This adaptation will diminish Red Cloud’s legacy, perpetuate negative stereotypes, and provide incorrect information to...
In 1868, Red Cloud, a respected Oglala chief, led an intertribal war against the U.S. Army and won.
Waters’ adaptation reiterates the subtitle’s claim that it's an untold story (“his story has long been forgotten by conventional American history”), though this is far from the first book about him, and contemporary tribal nations honor his legacy. Unfortunately, this book’s outsider perspective is all too evident. In the text, Lakota men and women are labeled as “braves” and “maidens” and the Lakota Sun Dance ceremony as “fearsome,” when it was an annual sacred ceremony to honor the Great Spirit. Often the tone is condescending. When the Mormon Trail opened in 1847, readers are told “the Lakota, in particular the Oglalas, were initially helpless in the face of this onslaught,” eliding the fact that the Oglalas were well-trained warriors. Further, Red Cloud is often portrayed as brutish: “Sometimes it just felt good and natural to go out and steal horses. If he took some scalps in the process, so much the better.” Finally, there is a glaring chronological error: in 1868, when Gen. Philip Sheridan closed Fort Laramie, the Lakota were told “if they wished to trade, they were free to do business at Fort Randall on the Missouri River in distant southeast South Dakota, about as far from [their Black Hills homeland] as one can travel and still be in the state.” South Dakota did not achieve statehood until Nov. 2, 1889.
This adaptation will diminish Red Cloud’s legacy, perpetuate negative stereotypes, and provide incorrect information to young readers: skip. (afterword, acknowledgments, timeline, glossary, historical sites, further information, index) (Nonfiction. 10-16)Pub Date: Feb. 17, 2017
ISBN: 978-1-4814-6460-4
Page Count: 320
Publisher: McElderry
Review Posted Online: Nov. 1, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2016
A beautiful, powerful reflection on a tragic history.
In spare verse, Lowry reflects on moments in her childhood, including the bombings of Pearl Harbor and Hiroshima.
When she was a child, Lowry played at Waikiki Beach with her grandmother while her father filmed. In the old home movie, the USS Arizona appears through the mist on the horizon. Looking back at her childhood in Hawaii and then Japan, Lowry reflects on the bombings that began and ended a war and how they affected and connected everyone involved. In Part 1, she shares the lives and actions of sailors at Pearl Harbor. Part 2 is stories of civilians in Hiroshima affected by the bombing. Part 3 presents her own experience as an American in Japan shortly after the war ended. The poems bring the haunting human scale of war to the forefront, like the Christmas cards a sailor sent days before he died or the 4-year-old who was buried with his red tricycle after Hiroshima. All the personal stories—of sailors, civilians, and Lowry herself—are grounding. There is heartbreak and hope, reminding readers to reflect on the past to create a more peaceful future. Lowry uses a variety of poetry styles, identifying some, such as triolet and haiku. Pak’s graphite illustrations are like still shots of history, adding to the emotion and somber feeling. He includes some sailors of color among the mostly white U.S. forces; Lowry is white.
A beautiful, powerful reflection on a tragic history. (author’s note, bibliography) (Memoir/poetry. 10-14)Pub Date: April 7, 2020
ISBN: 978-0-358-12940-0
Page Count: 80
Publisher: HMH Books
Review Posted Online: Jan. 11, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2020
PROFILES
An inventive introduction to a fascinating historical figure.
Another collaborative effort by the team that created The Poet King of Tezcoco: A Great Leader of Ancient Mexico (2007) chronicles the life of a controversial figure in pre-colonial Mesoamerica.
The indigenous woman who would serve as Hernán Cortés’ interpreter and companion was born in the early 1500s as Malinali and later christened Marina. She is now called La Malinche. Besides serving as translator to the Spaniard, she also gave him advice on native customs, religious beliefs and the ways of the Aztec. While Marina’s decision to help the Spanish in their often brutal quest for supremacy has led to many negative associations, others see her as the mother of all Mexicans, as she and Cortés had the first recorded mestizo. Although many of the details surrounding the specifics of Marina’s life were unrecorded, Serrano strengthens the narrative with quotations by her contemporaries and provides a balanced look at the life of a complicated, oft-maligned woman. Headers provide structure as events sometimes shift from the specific to the very broad, and some important facts are glossed over or relegated to the timeline. Reminiscent of pre-colonial documents, the illustrations convey both Marina’s adulation of Cortés and the violence of the Spanish conquest, complete with severed limbs, decapitations and more.
An inventive introduction to a fascinating historical figure. (map, chronology, glossary, sources and further reading) (Nonfiction. 10-12)Pub Date: Oct. 16, 2012
ISBN: 978-1-55498-111-3
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Groundwood
Review Posted Online: Sept. 11, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2012
BOOK REVIEW
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