Synopses & Reviews
Fifty years after her refusal to give up her seat on a Montgomery, Alabama, city bus, Mrs. Rosa Parks is still one of the most important figures in the American civil rights movement. This tribute to Mrs. Parks is a celebration of her courageous action and the events that followed.
Award-winning poet, writer, and activist Nikki Giovanni's evocative text combines with Bryan Collier's striking cut-paper images to retell the story of this historic event from a wholly unique and original perspective.
Review
"Giovanni and Collier offer a moving interpretation of Rosa Park's
momentous refusal to give up her bus seat. The author brings her
heroine very much to life...a fresh take on a remarkable historic
event." Publishers Weekly
Review
"Purposeful in its telling, this is a handsome and thought-provoking
introduction to these watershed acts of civil disobedience." School Library Journal
Review
"Paired very effectively with Giovanni's passionate, direct words,
Collier's large watercolor-and-collage illustrations depict Parks as an
inspiring force that radiates golden light." Booklist, Starred Review
Review
"An essential volume for classrooms and libraries." Kirkus Reviews
Synopsis
Winner of the Caldecott Honor Medal and the Coretta Scott King Medal, this picture book tribute to Rosa Parks celebrates the 50th anniversary of her refusal to give up her seat on a Montgomery, Alabama, city bus.
About the Author
Nikki Giovanni has written many books of poetry for children and adults. She is the author of
Lincoln and Douglass,
The Genie in the Jar, and
Ego-tripping and Other Poems for Young People.
Rosa is a Caldecott Honor book. Giovanni calls herself, "a Black American, a daughter, a mother, a professor of English." She was born in Knoxville, Tennessee, and grew up in Lincoln Heights, an all-black suburb of Cincinnati, Ohio. She studied at Fisk University, the University of Pennsylvania, and Columbia University.
She published her first book of poetry,
Black Feeling Black Talk, in 1968, and since then has become one of Americas most widely read poets. Oprah Winfrey named her as one of her twenty-five “Living Legends.” Her autobiography
Gemini was a finalist for the National Book Award, and several of her books have received NAACP Image Awards. She has received some twenty-five honorary degrees, been named Woman of the Year by
Mademoiselle Magazine,
The Ladies Home Journal and
Ebony, was the first recipient of the Rosa L. Parks Woman of Courage Award, and has been awarded the Langston Hughes Medal for poetry.
Nikki Giovanni lives in Christiansburg, Virginia, where she is a professor of English at Virginia Polytechnic Institute.
Bryan Collier is the author and illustrator of Uptown, winner of the Coretta Scott King Award and the Ezra Jack Keats Book Award. He is also the illustrator of Martin's Big Words, which was a Caldecott Honor Book. The Chicago Sun-Times has called Colliers art “breathtakingly beautiful.” Mr. Collier lives with his family in Upstate New York.