Lois Lowry's Blog

I read this  in this morning's NY Times Magazine and was so moved by it that I thought at first I would direct everyone how to find it online.  Then I decided to simply copy it here. This may, of course, violate copyright law.   But not to make it accessible seems to violate some other law of the heart.

The New York Times

May 3, 2009

Without a Prayer

By MAGGIE ROBBINS

I am in the middle of some finishing-up, some final work on a manuscript that I will give to my editor when we meet for lunch on Monday.

But no one can work on one thing non-stop and so I take breaks from time to time.  Today, over lunch, I picked up and read a few pages of a book I recently bought after reading a review.  The book is called THE HOUSEKEEPER AND THE PROFESSOR, by Yoko Ogawa. 

I have not read very far, but already I love this book, and the spare quality of its prose---a little like a Japanese garden or house: everything placed exactly right, no excess at all.

Here (to my mind) are three perfect sentences:

Yesterday afternoon two things happened in Cambridge, Massachusetts, where I live.

One, the Dalai Lama made a speech.  Two, a branch of Bank of America was robbed at gunpoint.

Guess which event I was at.  The wrong one.

Once again "And Tango Makes Three" has led the ALA list of "Most Challenged Books" this year.  For those of you  who been locked in  a  soundproof room for the last decade, this book is the true story of two male chinstrap penguins at the Central Park Zoo who, after they had been best pals for several years, were seen trying to hatch a rock that vaguely resembled an egg. Zookeepers gave them the second egg from another couple, and the two males hatched and raised the baby, thereby becoming the kind of caring family we wish every child in the world could have. 

(None of my books is on the current top ten list, though at the moment "The Giver" is under fire in Nashua, New Hampshire).

The SLJ Battle of the Books is entering its final two weeks, with judges Linda Sue Park and Chris Crutcher selecting the two from which I have to choose the winner.  I was insane to agree to playing that role, which guarantees that I will be hated and reviled by half the people following the battle.  My own personal favorite got dumped early on, waahhh.  But the truth is, every book in the running is a winner.

And even though it is not a contender in this particular contest, I hereby declare "And Tango makes Three" a champion.

Here is one Q and A from an interview with me that can be found at the Abbeville Press website (actually, at their blog, called Abbeville Manual of Style). 

AMoS: You are the Final Judge for this year’s “Battle of the (Kids’) Books” tournament held by School Library Journal. Do you find it fun or difficult (or both) to judge your fellow authors’ work?

 Recently I received an invitation to speak in Regina, Saskatchewan.  Of course I said yes.  It is someplace I would never see, otherwise!  But here's the astonishing thing: the invitation was for the spring of 2012.

I am 72 years old.  In the spring of 2012 I'll be 75. Assuming I am still alive. And functional.  This morning's NY Times has an article about Margaret Drabble, who has called it quits, writing-wise, because she is 69 and feels she has nothing left to say.

Scott O'Dell died at 91 and was working on a  new book, I was told by his editor, when he died.  So I am thinking of Scott O'Dell and hoping to emulate him, instead of Margaret Drabble.

And here is a funny Scott O'Dell story,  Two, actually.

In 1979 I was in New York for whatever convention was being held there---probably ALA---and I was invited to a cocktail party honoring Scott O'Dell.  I was in my hotel room, alone, getting dressed to go that party, when I realized that I couldn't reach the middle button on the back of my dress.  It was just at that one place that was unreachable though I contorted myself trying before I gave up.  Finally I decided the heck with it, and I left my room with the button unbuttoned.

Wednesday I drove to Augusta, Maine, in order to speak at the 20th annual Reading Round Up of Childrens' and YA Literature on Thursday morning.  I checked into the Holiday Inn beside the Convention Center, got out my laptop, realized it had a low battery, so looked for an outlet in order to plug it in. Nada.  The room's only electrical outlets were one behind the heavy king-sized bed headboard, or the other behind the massive piece of furniture that housed the TV.

SO:  Here is where I spent my evening:

This morning I found myself mentally switching lead sentences in the NY Times  so that the wrong photos appeared. For example:

WASHINGTON — And now there are four. In the space of a week, the number of states allowing same-sex marriage has doubled, with Iowa and then Vermont joining Massachusetts and Connecticut.

Okay, we all know (don't we? don't we?) that that photo is of Richard Holbrooke, envoy to the Mideast, talking to the foreign minister of Pakistan---it is not Travis and Geoff exchanging vows on Fire Island.

It is a mindless way to waste some Sunday morning time while a hundred miles away my grandsons are hunting for Easter eggs and riding their bikes.

Okay, this is just an example of how my mind works---fluttering hither and yon.

I was sitting here at my desk typing away on a book manuscript.  I needed to mention a residential neighborhood in Tokyo, and I wanted to be sure to get it right, so I went (courtesy of Google) to a map of Tokyo.

I once lived in Tokyo, so I was not starting from scratch, but as I looked around that map, I found not only the neighborhood I wanted (so should have stopped right there, confirmed the spelling, closed down the Tokyo map, and gone back to work) , but---there was mention of Ryogoku, the section of Tokyo where the Sumo wrestlers live and train, and that brought back some memories.

