How to use this Page

This article was a presentation given at the 2012 IBBY Congress in London, first posted here and developed from a PaperTigers.org Personal View, “Caught up in Conflict: Refugee stories about and for young people“.

A bibliography with links to relevant websites is listed by title can be … Continue reading ... →

Let There be Peace: Prayers from Around the World
selected by Jeremy Brooks, illustrated by Jude Daly
(Frances Lincoln, 2009)

 
Continue reading ... →

Today is Peace Day.  It’s also a day of  Global Ceasefire.  Wouldn’t it be wonderful if all the fighting stopped for this one day.  It’s certainly something to aim for, and beyond.

This week with my Cub Scout Pack in Kirkbymoorside, UK, we thought about Peace and what a global ceasfire might mean.  We made peace cranes, thanks to  Stone Bridge Press’ wonderful A Thousand Cranes: Origami Projects for Peace and Happiness (2011), adapted from a book by Florence Temko (1921-2009); and then we held a short vigil by candle-light (one of our Challenges in our Diamond Challenge was silence: hard but ultimately rewarding).

We shared Lao Tzu’s wise poem from 2,500 years ago:

If there is to be peace in the world,
There must be peace in the nations.
If there is to be peace in the nations,
There must be peace in the cities.
If there is to be peace in the cities,
There must be peace between neighbors.
If there is to be peace between neighbors,
There must be peace in the home.
If there is to be peace in the home,
There must be peace in the heart.

It is one of the prayers in the beautifully presented Let There be Peace: Prayers from Around the World, selected by Jeremy Brooks, illustrated by Jude Daly (Frances Lincoln, 2009).

People around the world will be pausing for a moment’s silence today at midday local time.  Let’s hope the guns stop firing too.

This week’s Poetry Friday host Renée LaTulippe has a bowl of Poetry Candy over at No Water River, so head on over…

With the FIFA World Cup underway in South Africa, I thought it would be a good time to highlight some of the children’s literature resources in that country. While surfing the internet for information on the subject I came across  Zoe Toft’s delightful blog Playing by the Book. Zoe resides in the UK with her husband and two young, bi-lingual daughters and says her blog is “a review of kids’ books and the crazy, fun stuff they inspire us to do”.

In her recent post Catching South African Fever, Zoe and her girls read The Dove (Dianne Stewart, illustrated by Jude Daly) and then, based on the beaded trinkets and animals mentioned in the story, made their own beaded artwork. Zoe has allowed us to share her photos and her review of the book here but I encourage you to visit her blog to read the entire post as she has also compiled an excellent list of resources for South African children’s literature.

The Dove, set in the South African province of Natal, tells the story of Lindi and her Grandmother who are tying to make ends meet after a flood destroys crops and sweeps away many animals. They make beaded trinkets to sell in tourist shops in Durban but have little success until they decide instead of their usual keyrings to make a dove, inspired by the first animal on their land after the flood had subsided. Their beaded animals and people are a hit and now Lindi and her Grandmother need not worry about having enough money until the next harvest.

M loved the story because of the sewing/creating theme, J enjoyed the small details in the illustrations (which actually reminded me a little of Gauguin in their style), and I loved the story for its freshness and believability – it was a great introduction for my girls into (what seems to me) “real” South Africa, rather than a version you might find preserved in an open air museum (although it would be very interesting to hear what any South African readers have to say about the themes in this book). This story set in modern South Africa would be the perfect read before holidaying there – a great way to start thinking about the people behind the trinkets we might bring back from visiting there.

Inspired by this gentle book I ordered a selection of African beads and buttons and M used these beads to create two pieces of art. We used some embroidery hoops we’d picked up in a charity shop, a large needle and some embroidery thread and then M set about designing her African villages and se

0 Comments on Zoe Toft’s blog Playing by the Book and her review of The Dove as of 1/1/1900

Add a Comment

With the Football World Cup kicking off tomorrow in South Africa it seems like a perfect opportunity to find out a little more about children’s picture books from South Africa. Although I’ve done a fair bit of research (more on this below), I have been rather hampered by the fact that our local library has recently closed “for the foreseeable future” because asbestos has been discovered there… I feel bereft!

Anyway, through the online library catalogue and inter-library loan and a bus trip to another library we’ve come up with a book that we’ve really taken to – The Dove by Dianne Stewart, illustrated by Jude Daly.

The Dove, set in the South African province of Natal, tells the story of Lindi and her Grandmother who are tying to make ends meet after a flood destroys crops and sweeps away many animals. They make beaded trinkets to sell in tourist shops in Durban but have little success until they decide instead of their usual keyrings to make a dove, inspired by the first animal on their land after the flood had subsided. Their beaded animals and people are a hit and now Lindi and her Grandmother need not worry about having enough money until the next harvest.

Photo: mickeymox

M loved the story because of the sewing/creating theme, J enjoyed the small details in the illustrations (which actually reminded me a little of Gauguin in their style), and I loved the story for its freshness and believability – it was a great introduction for my girls into (what seems to me) “real” South Africa, rather than a version you might find preserved in an open air museum (although it would be very interesting to hear what any South African readers have to say about the themes in this book). This story set in modern South Africa would be the perfect read before holidaying there – a great way to start thinking about the people behind the trinkets we might bring back from visiting there.

Inspired by this gentle book I ordered a selection of African beads and buttons from The African Fabric Shop – a favourite place of mine if a non-book treat is in order. M used these beads to create two pieces of art – one for her room, and one for J’s room. We used some embroidery hoops we’d picked up in a charity shop, a large needle and some embroidery thread and then M set about designing her African villages and sewing them in place.

