Maine Samplers addendum

Kelly Paul Briggs

Kelly Briggs agreed to probing interviews about the authoring process as she has experienced it. She is willing to share with librarians, teachers, and students the highlights and some of the problems of creating and publishing Island Alphabet. Her comments are in bold. Associated activities follow each comment. They are designed to help youngsters feel close to an author by participating in comparable procedures of research, relating artwork to researched and text, and creativity. Activities also adapt well to public library use.

Summary: Imagine a rhyme about a real Maine island, and above it an oval image that reflects and expands the rhyme's content. A decorated letter extends the mood. Below, a variety of historical nuggets individualize the islands further. These are strands of Maine's past that reach into the present, and enrich how we experience the splendor, the vitality, the richness of our Maine heritage.

Level: Can be viewed and 'read' at all levels.

Themes: Maine islands - history.

1. Kelly Briggs:

"If your group or class has spent time exploring island books or the ideas in Island Alphabet, you may wish to write and perhaps illustrate your own ideas about one of the following topics. I welcome your ideas, and will be happy to respond to any such products sent to me at: RR#1, Box 4163B, Camden, ME 04843. Please be sure to include your name and address."

If I could live on an island........
If I visited a Maine island.......

Who would I be, and why would I be going there?

When would I go?

How would I get there?

What would I need to wear?

What would I need to take with me?

What would I look forward to?

What might I be concerned about?

2. Kelly Briggs: "When I began my explorations about the islands, I made a manila folder for each one. As I located information I wrote or photocopied it and placed it in that island's folder. Some folders became very fat; others, like Uncle Zeke's, remained alarmingly slim. I found most of what I needed in three sources:

• The Maine Islands in Story and Legend by Dorothy Simpson, Blackberry Press, 1987;

• A Cruising Guide to the Maine Coast by Taft, International Marine, 1988;

• Islands of the Mid-Maine Coast by McLand

When I found confusing or possibly contradictory statements, I really did my homework. I checked other resources, including specialists at the College of the Atlantic and the Maine Department of Marine Resources. If I couldn't straighten out the facts, such as the fate of the circus animals, I stopped short of the differences. If I decided that a mistake had been made, such as the sighting of sea otters in Muscongus Bay, I changed that part of the book."

Activity: Look at the "O" page. The otter pictured there is a river otter. Groups of river otters have been known to swim in groups to islands, such as Otter Island, off the Maine coast. One author mistakenly thought that the otters were sea otters, and Kelly's first illustration for "O" was of sea otters. She changed it after she had checked with experts on Maine marine life.

Learn about both river otters and sea otters and make a comparison chart showing their similarities and their differences. Now study the way Kelly Briggs illustrates her pages, and create what you think the first illustration of the "O" page looked like, using not only her style but what you now know about sea otters. Make a class presentation, explaining your chart and your illustration in detail.

3. Kelly Briggs: "I did the rhymes first when I actually began creating the book. When the folders were teeming with facts, I browsed through them, thinking about what was important, also what was interesting, and also what I valued. I was really writing this book for myself, although I wanted to share this part of myself with readers. So I looked for what seemed meaningful to the inner ME.

"The selection of the content for the poetry set the tone for the whole book. I wanted to convey the spirit of the many wonderful childhood memories I had of my family activities on and around Maine islands. I wanted to go beyond the images that invite outsiders to Maine - lobsters and schooners and crabs - to the people who created and changed the histories of the islands - to the animals, and events, and traditions that affected them.

"I found things that amazed me, such as the people who ran up from New York and Philadelphia so long ago, bought parcels of land, and built houses with zillions of rooms, trying to outdo each other; people who felt that money could buy anything. I found dignified stories of families who maintained their island generation after generation and who finally had to sell, and other families who built the island back up again. I discovered touching tales, such as the folks from the National Audubon Society who went out to Seal Island and dug nesting burrows by hand in an old World War II bombing range, tempting puffins to once again nest there. These were examples of the spirit of how I think of Maine's islands."

3a. Explore in your mind something that is important enough for you to want to express for yourself as well as to share. It could be something like the growing skills and self-confidence you are developing through learning chess or ice hockey, or your need to find out about secondhand smoke or Alzheimer's disease. Write a paragraph about your interest. Now add a short description of your topic information and area[s] you feel you should learn more about. Now follow basic I-search procedure through pre-search stages. Your teacher and/or your librarian can guide you through this.

