Past Words Take Wing Authors
Thanhhà Lại (2024)
Thanhhà Lại is a
Vietnamese-American writer of middle-grade and young adult
novels. She lives in upstate New York with her husband and
daughter. Her first novel, Inside Out & Back Again (2011),
which won the National Book Award and a Newbery Honor, was partly
based on her childhood as a refugee growing up in the southern
United States.
Aida Salazar (2023)
Author, arts activist, and
translator Aida Salazar was born in Mexico and grew up in a
family of seven children in Southeast Los Angeles. Her fiction
and nonfiction writings for adults and children explore issues of
identity and social justice. Salazar is the author of the
critically acclaimed middle grade verse novels, The Moon Within
(International Latino Book Award Winner) and Land of the Cranes
(Américas Award, California Library Association Beatty Award,
Northern CA Book Award, NCTE Charlotte Huck Honor, Jane Addams
Peace Honor, International Latino Book Award Honor).
David A. Robertson (2022)
David A. Robertson is the 2021
recipient of the Writers’ Union of Canada Freedom to Read Award.
He is the author of numerous books for young readers, including
When We Were Alone, which won the 2017 Governor
General’s Literary Award and the McNally Robinson Best Book for
Young People Award.
Lesa Cline-Ransome (2021)
Lesa Cline-Ransome’s first book was
the biography Satchel Paige, an ALA Notable Book and a Bank
Street College “Best Children’s Book of the Year. She later
created Major Taylor: Champion Cyclist, Young Pele, Words Set Me
Free, Just a Lucky So and So: The Story of Louis Armstrong and
Germs: Fact and Fiction, Friends and Foes, Game Changers: The
Story of Venus and Serena Williams, The Power of Her Pen: The
Story of Groundbreaking Journalist Ethel Payne, Not Playing by
the Rules: 21 Female Athletes Who Changed Sports and Overground
Railroad.
Linda Sue Park (2020)
Linda Sue Park is the winner
of the 2002 Newbery Medal for her book A Single
Shard (2001), a story about an orphan boy in a 12th-century
Korean potters’ village. The prestigious Newbery Medal is awarded
annually for the most outstanding book for children and young
adults. Park was born in Urbana, Illinois, and grew up outside
Chicago. The daughter of Korean immigrants, she has been writing
poems and stories since she was four years old, and her favorite
thing to do as a child was read.
Erin Entrada Kelly (2019)
Newbery-winning author Professor
Erin Entrada Kelly identifies as Filipina-American and was raised
in Louisiana, where she began writing when she was just a little
girl. Then and now, when she was not writing she was reading, and
vice versa. Currently Kelly writes full-time in a co-working
space, where she works in longhand. Each idea that she considers
ready to write down gets its own fresh notebook, where character
and chapter outlines are accompanied by elaborate sketches of
trees.
Grace Lin (2018)
Grace Lin grew up in Upstate New
York with her parents and two sisters. While the other sisters
became scientists, Grace became an artist. Surprisingly enough,
being an artist was not Grace’s first choice. She first dreamed
of being a champion ice skater, and drew many pictures of herself
twirling and dancing on the ice. Unfortunately, Grace had neither
the talent nor coordination to make it to skating stardom.
However, the pictures she drew of herself held much promise and
quickly became Grace’s career focus.
Naomi Shihab Nye (2017)
Speaking with Krista Tippet, poet,
activist, teacher and humanitarian Naomi Shihab Nye said this of
writing: “Very rarely do you hear anyone say they write things
down and feel worse. It’s an act that helps you, preserves you,
energizes you, in the very doing of it.” As readers, we are
fortunate that Nye is energized by writing, because her writing
is a gift. It is a gift that inspires us, in large part by not
shying away from topics that challenge us.
Sheila Hamanaka (2016)
Sheila Hamanaka has been
illustrating children’s books since 1987. She is best known for
her books on peace and multiculturalism. Her award-winning book
“The Journey” is based on a five-panel mural she painted about
the history of the Japanese in America, focusing on the
concentration camps in which her parents were jailed during World
War II. Her popular “All the Colors of the Earth” celebrates the
diversity of children and parents. Hamanaka’s work with the
Animal Welfare Institute reflects her deep concern for all
sentient beings and for our home, earth.
Joseph Bruchac (2015)
Living and working in his family
home at the foot of the Adirondack Mountains, acclaimed author
Joseph Bruchac (b. 1942) has devoted forty years to celebrating
his Abenaki heritage through prose, verse, story, and song. As
the author of more than 120 books, a professional musician, and a
skilled teller of traditional tales, Bruchac has worked to share
traditional and contemporary Native American culture through many
genres and for audiences of all ages.