0 Comments | Previous | Top | Next

By: Aline Pereira, on 1/6/2010
Blog: PaperTigers (Login to Add to MyJacketFlap)
JacketFlap tags:  Karen Gray Ruelle, Deborah Durland DeSaix, Social Justice Challenge, The Grand Mosque of Paris, Jeremy Brooks, Let There Be Peace: Prayers from Around the World, The Tiger's Bookshelf, Jude Daly, The Tiger's Treasures, Add a tag

0 Comments | Previous | Top | Next

By: Julie Fortenberry, on 6/23/2009
Blog: Children's Illustration (Login to Add to MyJacketFlap)
JacketFlap tags:  jude daly, Add a tag

Jude Daly

0 Comments on as of 6/23/2009 11:50:00 AM

Add a Comment

6 Comments | Previous | Top |

By: Dianne Hofmeyr, on 2/13/2009
Blog: An Awfully Big Blog Adventure (Login to Add to MyJacketFlap)
JacketFlap tags:  Jude Daly, the dark The Star-bearer, summer, Dianne Hofmeyr, the dark, Goodbye to the Villa Piranha, London Review of Books, Add a tag

illustration by Jude Daly from 'The Star-bearer'

I’m home in the dark. Yesterday I arrived, dragging my case through the sleet from South Ken tube station, clutching a skimpy cardigan, bare brown feet in their paper-thin shoes slowly going blue, and couldn’t budge the door for the mounds of post stacked up behind it. Not a single incredible book deal or film offer! So I took to my bed with coffee and some back copies of the London Review of Books [less formidable than the buff-coloured envelopes] and found this bitter-sweet poem by Francis Hope [for which I have no permission].

Goodbye to the Villa Piranha
[the house I’ve left behind has no such fancy name]

Prepare the journey North,
Smothering feet in unfamiliar socks.
Sweeping the bathroom free of sand, collecting
Small change of little worth.

Make one last visit to the tip
(Did we drink all those bottles?) and throw out
The unread heavy paperback, saving
One thriller for the trip.

Chill in the morning air
Hints like a bad host that we should be going.
Time for a final swim, a walk, a last
Black coffee in the square.

If not exactly kings
We were at least francs bourgeois, [africain bourgeois?] with the right
To our own slice of time and place and pleasure,
And someone else’s things. [in this case our own]

Leaving the palace and its park [a matter of perspective when you return to a postage stamp flat]
We take our common place along the road,
As summer [a southern hemisphere summer] joins the queue of other summers,
Driving [flying] towards the dark.

Apart from the poem now here in the dark, alongside the upturned case and its contents of useless sandals and gossamer shirts, I’ve also discovered amidst the heap of post a letter that states:


‘There are holes in your plot!’ A polite way of saying – you’ve lost the plot? And references to ‘this first draft’.

What? Does she really believe this is my first draft??? Doesn’t she know how many drafts have been in my head before even committing anything to paper or how many have drafts have subsequently been written??? Hasn’t she read our latest blogs??? Doesn’t she know that no writer of any substance would ever dream of not re-writing? We just don’t like others to tell us to re-write.

So here in the dark, I’m ignoring all this. I’ve snuggled back under the duvets with these wondrous back copies of the London Review telling of writers who never have holes in their plots, with yet more coffee… and perhaps I won’t come out again until summer comes to London and things look different and I can write a blog called: Flying towards the light!

6 Comments on Flying towards the dark - Dianne Hofmeyr, last added: 2/15/2009

Display Comments

Dianne Hofmeyr said, on 2/13/2009 4:29:00 AM

Forgot to give credit... that beautiful illustration is by Jude Daly from the picture book 'The Star-bearer'. It sort of sums up my mood of yearning. di

Natasha Mostert said, on 2/13/2009 8:14:00 AM

"Holes" in the plot - ouch!

But take heart -- all of us who live with our egos exposed have had to deal with this kind of comment. I've had scribbled in the margins of my manuscripts: "purple prose", "overwrought", why? why?" and even "woo! woo!" One editor demanded that I delete not a chapter, but a character. I kept thinking that even if I did so, his presence would continue to linger -- like a cartoon figure who had run through a wall leaving a blank outline behind.

Here's a quotation to make you feel better. And it is by none other than the great Charles Darwin:

"I have tried lately to read Shakespeare, and found it so intolerably dull that it nauseauted me."

Eye of the beholder and all that...:)

Great blog!

Lucy Coats said, on 2/13/2009 9:35:00 AM

Oh Dianne. To come back from that wonderful African sun and find slush-bound and gloomy Britain, as well as that letter. I am SO with you under that duvet, but wish you a speedy flight towards the light. Oh, and as usual, your blog is wonderful--with absolutely NO holes at all. xxL

Linda Strachan said, on 2/13/2009 11:01:00 AM

Hi Dianne
I too have just returned from summer - Bay of Islands, New Zealand, and Melbourne. Returning to the frozen north I too want to 'coorie doon' under the covers and wait for summer.

But at times Melbourne was too hot for comfort and having left there two days before the worst of the fires I feel dreadfully sorry for those poor families whose homes and communities, and lives, have been lost so suddenly. Perhaps the frozen north is not quite so bad after all.

Dianne Hofmeyr said, on 2/13/2009 11:05:00 AM

Lucy... thanks! I heard from your nice librarian friend, Karen Yingling in Ohio re the blog. Its always a wonder to me to have this instant contact from someone on the other side of the world!

adele said, on 2/15/2009 4:03:00 PM

Very good to have you back with us, Dianne! It's nearly springtime...

Add a Comment