"The rhymes just started coming then. I was thinking of how what I was writing was like a little scrapbook, glimpses of what the islands mean to me. The verse became my voice, the child in my grown-up self. As I began writing my book I was also thinking about how to make the words catchy so that readers would not only enjoy them but perhaps remember the ideas. (I used to make up rhymes in school to help me remember lessons.) After I had written the text, I checked on how it 'shared.' I got lots of helpful feedback. Now as I work on new books, rhyming comes marching in, seeming to have a mind of its own. Perhaps that is how I best express myself."

3b. Do you know how you best express yourself? What way have you had most practice in? What way are you interested in pursuing more seriously? Write a paragraph about these three questions. Now choose some components of school studies that you are having trouble remembering. Compose some rhymes about them, or devise some other memorization technique. Plan a means of evaluating their effect and have it approved. Use your technique and evaluate.

"The soft colors and tones I used in the illustrations also seem chosen by some inner need. When the publishers suggested changing the text to 'zingy action' rhymes, I realized that the subtle poetry I had composed 'matched' the subtle colors of my art. So I stood firm, and minimal changes were made in the text or the colors.

"I used a rapidograph pen - the kind used by draftsmen and some artists - sizes 4xo and 6xo. They make very fine dots and lines. These pens come with empty cartridges. I filled them with Rotring artists' colors. The nice thing about Rotring is that the pigments are permanent. They don't smudge as you work with them. My tilted, well-lit drawing table was set up in our dining room. When anyone walked through, the floor jiggled and the table shook and 'oops' an extra little bump appeared on a drawing. I discovered, since I worked with thick watercolor paper, that I could 'shave off' any mistakes with a safety razor blade. But the dining room also became a no-entry place for those 'anyones!'

"It took me 500 hours to create the first twenty-six illustrations. I had already signed a book contract, which required that I complete them in a short time-frame. Next time I'll know better how long my art work will take, and I'll arrange for a more reasonable time-frame."

3c. Use the collection of alphabet books from activity 5 to examine:

• topics & subtopics authors chose as content
  
• how authors provide extra information
• a paragraph about each sub-topic
• a compendium at book's end
• a map at end to locate spices, tribes, etc.
• many small sketches, explained at end other
  
• creative techniques used in presentation
  

Discuss these in a group or class. Brainstorm creative topics, formats, ways to present information. Prepare The Anatomy of Creating an Alphabet Book. Include a bibliography of ABC books. Format could be a how-to book, a computerized version available through an Internet connection, or another approved medium. Offer to school or district staff, students, board members, other approved recipients.

3d. Get topic approval for an alphabet book of your own. Do a pre-search. Prepare an over-all plan, including calligraphy, text concept, and illustrative style and medium. Upon approval of the pre-search and the plan, create pages to represent three of your letters. Keep a double-entry journal as you research and develop your pages, including time spent on content, lettering, and pictures. As part of a final presentation, predict and justify how long it would take to complete your alphabet book.

4. Kelly Briggs: "Maps, real or imagined, are used as end papers in many books to help readers imagine or understand location. A map was mistakenly omitted from the end papers of Island Alphabet. The publishers have prepared map inserts for books yet to be sold."

4a. Activity: With a group, explore books with maps, and list some different ways they are used to represent location. Which type of map seems best suited to Island ABCs? Prepare one, present to a panel, and upon approval arrange for each reader of the book to receive a personal copy of the map.

4b. Small group: make a map of all schools on Maine islands. Label the schools as to grades included. Is there anything missing, and if so, why? Each group member now make a similar map of Maine island schools for a different year, 10, 20, 30 years ago. The group will then analyze these, list changes, and venture the reasons. Now research the reasons and make any needed changes. Prepare 2 graphs reflecting both the changes and the reasons, using same figures and information but rearranging as to scale, color, or some other factor. Which seems to portray the information best, regarding accuracy, understanding, objectivity, use? [Other information about island education may be substituted upon approval.]

4c. Read Stephen Vincent Benet's poem called "American Names." With a group, browse a Maine map that names its islands, and brainstorm how various islands might have gotten their names. Categorize these ideas and choose the four or five most logical ones. Now list at least five island names under each category in colorful chart form. Finally, research these islands to verify your guesses, stopping after three 'hits' for each group member. Present your findings and the changes you had to make to your class. [Include a place on the charts to record verifying source for each naming.]

5. Kelly Briggs: "Lettering has interested me for a long time. I took instruction in calligraphy and loved working with it, and collected examples of ways letters were designed and embellished. But I felt hemmed in by the discipline. I wanted to involve it more with art, and discovered and studied author/illustrator Marie Angel, who included 'illustrated letters' in her books. That evolved into the idea of an ABC book which would include 'creative calligraphy.' This proved to be the jump start into an earlier goal that I had written in my high school yearbook - '.....a career in children's literature.'