Andrea and Brian Pinkney (2014)
Andrea and Brian Pinkney were the
featured authors of the School of Education’s 2014 Words Take
Wing: Honoring Diversity in Children’s Literature annual
presentation and lecture. Brian is an award-winning illustrator.
Andrea has authored over 20 books for children, including
Alvin Ailey, Dear Benjamin Banneker, and
Let It Shine: Stories of Black Women Freedom Fighters,
which won a Coretta Scott King Honor Award in 2001. Her latest
award-winning book is Hand in Hand: Ten Black Men Who Changed
America.
Margarita Engle (2013)
Margarita Engle is a Cuban-American
and winner of the first Newbery Honor ever awarded to a Latino.
She writes award-winning young adult novels in verse including
The Surrender Tree, a Newbery Honor book and winner of
the Jane Addams Book Award.
Ying Chang Compestine (2012)
Award-winning author, dynamic
public speaker and world traveler, Ying Chang Compestine is the
author of numerous books, including picture books, young adult
novels, and cookbooks for adults that promote healthy eating.
Joyce Carol Thomas (2011)
African American poet, playwright
and children’s author, Joyce Carole Thomas celebrates the folk
traditions and history of African American women, children and
families in America. She is celebrated for her young adult
novels, poetry, and picture books, as well as fiction and plays
for adults. She won the American Book Award for her first novel,
Marked by Fire, and the Coretta Scott King Award for her
second, Bright Shadow. She died on August 13, 2016, in
Stanford, California.
Belle Yang (2010)
Belle Yang’s writing celebrates the
immigration journey of her family from China to Japan and the
United States. Her work is beautifully illustrated with her
paintings, which have been compared to Gauguin’s. Her book
Always Come Home to Me is the 2008 winner of the Best
Children’s Book award by the Chinese American Librarians
Association. In 2010, she released a graphic memoir, Forget
Sorrow: An Ancestral Tale. To learn more about Belle Yang,
visit her website.
Francisco X. Alarcón (2009)
Francisco Alarcón (1954-2016),
Chicano poet, children’s author and professor at UC Davis,
was the author of 10 volumes of poetry, including, From the
Other Side of Night / Del otro lado de la noche: New and Selected
Poems (University of Arizona Press 2002), Sonetos a la
locura y otras penas/Sonnets to Madness and Other
Misfortunes (Creative Arts Book Company 2001), No Golden
Gate for Us (Pennywhistle Press 1993), Snake Poems: An
Aztec Invocation (Chronicle Books 1992), De amor
oscuro/Of Dark Love (Moving Parts P
Robert D. San Souci (2008)
Robert San Souci (1946-2014) wrote
over 80 books, collaborating on nine of them with his brother
Daniel, a children’s book illustrator. Many of San Souci’s books
are retellings of traditional folk tales and celebrate cultures
from around the world. Some titles include The Reluctant
Dragon, Little Pierre, and The Well at the End
of the World. He was a consultant to Disney Studios and was
instrumental in the production of the film Mulan, for which he
wrote the story.
Patricia McKissack (2007)
Patricia McKissack delighted more
than 1,000 children, teachers and community members with two
lectures, focusing on storytelling and her personal journey as a
children’s literature author. McKissack told her audience
that she began her career as a writer to tell stories that hadn’t
been written for children, from the ghost stories and tall tales
of her youth to stories about the many contributions made by
African Americans that have been previously overlooked.
Pam Muñoz Ryan (2006)
Pam Muñoz Ryan, has written over 30
books for young people in many genres, including the novel,
Esperanza Rising, winner of the Pura Belpre Medal, the
Jane Addams Peace Award, an American Library Association (ALA)
Top Ten Best Book for Young Adults, the Americas Award Honor and
other accolades. When Marian Sang is the recipient of
the National Council of Teachers of English Orbis Pictus Award
for excellence in non-fiction. Becoming Naomi Leon
received the ALA Schneider Family Award, the Tomás Rivera Award,
and an ALA Notable. She is twice the recipient of the Willa
Cather Literary Award for Writing and a four-time nominee for the
California Young Reader Medal, receiving the medal for Riding
Freedom in 2000. To learn more about Ryan, visit her
website.
Laurence Yep (2005)
Laurence Yep served as the
inaugural speaker of our children’s lecture series. Yep’s
interest in intersecting cultures, differing perspectives and the
links between generations of people all illustrate the rich
diversity of ideas found in children’s literature. His stories
excite children and teens by placing them in unfamiliar worlds
with protagonists who share their sense of wonder and discovery.
