Tag Archive for Melissa Sweet

A Favorite Line from Charlotte Zolotow

I busted out the scanner to give you all a gander at a favorite page from a collection titled Snippets, by Charlotte Zolotow, illustrated by Melissa Sweet.

Published in 1993, Snippets is exactly that — forty-one brief passages gathered from Zolotow’s many books. As the subtitle says: A Gathering of Poems, Pictures, and Possibilities . . .

The pages read like small poems, offering concrete and sturdy observations, or hopes and dreams and wild imaginings.

God, I love that excerpt, which originally appeared in the book, A Father Like That. “You never were a boy. You don’t know.”

Charlotte Zolotow has an uncanny knack for getting to the heart of things.

She is, of course, a legend in children’s publishing. An author, editor, publisher, and educator whose work includes William’s Doll, The Storm Book, If You Listen, and Mr. Rabbit and the Lovely Present.

In an interview, Charlotte once told me: “Things that matter to children — that’s what I try to get into my books. Things that are very important, even if they aren’t important to the adults around them.”

A good thing to remember and, I hope, to share.