By Carole
Boston Weatherford; Illustrated by Eric Velasquez
Candlewick
Press. 2017
ISBN:
9780763680466
To write this review, I borrowed the book from my,local public library.
To write this review, I borrowed the book from my,local public library.
Note: While Cathy is on sabbatical until February, 2018, Louise is writing all the reviews.
“Where is our historian to give us our side,
to teach our people our own history?”
Afro-Puerto
Rican, Arturo Schomburg spent his life amassing a large collect of over ten
million items of print, music, and art.
“Like a detective, he hunted clues and found
facts affirming the role of African descendants in building nations and shaping
cultures.”
This
stunning informational biography follows Arturo’s life, from his birth in
Puerto Rico in 1874 to his arrival in the United States at age seventeen, and traces
his life-long passion of searching for materials that confirmed African
achievements in art, science, literature, and music. He died June 8, 1938.
"History
was not history unless it was complete from all angles."
Weatherford (Freedom in Congo Square) is a master at
crafting poems that say so much with few words. Accompanying the text are the
illustrations by Eric Velasquez. Rendered in oil on watercolor paper, these
large, luscious paintings give a visual depth to Schomburg’s life.
It is
remarkable to learn about some of the materials Schomburg was able to find. A copy of Poems on Various Subjects, Religious and
Moral by Phyllis Wheatley, published in 1773. He purchased the military orders
of Toussaint Louverture, the leader of the revolt to liberate slaves in Haiti
and two volumes written by early American whaler, shipbuilder, and maritime
trader, Paul Cuffee.
Arturo was
inspired after reading the word written by Frederick Douglass, “his speeches awake Arturo to the power of
the pen.”
Arturo wondered
why the African heritage of Russian poet Alexander Pushkin and German composer
Ludwig van Beethoven was never mentioned.
When his
vast collection threatened to overrun his home and threaten his family’s
happiness, Arturo sold his collection for $10,000 to the Carnegie Corporation
where it was donated to the New York Public Library in 1926. In 1932, Stomburg
added four thousand volumes to the Fisk University Library’s Negro Collection.
An
extraordinary book about a remarkable man.
Back matter
includes a time line, source notes, and bibliography.
“Schomburg placed his personal bookplate in
every volume he collected. It featured an engraving of an enslaved woman in
chains, hands clasped, looking heavenward. Her plight and her plea spark
questions. Schomburg’’s collection holds answers: each artifact a window on the
past, each book cover a door of possibilities, each page a passport to freedom.”
nice post
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