In 1995 Martin and I traveled around Japan for a couple of weeks---just tourists.  During our time in Tokyo we had a chance (promising to sit very quietly, the same promise we had to make once when we attended a murder trial at Old Bailey in London) to watch young Sumo wrestlers training.  Following that, we wwent to a restaurant run by a retired Sumo wrestler (well, what else would a retired super-fat guy do?) where we were served a very hearty—and delicious—stew called Chonko-nabe.

Several days later we were in another part of Japan, very rural and mountainous. And while we were walking through a particularly scenic area, suddently there were throngs of uniformed schoolchildren, middle school age, apparently on a field trip.

The E.B. White Read Aloud Awards, established in 2004, honor books that reflect the universal read aloud standards that were created by the work of the author E.B. White in his classic books for children: Charlotte’s Web, Stuart Little, and The Trumpet of the Swan.

In the first two years of the award, a single book was selected.

In 2006, in recognition of the fact that reading aloud is a pleasure at any age, the award was expanded into two categories: Picture Books, and Older Readers.

Books are nominated for their universal appeal as a “terrific” book to read aloud.

My friend Margaret from Minnesota has just left after a lovely 5-day visit in which I made her eat too much and watch too many movies and become addicted to "In Treatment." (And now she will have to undergo withdrawal because she doesn't have HBO back home).

Margaret and I are the same age and at one point we became the founding (and only) members of the Margaret O'Brien Fan Club. There is practically no one left who can recite the titles of M O'B movies; when Margaret and I die, this bit of 1940's trivia will be lost..

Here is what she brought me as a gift:

Margaret journeyed here from St. Paul but that is not what the title of this post refers to. No, it is Margaret O'Brien's first movie, made when she was four years old, a true tear-jerker. There are few people living who remember it.

• SLJ Kicks Off Its First Annual Battle of the Books
  School Library Journal is about to launch its first annual Battle of the (Kids’) Books contest. What is it, you ask? Call it a book war. Lois Lowry, Jon Scieszka, Linda Sue Park, and John Green are just some of your favorite authors who’ll be judging the contest, which pits 16 of last year’s best books for young people against each other.

This will be a bit like March Madness (did you see that last-5-seconds win of Villanova over Pitt Saturday night?!) with 16 books starting out, and books being dropped on each round...and I get to judge the final round!  So people will either hate or love me when it's over.  But it is all in fun, and the books have all been chosen because they were the best of 2008, so there won't really be any losers here.

The battle begins on April 13th and will conclude with the selection of the winner on May 5th.

I have been given the okay to show people the jacket of the book that will be published next fall....

Bagram Ibatoulline's art is so lush and beautiful (sorry I got the scan a little crooked!) and from this jacket you can guess how gorgeous the inside pages are.  But for those: you'll have to wait until the book is published!

...but don't take it personally.

It's come to this. Sob.  Alfie, whose (monogrammed) bed is at the foot of mine, declined even to climb the stairs last night at bedtime.

He wanted to sleep with his visiting German Shepherd friend, Sophie, who was occupying a downstairs guest room.

They met as puppies (see photo) and have been buddies every since. Now, at 3 years old, Sophie towers over Alfie.  But last night they curled up together like the old friends they are,  And I, sob, slept alone.

I am now in Maine, where last evening 15 deer strolled across my meadow nibbling on exposed grass now that the snow is melting.  I tried to take a photo but don't have my camera here, and the cell phone couldn't get a good picture in the dim light and at some distance.  Both dogs---Alfie, and his German Shepherd friend Sophie, who is visiting--- stood silently and watched. The deer were aware of the dogs, and didn't care---and the dogs were aware of the deer and more curious than hostile.

Before I came up here, on Wednesday, I had a lovely visit to Boston International High School---all students for whom English is a new language, in some cases quite new.  They were attentive, interested, polite, and in every way fun to be with.  And generous,too, with a gift of flowers (see photo) and an album of their own writings.

And now I am in Maine, where this morning the furnace guy tended the furnace and now the plumber is here doing some tune-up on an annoying toilet. My friend Kay, Sophie-the-dog's mom, is at work in another room (she's a professor at Harvard) , and I am here in my studio, and we have both vowed to work hard and not be distracted by dogs or plumbers or the NY Times or deer.

Okay, it is no secret that I am fascinated by names, that I love naming book characters, that my own children have had to curb my impulse to name their babies, and that even dogs, my own and other people's, are not exempt from my need to baptize.

But recently, in signing books in Florida, I encountered something I've not seen before.  A teenage girl had a name---I've forgotten what it was---that ended in an A.  The letter A. Let's say it was something like Alyssa.

I wrote "For Alyssa" in her book---spelling it correctly, not Elyssa or Alissa, because I have learned the hard way that I must ask them to write their names for me so that I get it right---otherwise, they sometimes cry, if I misspell.

