Tag Archive | charlotte zolotow

Poetry Friday: Charlotte Zolotow and the Poets

The recently deceased children’s author Charlotte Zolotow was also an editor and a poet herself. She edited many of the most gifted authors of poetry for children of the twentieth century during her tenure at Harper and Row.

Lee Bennet Hopkins wrote of his editor Charlotte Zolotow: “Charlotte was editor-supreme. Her respect for an author, her insight, foresight, her vision of what could be — become — has been a highlight of my career. Lucky is one to be caught in the true Charlotte’s web.”

Paul Fleischman, winner of the 1989 Newbery Medal for Joyful Noise: Poems for Two Voices was also edited by Ms. Zolotow. In a tribute to her editorial skills, he says: “In matters of larger scope, her vision was truly exceptional. She was an astounding discoverer of talent. Once she’d found you, she didn’t rewrite you any more than she did your sentences. Ideas for books weren’t thrust upon you. The latest trends in publishing were never bandied about. Charlotte operated on the theory that the best book you had inside you was the one you most wished to write, no matter what happened to be selling at the moment.”

61AjTymBiWL._SX258_PJlook-inside-v2,TopRight,1,0_SH20_BO1,204,203,200_Poet Karla Kuskin, also a friend and protege of Ms. Zolotow, wrote a poem for a 1990 celebration of Charlotte Zolotow’s work:

There is that smile
that warms us like the sun.
There is the ouevre
(fine work done,
fine work yet to come).
There is all this, and more
combined
with that well honed and stainless
steel trap mind…

Mind and imagination combined made Charlotte Zolotow a formidable and talented author and editor and poet. Here are a couple of poems by Ms. Charotte herself:

51CA533HDML._SY344_PJlook-inside-v2,TopRight,1,0_SH20_BO1,204,203,200_Ladybug by Charlotte Zolotow

Little ladybug
With your
Glazed red wings
and small black polka dots
you look like a porcelain statue
until suddenly
you
fly
away.

People by Charlotte Zolotow

Some people talk and talk
and never say a thing.
Some people look at you
and birds begin to sing.

Some people laugh and laugh
and yet you want to cry.
Some people touch your hand
and music fills the sky.

Charlotte Zolotow, b.1915, d.2013

Children’s author and book editor Charlotte Zolotow died yesterday at the age of 98. She wrote and published over seventy picture books for young children, including Mr. Rabbit and the Lovely Present, William’s Doll, Big Sister Little Sister, and Over and Over. As an editor for Harper and Row, she was instrumental in publishing such authors as ME Kerr, Paul Zindel, Kara Kuskin, and Patricia MacLachlan, whose lovely book Sarah Plain and Tall won the Newbery Award.

Some of my favorite books by Charlotte Zolotow, illustrated by many of the picture book world’s most gifted illustrators:

51jqpA8tDML._SY344_PJlook-inside-v2,TopRight,1,0_SH20_BO1,204,203,200_

51CDZcP-cPL._SX258_PJlook-inside-v2,TopRight,1,0_SH20_BO1,204,203,200_

51Ozy4JCDmL._SY344_PJlook-inside-v2,TopRight,1,0_SH20_BO1,204,203,200_

512AKCJYarL._SY344_PJlook-inside-v2,TopRight,1,0_SH20_BO1,204,203,200_

510H4-12bOL._SY344_PJlook-inside-v2,TopRight,1,0_SH20_BO1,204,203,200_

Here at Semicolon, I wrote a birthday celebration post for Ms. Zolotow a few years ago, and there’s a linky there. I’ve moved it here so that if you want to link to your post about Charlotte Zolotow and her legacy, you can. I’m adding links myself to the tributes I find so that I can go back and read them again when I want to remember. Or I can just read her books. The books will last.