neat Sunday best, but I noticed, too, how pinched they were.”

Pinched because they were hungry. The British blockade of Germany in the North Atlantic meant that Germans were short of cloth, machinery, raw materials, and even food that was removed from ships sailing to Germany before the ships reached a German port. Germany responded to the British blockade with its own policy of “unrestricted submarine warfare,” and we all know what came next. The Americans entered the war.

My head was beginning to swim, but I made one more effort.
“There is food in my rucksack—biscuits and ham and chocolate. Pray take it for your use. And here is some money to buy Christmas fare for the little ones.” And I gave her some of the German notes.
After that my recollection becomes dim. She helped me up a ladder to the garret, undressed me, and gave me a thick coarse nightgown. I seem to remember that she kissed my hand, and that she was crying. “The good Lord has sent you,” she said. “Now the little ones will have their prayers answered and the Christkindl will not pass by our door.”

Christmas in Connecticut, 1942

Dec3

The hit song of 1942 is Irving Berlin’s White Christmas, sung by Bing Crosby in the movie Holiday Inn. Crosby first sang the song on Christmas Day, 1941 on an NBC radio show. But the song took off in late 1942, and it’s credited as the best-selling single of all time, with estimated sales in excess of 50 million copies worldwide.

Saturday Review of Books: December 3, 2011

Dec3

“Books are not absolutely dead things, but do contain a potency of life in them to be as active as that soul was, whose progeny they are; nay, they do preserve, as in a vial, the purest efficacy and extraction of that living intellect that bred them. As good almost kill a man, as kill a good book; who kills a man kills a good reasonable creature, God’s image; but he who destroys a good book, kills reason itself––kills the image of God, as it were, in the eye.” ~~John Milton

John Milton, Puritan poet, has a birthday on December 9th.

SatReviewbuttonIf you’re not familiar with and linking to and perusing the Saturday Review of Books here at Semicolon, you’re missing out. Here’s how it usually works. Find a book review on your blog posted sometime during the previous week. The review doesn’t have to be a formal sort of thing. You can just write your thoughts on a particular book, a few ideas inspired by reading the book, your evaluation, quotations, whatever.

Then on Saturday, you post a link here at Semicolon in Mr. Linky to the specific post where you’ve written your book review. Don’t link to your main blog page because this kind of link makes it hard to find the book review, especially when people drop in later after you’ve added new content to your blog. In parentheses after your name, add the title of the book you’re reviewing. This addition will help people to find the reviews they’re most interested in reading.

After linking to your own reviews, you can spend as long as you want reading the reviews of other bloggers for the week and adding to your wishlist of books to read. That’s how my own TBR list has become completely unmanageable and the reason I can’t join any reading challenges. I have my own personal challenge that never ends.

Christmas in Norway, 1952

Dec1

From Arne and the Christmas Star, a story of Norway by Alta Halverson Seymour. Illustrated by Frank Nicholas. Wilcox and Follett Company, 1952.

Arne knew there would be stacks of flatbrod, hard and crisp and round, each piece larger than a plate. Besta baked these right on top of her well-scrubbed cookstove. There would be heart-shaped waffles, and lefse and bakelse and rosettes and all kinds of good coffeecakes. His mouth watered at the thought. If a boy hung around the kitchen at the right times, he was sure to come in for a good many samples, especially broken bits.

He knew there would also be a final scouring of the house just before Christmas, that the windows and the copper flowerpots on the window sills would be gleaming. The geraniums and begoneas would be coaxed into bloom for Christmas. And of course the womenfolk would be busy planning and preparing food to last through the Christmas season.

Giving Books: Picture Books for Mom and Baby

Nov30

A friend asked me for some suggestions for a project that her church is doing to gather some gifts for young single moms in their area. Here are my favorite classic picture books for Mom and baby (or toddler/preschooler) to enjoy together:

Runaway Bunny by Margaret Wise Brown. Some people think the mother in this story is way too overprotective, but I happen to think that the little ones like the idea of a Mother Bunny who will never let them escape her love for them.

Good Night Moon by Margaret Wise Brown. Another winning title from the pen of Ms. Brown.

Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See? by Bill Martin Jr.

Drummer Hoff by Ed Emberly. Drummer Hoff fired it off.

Is It Red? Is It Yellow? Is It Blue? by Tana Hoban. Beautiful city photographs introduce children to colors.

The Carrot Seed by Ruth Krauss. Will the carrot seed that the boy plants really grow? A lesson i patience and faith.

Umbrella by Taro Yashima. A little Japanese girl longs to take her new umbrella to school but must wait until it rains.

Noah’s Ark by Peter Spier. Peter Spier is a talented illustrator, and in his books mostly the pictures tell the story. The pictures are a little too small and detailed for the youngest ones, but children will grow into this book and others by Spier.

The Gingerbead Boy by Paul Galdone. All of Galdone’s folk tale/fairy tale renderings are wonderful with big, bold illustrations and straightforward narration. These books, including The Three Bears, The Little Red Hen, The Three Billy Goats Gruff, and many others, are my favorite beginning folk tale books for reading aloud to young children.

Mr. Rabbit and the Lovely Present by Charlotte Zolotow. Charlotte Zolotow is another of my favorite picture book authors, and this story of a girl who is looking for a present for her mother is deliciously repetitious but also surprising. Illustrations are by Maurice Sendak.

If I were buying only ten books for a beginning library for mom and a young child to read together over and over again, these are the ten I would choose.

What about you?