Teacher and Author
Roi Ottley thought of himself as a Negro. To him, Joe Louis, Paul Robeson, Langston Hughes, as well as the nameless dark-skinned American soldiers he reported on, were Negroes. To us, today, that noun never crosses our minds. If it … Continued
Erik Larson describes Martha Dodd’s, Sowing the Wind as the tale of “a good-hearted World War I flying ace” being “seduced and degraded” by Nazi brutality. [In the Garden of Beasts 359] Her tale is redolent of W. H. Auden … Continued
Martha Dodd. She was not a journalist stationed in Berlin. She did not report on the heady news from a Nazifying Germany (though she had had a brief stint with the Chicago Tribune). She was no diplomat. She did not … Continued
“This is a big story,” says Steve Sheinkin at the start of Bomb: A Race to Build–and Steal–the World’s Most Dangerous Weapon (Roaring Brook Press, 2012). Indeed. For those, like me, who came of age in the late seventies … Continued
What a delightful book! Sarah Jane Marsh shows that big events in history can be simplified for younger readers without dumbing them down. She establishes on the first two pages that Paine is a dreamer, enamored with words. On the … Continued
Charles Dickens and the Street Children of London is a biography of Charles Dickens and a brief history of a reform movement. The industrial revolution created great wealth for a few and new opportunities for a growing middle class. It … Continued