"I put together an alphabet that had clear, unmistakable letters. As I worked, my alphabet demanded to be modified: the edges were too pointy and needed to be more rounded; I 'fattened' each letter to make room for inner designs. Overlapping each letter with part of the illustration related the visual art closer yet."

different styles of fonts how ABC letters are placed on page how letters relate to content how art is used creatively how borders relate to texts/content

Group discussion of reactions will result in some conclusions. Relate Island Alphabet to your reactions and your conclusions. Prepare to share your ideas. Use visuals from your collection through

• a computerized 'slide' program composed of colored scanned examples or computer/compatible camera or video inputs,

• slides photographed from copystands

• a videoed gallery of examples. Using examples directly from your collection would work only if your audience was very small. Your collection will serve well as an opportunity for audience browsing after and/or before your presentation.

• Note: Your presentation can become a permanent resource available through the library if you include a sound narration. [A rear-screen projector can accommodate a synchronized cassette tape that controls its slides.]

5. Kelly Briggs:: "Ideas for the pictures came from many sources. Since I did the text first, I knew the subjects I needed: sea and fir trees, sheep and herons, ferryboats and campfires, cottages and mansions, to mention just a few. I scoured newspapers and magazines, and clipped anything that seemed to fit. I researched books for descriptive information as well as for pictures. I used family photographs, old and new, for models. My father and my sister walking, my niece and nephew, and a picture of my great-great-grandfather with his stone cutter co-workers. I went to visit islands myself and took photographs, or sketched them on the spot One friendly Mainer marched me through her house and sat me on her back porch, provided me with paper and pencil, and identified Uncle Zeke's Island for me just offshore. I brought home brimstones to dwell on their deep shiny beauty.

"I talked to people and read. Then I used my imagination to compose each picture so that it had a focus. I tried to have plenty of detail, but not clutter. The 'right' focus and the 'right' amount of detail didn't always happen immediately. Sometimes I modified a painting three or more times before it evoked what I was trying to convey. It was just like editing words and rhymes so that they 'fit' what I wanted to say."

6. Kelly Briggs:: "The illustrations for my book were created by tiny dots placed very close together for darker color, or further apart for lightness. This technique is known as 'pointillism'. I also used short patches of lines in some areas of my pictures to create a more 'textured' look - sort of like a tapestry. By using pointillism and adding my own touches I created my own style of illustration."

6. Activities: Learn more about this artistic technique called pointillism. Check the art section of your library; find a biography of the French painter Georges Seurat; invite your art teacher or a community expert to provide examples and explanations of this approach to art. Look at books by other illustrators using this technique.

Experiment with this technique, standing back now and then to see how at a distance they blend together. Try using a line or two, or some kind of tapestry, or some other 'touch' of your own. Some materials students can use are markers, paints, paper-punch dots, q-tips. When you feel ready to go beyond experimentation, create a small, black and white stippled picture. Some artists add to black and white stippled pictures by rubbing on colored chalk with their fingers. Make a photocopy of your black and white picture and try this

Discuss your pictures and your experiments with your next picture in mind. Now create a small, colored stippled picture. Some likely nature scenes: objects reflected in water, objects in sunlight casting shadows.

Share your work in a group and share helping tips. If more than one group is involved, have groups report to each other. Develop a how-to for future stipplers. Include examples. Bind and catalog and prepare for inclusion in your school library.

Selected Bibliographies:

Islands and/or Maine

Arnosky, Jim. Near the Sea: a Portfolio of Paintings. Lothrop, Lee & Shepard, 1990. Colors limited to 6.

Coatsworth, Elizabeth. Lighthouse Island. Norton, 1968 . A summer visitor learns to enjoy island life, including collecting earth and planting lettuce
pansies.

Cooney Barbara. Island Boy. Viking, 1988. A family-island history, including the coming of the "rusticators" and native response to their needs.

Dean, Julia. A Year on Monhegan Island. Tichnor & Fields, 1995.

Gibbons, Gail. Christmas on an Island. Morrow, 1994.

_____________. Surrounded by Sea: Life on a New England Fishing Island.. Little Brown, 1991- 4 seasons (dedication is to "Matinicus friends".
Includes diagrams of traps, underwater netting, labels.

Graff, Nancy Price. The Call of the Running Tide: a Portrait of an Island Family. Little, Brown 1992. A photographed year of lobstering off Swann Island.

Hadley, Irwin. The Original Freddie Ackerman. McElderry, 1992. [See A Maine Sampler of Information Skills Activities III, pp.53-56.]

Jones, Dorothy, & Ruth Sargent. Abbie Burgess, Lighthouse Heroine. Downeast, 1969. The classic story of a girl maintaining the Matinicus island light during storms of 1856 & 7. Kiermaer, Constance. To Be on an Island. Downeast, 1980.

