Comments on: Blurring the Lines

By: Annette Sheldon

Annette Sheldon — Fri, 23 Apr 2010 13:48:03 +0000

Kathi
BRAVA! BRAVA! And so, THERE, gutless anonymous!
Great message, thank you for writing it.
Annette Sheldon

By: Nicole Valentine

Nicole Valentine — Thu, 25 Mar 2010 22:13:57 +0000

I’m reading this article as someone who not long ago was playing the sacred game of naming with her infant, and is now going to undertake writing for children as her life. I begin my MFA at VCFA in July. I plan on treating children with the same respect E. B. White, Mary Norton and C.S. Lewis had for me. Young minds have deep recesses too, and if they’re never reached how will they know that part of themselves as adults? Bravo! I truly hope I get the chance to work with you.

By: Betty X. Davis

Betty X. Davis — Fri, 05 Mar 2010 15:51:05 +0000

Kathi, you are a rare gem.
From Elephants Aloft to The Underneath you have been part of my life. My father, too, read Kipling to me — at my bedside: The Law of the Jungle, the beloved Road to Mandalay. On my own I memorized IF and love to hear my voice boom it out (when I’m in the car, alone).
About reading: my oldest son was dyslexic, so only given easy readers (mostly awful books) by teachers. As a junior in high school, things came together for him. A male teacher understood him, and my son learned to read. His first choice? The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich — every word.
He also read every word of Vanity Fair but got an F on his book review because he misspelled Thackeray (Thackary?)– it is spelled both ways on street signs in University Park and Dallas.

By: Melissa Buhler

Melissa Buhler — Thu, 25 Feb 2010 22:58:33 +0000

Wow! You have covered a lot of ground in your ramble. Your sons, being garage musicians it sounds like, remind me of my own. The A.R. problem you cite came up pointedly with one of my sons, who was prone to running up against “rules.” He’s settled down as an adult but tends to gobble up the stories he likes as if they were consumate treats. I rankle at any categorization of readers even though I have been a librarian and have had my share of class reading lists. It has always served me best to tease out the individual kid when possible. I believe there is a book for each and everyone of us, but it may need a little help to find.

By: Augusta Scattergood

Augusta Scattergood — Tue, 23 Feb 2010 20:31:06 +0000

So many truths here. Like the books we’ve loved all our lives, we can read your essay many times and take away something new with each reading. Thank you.

By: Jessica Leader

Jessica Leader — Mon, 15 Feb 2010 20:42:54 +0000

Oh Kathi, I just loved this. Throat-straining and funny (“Be specific, for Christ’s sake,) personal and political. I’m so proud to know you and hope that many, many people, especially education policy-makers, read this piece. Are you sending this to Arne Duncan, I hope? Or at the very least, the decision-makers in Texas?

By: Virginia Walter

Virginia Walter — Sat, 06 Feb 2010 07:05:16 +0000

When I first saw the cover of The Underneath, I thought that my ten-year-old granddaughter Natasha, an animal lover, would enjoy the book. The I read the book and thought it much too dark for her tender heart to bear. But when I next visited her, she asked, “Grandma, have you read The Underneath?” She loved it and understood it at the level that worked for her, as I loved it and understood it at the level that worked for me.