Hesse, Zelinsky Take Home Newbery, Caldecott Medals
Staff -- School Library Journal, 2/1/1998
Karen Hesse, author of Out of the Dust (Scholastic), and Paul O. Zelinsky, illustrator of Rapunzel (Dutton), are the 1998 winners of the Newbery and Caldecott Medals.
These children's literature awards, plus a host of others, were announced at ALA's Midwinter Meeting in New Orleans on January 12.
In Out of the Dust, 14-year-old Billie Jo relates how her mother dies after she has an accident with burning kerosene. Ellen Fader, Newbery Committee chair said, "Hesse's painstaking first-person narration of Billie Jo's withering, and finally taking root, is spare and gritty. She creates a stark and piercing rhythm with free-verse form."
Zelinsky, in his retelling of Rapunzel, uses "richly detailed oil paintings" that "convey dramatic emotions and feature distinctive architecture, lush landscapes, and authentic costuming of Renaissance Italy," said Caldecott Committee Chair John Stewig.
The committees also selected honor awards. Newbery honor winners were: Lily's Crossing (Delacorte) by Patricia Reilly Giff; Ella Enchanted (HarperCollins) by Gail Carson Levine, and Wringer (HarperCollins) by Jerry Spinelli. The Caldecott honor winners were: Harlem (Scholastic), illustrated by Christopher Myers; The Gardener (Farrar), illustrated by David Small, and There Was an Old Lady Who Swallowed a Fly (Viking), illustrated by Simms Taback.
More information on these awards is available at ALA's Web site, www.ala.org/alsc/newbery.html and www.ala.org/alsc/caldecott.html.
Other awards announced include:
- Coretta Scott King Author Award:
Sharon M. Draper for Forged By Fire (Atheneum). - Illustrator Award:
Javaka Steptoe for In Daddy's Arms I Am Tall (Lee & Low). - Coretta Scott King Illustrator Honor Books:
Ashley Bryan's ABCs of African American Poetry (Atheneum) illustrated by Ashley Bryan; The Hunterman and the Crocodile: A West African Folktale (Scholastic) by Baba Wague Diakite; and Harlem (Scholastic) by Christopher Myers. - Coretta Scott King Author Honor Books:
I Thought My Soul Would Rise and Fly: The Diary of Patsy, A Freed Girl (Scholastic) by Joyce Hansen and Bayard Rustin: Behind the Scenes of the Civil Rights Movement (Hyperion) by James Haskins. - Margaret A. Edwards Award:
Madeleine L'Engle. - Pura Belpre Illustrator Award:
Stephanie Garcia for Snapshots from the Wedding (Putnam) - Belpre Illustrator Honor Books:
The Golden Flower (S&S), illustrated by Enrique O. Sanchez and written by Nina Jaffe; My Family, illustrated by Carmen Lomas Garza (Children's Book Press); and Gathering the Sun: An Alphabet in Spanish and English (Lothrop), illustrated by Simon Silva and written by Alma Flor Ada. - Belpre Author Award:
Victor Martinez for Parrot in the Oven (HarperCollins) - Belpre Author Honor Awards:
Spirits of the High Mesa by Floyd Martinez (Arte Publico) and Laughing Tomatoes and Other Spring Poems by Francisco X. Alarcon and illustrated by Maya Christina Gonzalez (Children's Book Press). - Mildred L. Batchelder Award:
The Robber and Me (Holt) by Josef Holub - Batchelder Honor Awards:
Nero Corleone: A Cat's Story (Viking) by Elke Heidenreich and Hostage to War: A True Story (Scholastic) by Tatjana Wassiljewa. - Laura Ingalls Wilder Award:
Russell Freedman - Andrew Carnegie Medal for Excellence in Children's Video:
Willa: An American Snow White, produced and directed by Tom Davenport - May Hill Arbuthnot Lecture Award:
Lillian N. Gerhardt, Editor in Chief, School Library Journal
