Rhiannon Giddens Instagram – February 3
Jacqueline Woodson / @jacqueline_woodson
I first met this fellow MacArthur Fellow at a literary event and I was immediately struck by her ease in her skin and the lovely way she looks out at the world. She has blessed us with so many beautiful books, from picture books to teenage to adult, and has so many left to write! The bio on her page is gorgeous so I will just put it below.
Buy her books – give them to someone you love (but read them first). Start with brown girl dreaming.
From her website:
“I wrote on everything and everywhere. I remember my uncle catching me writing my name in graffiti on the side of a building. (It was not pretty for me when my mother found out.) I wrote on paper bags and my shoes and denim binders. I chalked stories across sidewalks and penciled tiny tales in notebook margins. I loved and still love watching words flower into sentences and sentences blossom into stories.
I also told a lot of stories as a child. Not “Once upon a time” stories but basically, outright lies. I loved lying and getting away with it! There was something about telling the lie-story and seeing your friends’ eyes grow wide with wonder. Of course I got in trouble for lying but I didn’t stop until fifth grade.
That year, I wrote a story and my teacher said “This is really good.” Before that I had written a poem about Martin Luther King that was, I guess, so good no one believed I wrote it. After lots of brouhaha, it was believed finally that I had indeed penned the poem which went on to win me a Scrabble game and local acclaim. So by the time the story rolled around and the words “This is really good” came out of the otherwise down-turned lips of my fifth-grade teacher, I was well on my way to understanding that a lie on the page was a whole different animal — one that won you prizes and got surly teachers to smile. A lie on the page meant lots of independent time to create your stories and the freedom to sit hunched over the pages of your notebook without people thinking you were strange. (cont.) | Posted on 03/Feb/2024 23:13:10
