Mary Oliver
Cynthia Grady
In the beginning, before I found myself within the pages of a book identifying with this character or that one, I listened to my grandmother read aloud from My Book House while surrounded by my eight siblings. The giant, multi-volume anthology contains poetry from Mother Goose to Shakespeare, selections from the Song of Solomon to Christina Rossetti to Robert Louis Stevenson, folk and fairy tales from around the world, Aesop’s fables, as well as some not-as-old previously published stories like The Tale of Peter Rabbit by Beatrix Potter.… more
Melissa Sweet
In this interview with Melissa Sweet, illustrator of A River of Words: The Story of William Carlos Williams, our Bookstorm™ this month, we asked six questions and Melissa kindly took time from her busy days of visiting schools and creating art.
Do you recall the first time you encountered a William Carlos Williams poem? My first introduction to William Carlos Williams was when I was seven years old and went to the Metropolitan Museum of Art.… more
Do you recall the first time you encountered a William Carlos Williams poem? My first introduction to William Carlos Williams was when I was seven years old and went to the Metropolitan Museum of Art.… more
Jen Bryant
In this interview with Jen Bryant, author of A River of Words: The Story of William Carlos Williams, our Bookstorm™ this month.
Do you recall the first time you encountered a William Carlos Williams poem?
I was in high school—and it was part of an anthology reading that we did for English class. I had disliked/not understood/ been unmoved by all of the other poems in this assigned reading (I recall that the language in those poems was archaic and flowery, and the forms very, VERY traditional)—and then—whooosh—like a breath of fresh air, here were a few selected W.… more
Liza Ketchum: Serendipity
Serendipity is one of my favorite words. I love its dancelike sound and the way it trips off the tongue. According to my dictionary, serendipity means “the faculty of making fortunate discoveries by accident.”
I find the etymology of words fascinating. Even as a child, I liked to study the maps that show the relationship and origins of Indo-European languages.… more