Lord, Cynthia. Islands and Lighthouses: An Adventure in Maine History. September Co. Brunswick, 1987. [Curriculum]

McCloskey, Robert. One Morning n Maine. Viking, 1952. Comfortable simplicity of family life on an island.

______________. Time of Wonder. Viking, 1957. A Penobscot island summer through the eyes of children.

MacDonald, Emma Discover Maine through Handicraft. Maine DEC, 1974.

Olson, Arielle. The Lighthouse Keeper's Daughter. Little Brown, 1987. Matinicus Rock story once again, including the common practice
of importing soil for patches of flowers and lettuce. Porter, Eliot. Summer Island. Abridged. Sierra/Ballentine 1966 Poetry, descriptions,
photos, histories of islands of Penobscot Bay.

Robinson, Victoria S., Ed. Afoot in Maine. Knowlton & McLeary, 1976.

Roop, Peter &A. Connie. Keep the Lights Burning, Abbie. Carolhoda, 1985.

Sauer, Julia. The Light at Tern Rock. Puffin, 1951. A boy's variation of Abbie Burgess.

Sharpe, Grant W. A Guide to Acadia National Park and the Nearby Coast of Maine. Golden, 1968.

Wass, Philmore B. Lighthouse in my life: the Story of a Maine Lightkeeper's family. Down East, 1987. Autobiography.

Young, Ruth. Daisy's Taxi Orchard, 1991.

Alphabet Books A my name is Alice.

Anno, Mitsumasa Anno's Alphabet: an Adventure in Imagination. Crowell, 1975.

Brent, Isabelle. An Alphabet of Animals. Little, Brown, 1993.

Budd, Lillian. The Pie Wagon. Lothrop, Lee, & Shepard, 1960.

Cushman, Doug. The ABC Mystery. Harper Collins 1993

Hepworth, Cathi. Antics! An Alphabetical ANThology. Putnam, 1992

Ipcar, Dahlov I love My Anteater with an A. Knopf, 1964. Mayers, Florence. A Russian ABC

Featuring Masterpieces from the Hermitage, St Petersburg. Abrams, 1992.

Musgrove, Margaret. Ashanti to Zulu: African Traditions. Dial, 1976.

Owens, Mary Beth. A Caribou Alphabet. Dog Ear Press, 1988.

Pallotta, Jerry. The Spice Alphabet Book. Charlsebridge, 1994.

Rankin, Laura. The Handmade Alphabet. Dial, 1991.

Smith, Harry W. ABC's of Maine. Down East, 1990.

Van Allsburg, Chris. The Z was Zapped;: a Play in Twenty-Six Acts. Houghton Mifflin, 1987.

Viorst, Judith. The Alphabet from Z to A, With Much Confusion on the Way. Atheneum, 1994. Illustrated by Richard Hull.

Calligraphy:

The Calligrapher's Handbook. Gallery, 1985.

Complete Guide to Calligraphy: Techniques and materials. Chartwell, 1988.

Haines, Susanne. The Calligrapher's Project Book. Crescent, 1987.

Wright, Harry. Lettering in a Variety of Alphabets. Pittman, 1950.

Pointillism, run-over art, and decorated borders or letters.

Carle, Eric. Do You Want To Be My Friend? Crowell, 1971.

Carlstrom, Nancy The Snow Speaks. Little, Brown, 1992. Illustrated by Jane Dyer.

Early, Margaret. Sleeping Beauty. Abrams, 1993.

Ernst, Lisa Campbell. Sam Johnson and the Blue Ribbon Quilt. Lothrop, Lee & Shepard, 1983.

Hadley, Mary Jane. "Going vibrant with endangered species." School Arts, Dec. 92, Vol. 92 Issue 4, p. 11.

Hodges, Margaret. Saint George and the Dragon. Little, Brown, 1984. Illustrated by Trina Schart Hyman.

Lear, Edward. The Owl and the Pussycat. Putnam, 1991. Illustrated by Jan Brett.

Niceley, H T. "Painting with Dots", School Arts, Dec. 93 Vol. 93 Issue 4, p. 32.

Shub, Elizabeth The Fisherman and his Wife. Verlag, 1978. Illustrated by Monica Laimgruber. [stippling]

Viorst, Judith. See Alphabet from Z to A.

Willard, Nancy. The Sorcerer's Apprentice. Scholastic, 1993. Illustrated by Leo and Diane Dillon. Small secondary picture at foot of each page
takes action one step further.

Yorinks, Arthur. Hey, Al. Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 1986. Illustrated by Richard Egielski.