Celebrate Nonfiction

Exploring the Joy of Nonfiction Reading and Writing

Nonfiction Authors Dig Deep by Lesa Cline-Ransome

Today we continue the Nonfiction Authors Dig Deep series with an essay by author Lesa Cline-Ransome. Thank you, Lesa.

Much of my life has been shaped by stories.
From my earliest days, as a visitor to the Malden Public Library in
Massachusetts, I was transformed by the stories I read. 

As a young girl, so shy and nervous I was
often too afraid to speak, I devoured the fictional stories of fearless girls
and rabble rousers. In them, I saw a seedling of myself, waiting to take
root. 

Yet, while I read stories by Astrid Lindgren
and Judy Blume, I avoided biographies. The often bland, didactic narratives of
seemingly perfect people with perfect lives failed to resonate with me in the
way that fictional characters could. 

Instead of seeing inspiration and potential, I
saw a failure in myself to reach the level of perfectionism required to be
successful.  Where was the grit, and
perseverance and fierce independence of a girl like Pippi Longstocking,
orphaned, living alone, fending off all manner of danger? The divide between
fiction and non-fiction was vast in my eyes, that is, until I read the story
Harriet Tubman.

As the only black student in a classroom of
all whites, I dreaded the time of year when slavery was discussed. The room
would grow uncomfortably quiet as my classmates stole glances in my direction
because they felt that somehow, those inaccurate and incomplete descriptions of
enslaved persons portrayed the complete sum of my African American ancestry. In
my history, they saw people too weak, too afraid, too incapable of resisting bondage. 

But then, one year, we read about Harriet
Tubman. Her story was like one of an action adventure hero, complete with
danger, disguise, late night plots and daring escape. Because her story was
also true, it was even better than Pippi Longstocking.

Harriet suffered at the hands of slave
masters, was unschooled, and endured persistent health problems. She was
rejected by her husband when she returned to rescue him. Yet despite these
impediments, she kept right on striving. 

Now this, I thought, was a real life
hero. 

I realized then that it wasn’t that I
disliked biographies. What I disliked were the biographies I’d been handed in
the past. I needed to read stories about people who looked like me. People who
had persevered despite racism, loss, and adversity.

When I began writing for children, I wrote the
kind of biographies I longed for as a child. My earliest books included Satchel Paige, Young Pele: Soccer’s First
Star, and Major Taylor:  Champion Cyclist. You won’t find these
athlete’s names in social studies textbooks, alongside names like Babe Ruth and
Joe DiMaggio. Their stories of struggling to reach their potential against all
odds drew me in.  Their stories are human
stories of how small ripples can cause big waves in the fight for dignity and
equal access. 

Books like
Just a Lucky So and So:  The Story of
Louis Armstrong, My Story, My Dance: 
Robert Battle’s Journey to Alvin Ailey and Before There was Mozart:  The
Story of Joseph Boulogne Chevalier de Saint George seek to highlight the
role of the African American influence on the arts.

Diving further into history with the
biography of Frederick Douglass in Words
Set Me Free, helped me discover one young boy’s quest for dignity and
freedom in the form of education. 

And most recently, as I told the story of
Harriet Tubman in Before She was Harriet,
I remembered how all those years ago, her story of courage, gave me hope that I
too could one day be fearless. 

These true stories reveal the crucial role of
African Americans in the building of this country and how the lessons from a
troubled history can provide a roadmap for a better future. They give young
readers a broader understanding of our shared history, our culture, and our
strengths.

I still love Pippi Longstocking, but in each
of the figures I’ve written about, I found the real life stories of
fearlessness I sought as a young girl. And ultimately, both off and on the
page, I found my voice. 

Lesa
Cline-Ransome
is the author of nearly twenty books for children including Friends and Foes, Light in the
Darkness:  A Story of How Slaves Learned
in Secret, and Freedom’s School. Before She Was Harriet received a
Christopher Award, Jane Addams Award, and a Coretta Scott King Honor for
Illustration. Lesa’s debut middle grade novel, Finding Langston, received the  Scott O’Dell Award for
Historical Fiction and the Coretta Scott King author Honor Award. She lives with her
husband and frequent collaborator, illustrator James Ransome. www.lesaclineransome.com.

4 Responses

  2. Really enjoyed reading "Before She was Harriet" – I love the way Lesa Cline-Ransome gives the history of the stories, so young girls today are able to face their futures with courage. Thank you for posting this.

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