My Name Is Truth: The Life of Sojourner Truth
Inspirational and informative intro to an American hero.
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A Lot or a Little?
The parents' guide to what's in this book.
What Parents Need to Know
Parents need to know that My Name Is Truth: The Life of Sojourner Truth is a stylized and emotionally powerful biography of the former enslaved woman and abolitionist crusader who dedicated her life to sharing her heartrending life story so others might be inspired to take up the fight for civil rights. Though it's aimed at young readers, this beautifully illustrated picture book is rich in historical information and acts as a good starting point for further investigation into one of 19th-century America's most prominent female voices.
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What's the Story?
My Name Is Truth: The Life of Sojourner Truth tells the harrowing and true story of one of 19th-century black America's towering figures, the former enslaved woman turned abolitionist firebrand who took her name from her dedication to spreading a message of justice. Award-winning children's book author Ann Taylor, who previously wrote the first-person narrative Abe Lincoln Remembers, teamed up with Coretta Scott King Honor-winning illustrator James Ransom to create this poignant and moving biography, which is told from Truth's perspective but does not use actual quotes. The story traces the arc of Sojourner's life, from her childhood and motherhood in captivity, to her dramatic escape and rescue by a nearby Dutch family, to her legal challenge of her son's illegal sale out of state, to her career as a nationally respected public speaker and author.
Is It Any Good?
The text is stylized with African-American colloquialisms and colored with vivid imagery and poetic rhythm. James Ransom's watercolor illustrations are gorgeous and evocative, maintaining a tone of hope even in the story's darkest moments. These examples of the cruelty and insensitivity that African Americans often suffered in that era reveal the grotesqueness of racism and the continued importance of a deep societal commitment to social justice and ending discrimination.
Equal parts painful and powerful, My Name Is Truth sheds light on an important leader and one of the most troubling chapters of United States history.
Talk to Your Kids About ...
Families can talk about the long and continuing struggle for human rights in the United States and elsewhere. How have figures such as Sojourner Truth, Frederick Douglass, W.E.B. DuBois, and Martin Luther King Jr. contributed to the spreading of the message of equality?
The social and economic effects of slavery in America are still being felt 150 years after the Civil War officially outlawed it. What's the lasting legacy of that brutality and exploitation? Will those wounds ever heal, and how can each of us do our part to help?
Book Details
- Author: Ann Turner
- Illustrator: James Ransome
- Genre: Biography
- Topics: Great Girl Role Models, History
- Book type: Non-Fiction
- Publisher: Harper
- Publication date: January 20, 2015
- Publisher's recommended age(s): 6 - 10
- Number of pages: 40
- Available on: Hardback
- Last updated: February 26, 2020
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