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asakiyumeI was alerted to this beautiful story and its beautiful art by this entry of osprey_archer's. She calls it a beautifully dreamy fairytale, and it is.
When hard times hit the little Florida community where Calpurnia lives, she sets out to catch fish for her father to sell, "so that hard times will be soft times." Mother Albirtha, the wisest woman in the community, tells her to follow her nose to get to a secret river, where she catches fish upon fish. She shares fish with increasingly scary animals on her way home and with Mother Albirtha, and hard times do become soft times. Calpurnia can never find the river again--Mother Albirtha explains why:
Those lines were so perfect. I can't quite put into words why they move me so. That a river should appear when we need it. That it then will take itself away and we can't find it again.
The art of Leo and Diane Dillon is breathtaking. Calpurnia makes up a poem:
(again just HITTING me with truth and beauty)
And here's the art:
Later, when she's thinking of going fishing, Calpurnia reflects that if she was a fish, she wouldn't want to bite at something nasty like an angleworm. She'd only bite at something beautiful, like a flower. And here's the Dillons' vision of that:
So she carefully makes crepe paper roses for lures. The picture of her doing this shows a child's concentration and care so well:
She wears them in her hair until she gets to the river. Here you can see them festooning down her back, and you can see how thick with fish the river is.
When she's done, she carefully ties the fish to her rod using bear grass, which, Rawlings tells us, "has long, thin, tough leaves, and they can be used like strong pieces of string." I appreciate this knowledge! And this way of carrying fish must be universal; people do it in Timor-Leste:
The animals to whom she offers fish on her way home are an owl, a bear, and a panther. The owl is stunning: his feather have owl faces in them!
The animals don't all say thank you--though Calpurnia reckons they must be thankful--but the panther purrs, which she recognizes as a thank you. She says another poem:
Again, I was struck by the wisdom of this: of giving people things to do as a solution. I'm going to remember it.
One last wisdom from the book. Calpurnia gives the fish to her father to sell, but people are weak from not having eaten, and one after the other they ask if they can pay after they have eaten and earned a day's wage, and Calpurnia's father says yes. And when they've earned some money, not only do they pay him back, they're able to go to Mother Albirtha's shop and make purchases. A great description in a child's book of how economic recovery works! People actually have to recover. And then they can work, and then they can make purchases.
A remarkable story, with beautiful art. Thank you,osprey_archer!
osprey_archer's. She calls it a beautifully dreamy fairytale, and it is. When hard times hit the little Florida community where Calpurnia lives, she sets out to catch fish for her father to sell, "so that hard times will be soft times." Mother Albirtha, the wisest woman in the community, tells her to follow her nose to get to a secret river, where she catches fish upon fish. She shares fish with increasingly scary animals on her way home and with Mother Albirtha, and hard times do become soft times. Calpurnia can never find the river again--Mother Albirtha explains why:
"Child, sometimes a thing happens once, and does not ever happen anymore."
Calpurnia said, "But I want to catch more catfish in the river."
Mother Albirtha said, "Child, you caught catfish when catfish were needed. Hard times have turned to soft times. So you will not find the river again."
Those lines were so perfect. I can't quite put into words why they move me so. That a river should appear when we need it. That it then will take itself away and we can't find it again.
The art of Leo and Diane Dillon is breathtaking. Calpurnia makes up a poem:
Everybody's bees is my friends.
Everybody's flowers is my flowers.
Everybody's happy hours
is my happy hours.
All this goes on
and there is no ends
(again just HITTING me with truth and beauty)
And here's the art:
Later, when she's thinking of going fishing, Calpurnia reflects that if she was a fish, she wouldn't want to bite at something nasty like an angleworm. She'd only bite at something beautiful, like a flower. And here's the Dillons' vision of that:
So she carefully makes crepe paper roses for lures. The picture of her doing this shows a child's concentration and care so well:
She wears them in her hair until she gets to the river. Here you can see them festooning down her back, and you can see how thick with fish the river is.
When she's done, she carefully ties the fish to her rod using bear grass, which, Rawlings tells us, "has long, thin, tough leaves, and they can be used like strong pieces of string." I appreciate this knowledge! And this way of carrying fish must be universal; people do it in Timor-Leste:
The animals to whom she offers fish on her way home are an owl, a bear, and a panther. The owl is stunning: his feather have owl faces in them!
The animals don't all say thank you--though Calpurnia reckons they must be thankful--but the panther purrs, which she recognizes as a thank you. She says another poem:
If somebody scares you, the thing to do
is give somebody something to do.
Then they never bother you.
Sometmes they say "thank you."
Again, I was struck by the wisdom of this: of giving people things to do as a solution. I'm going to remember it.
One last wisdom from the book. Calpurnia gives the fish to her father to sell, but people are weak from not having eaten, and one after the other they ask if they can pay after they have eaten and earned a day's wage, and Calpurnia's father says yes. And when they've earned some money, not only do they pay him back, they're able to go to Mother Albirtha's shop and make purchases. A great description in a child's book of how economic recovery works! People actually have to recover. And then they can work, and then they can make purchases.
A remarkable story, with beautiful art. Thank you,
osprey_archer!
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Date: 2023-02-24 06:16 pm (UTC)This sounds like such a lovely book. Wish I had known about it when I was teaching, because it's one that would have worked so well for my learning disabled students.
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