So I wrote "For Alyssa" above my signature and handed it back to her---but she said, "There's an accent over the A" and handed it back.  I looked at what she had written on her post-it  and sure enough, there was a little mark of some sort over the final A.

So I was to make it "Alyssá"  as in voilá.  Go figure. Well, what the heck. I added the accent mark.

These beauties came for my birthday from my daughter-in-law in Germany (and from her partner,  Jürgen, and from my granddaughter, Nadine)---and they really brighten the scene here while outside it is bitter cold once again.  My son in Maine  told me he went for a 30-mile bike ride with a friend on Sunday, but I can't even imagine it, in this cold.

Me, I was in Fort Myers, Florida over the weekend, and enjoying---in addition to the sunshine and 80 degrees)  a couple of trips down Memory Lane.  I had lunch with my old friend Dianne, who lives there, and whom I last saw when we were both 17.  We worked (and roomed)  together at a Pocono Mountains resort the summer before we began college. And before that, we were in high school together--and she reminded me of the weekend, spring of 1954, that we went together to visit my sister who was at Penn State. Big deal for a couple of high school girls!

Then that night I had dinner and a visit with another friend, Harriet, who also lives in that part of Florida, with whom I had been in junior high school in Tokyo in the late 1940's!

My memories of those years---both age 12 and age 17---are so clear they could have been yesterday.

"....Tell your ma I’ll bring something for you tomorrow, and you won’t have to scratch so frequently.”
       Liz looked up from her misshapen As and Bs.
     “Got no ma,” she said matter-of-factly.
    “Oh, my! Pity! Well, your pa, then. Tell him.”
    “Got no pa neither.”
    “But—”
    “I be a norphan,” Liz explained.
    A norphan! The princess knew of such people—she had heard stories about them. They frequently appeared in fairy tales. But here was one in person!
    “But where do you live? Who takes care of you?” The princess couldn’t imagine being so small and having no one.
    “Oh,” the little girl explained matter-of-factly, “I stay wif whoever wants me, ‘cause they fink mebbe I can help out. Then, when they don’t want me no more, I go live wif sumbody else.”
    “You must be very forsaken and pathetic,” the princess said sympathetically. “I’m actually quite interested in norphans..."

This is a snippet from a new book---not yet published; won't be published, in fact till next spring---called THE BIRTHDAY BALL, and this (below) is a picture of the little norphan, Liz, in an illustration done by my friend Jules Feiffer.

Jules makes such charming drawings look effortless---and maybe they are, for him!  I was delighted when he said he'd illustrate this book of mine---I have always admired his deft touch. He draws FEET and HANDS better than anyone I know.

I've been in Sarasota visiting dear friends of 40 years--Sylvia and Tony, who winter there---and it was great to be in the warm sunshine (it was snowing in Boston the day I flew out); and now I am home, and feeling fine (though too busy) and it was almost 60 degrees today.  But Martin has been sick for ten days---he missed a lovely party last night (there was a wonderful piano player, and someone said: "Too bad Martin's not here. He'd be singing"..and I had to say, "No, he'd be coughing")...and now my friend/neighbor, Kay, who comes over almost every day so that her dog can play with Alfie, has just emailed to say that she has a cough and a temperature of 102.  So something is making the rounds, and so far has missed me, and I have my fingers crossed. I have important meetings this week, and a trip to Fort Myers, FL on Friday.

I was just sorting through old photos in my computer and came across this one, which I love. I took it fourteen years ago. The dog is now dead and the toddler is a teenager. But there is a timelessness to it.

I don't think I am yet authorized to show anyone, but I have just received the final art, by Bagram Ibatoulline, for the book called CROW CALL which will be published in the fall.  It's an autobiographical story, set in my childhood in the 1940's, but he has made it --- yes, to repeat myself -- timeless. The paintings are absoutely beautiful and I feel very fortunate that this immensely gifted artist agreed to illustrate my words.

The snow is gone!  One day of 55 degree weather yesterday---and this morning I let the dog out and there was no snow at all on the ground.

All the buried dog toys have re-surfaced, and it reminds me of a terrible time many years ago when my then 16-year-old daughter had a birthday party for herself, inviting just her good friends, and her father and I went off for the evening to play bridge with some close friends of ours---until we got a call from the police suggesting we come right home.

Word had gone out, as it apparently does, on the teenaged grapevine, that there was a PARTY, and so kids---strangers to her---came from all over, even nearby towns---and crashed into our house.  It was she, actually, if I remember correctly, who called the police.  When we got home, the police had gone, and all of the party-crashers had been removed (and some had stolen some small household objects on their way out) and our daughter, weeping, was still cleaning up the mess along with some of her faithful friends.

But the reason I thought about it just now is because her birthday is in February. The party was in February, in Maine. Deep snow on the ground.  And when it melted, a couple of months later, our yard was strewn with revealed beer cans---I want to say hundreds, but it probably was many fewer than that---tossed by the party-crashers eluding the police.

That same daughter, ironically, now has a master's degree in criminal justice, and just yesterday emailed me that she was thinking of going on for further work in forensic psychology.