Miss Rumphius

While the children eat their morning snack, I read a picture book aloud. Lately, I've been on a nostalgia kick and have been selecting books from my early years of teaching. Today's choice was Miss Rumphius by Barbara Cooney.

Cooney wrote and illustrate this lovely story about a girl who chooses her own path and relishes all of the joy and all of the difficulties. Her illustrations, done in acrylics and Primacolor pencils, are reminiscent of American folk art and give the reader a feeling of walking through history. The double-page spreads of her island speak to me, perhaps because I, too, live on an island that I love. The cool colors, the fog, the friendly feel of the village give the reader the unmistakable urge to visit.

Miss Rumphius, the Lupine Lady, began life as Alice and her life story is told by her great-niece. She listens to her grandfather's stories of far away places and vows to follow in his footsteps - travel the world and then settle by the sea. He challenges her to also do something to make the world more beautiful.

Alice becomes a librarian (one of my favorite illustrations in the book!) and then goes off to see the world - and she does, with great flair and gusto. When she injures her back, she settles in a cottage by the sea to recuperate and begins to contemplate what she can do to make the world a more beautiful place. I'll leave the rest for you to discover, but I want to make one more observation about the illustrations - as she begins her journey to make the world a more beautiful place, she bears a striking resemblance to Katherine Hepburn.

Alice Rumphius models the excitement, adventure, independence, and even loneliness in the life of a woman who has chosen her own destiny and moves forward with faith and joy.

Though Barbara Cooney has been gone for 18 years, her books will resonate with young readers, and their parents, for decades to come. She believed in writing TO children rather than AT them, and that is one of many reasons that children love her stories.

The two-time Caldecott Medal winner wrote and/or illustrated 110 books during her lengthy career.  According to The Washington Post, Tim Moses of Viking Children's Books, states that she was Miss Rumphius.

"Of all the books I have done," she once told Moses, " 'Miss Rumphius,' 'Island Boy' and 'Hattie and the Wild Waves' are the closest to my heart. These three are as near as I ever will come to an autobiography." 

This is an excellent article in The Atlantic about Cooney and her work, a more verbose article in The Horn Book, and another, shorter, more personal article in The Washington Post, from which the above quote was taken, written shortly after her death.