A Word on Words; 0925; Edna Ross Lipson

thanks so much we're down words a program delving into the world of books this week in eden ross lipson talks about the new york times' parents' guide to have children your host for work and words mr johnson once again welcomes the word on words singing if you're a parent or a grandparent or a great great grandparent with your chart and i got a book for you is a book that's a and i it's a how to book it is the new york times guide to the best books for children and a ball and going through them

that the venue compile eden ross lipson and so in light of that year people have ridden poked around and i have folks in it around it over lafayette says is the perfect book for a parent or grandparent looking for a gift for a birthday christmas graduation holidays commencement just keeping travel thanks to get a strike either i wanna know where the idea came from i mean i can't tell you how many times i have said to some pool clerk in the bookstore i want to follow the money is a lot of books my nephew listen as a child i just turned six as challah notice it in theirs and visitors learn how to raise exactly what i did not i am in it so

well someone came they came to me and said can you do a guide to cheddar to children's literature and i said no i can't i can do a guide to books to books that i love and books that i like and a working mom i can't write chapters and essays and elegant verses but you can sit down and go through one book at a time and what i did was with the help of the publishing industry was an index to this in this revised edition there are over a thousand main titles there almost two thousand titles in all i organize them developmentally which means we start with wordless books although we have to quickly say that wordless book sinatra very little children necessarily the people who may not read english then picture books in storybooks and early readers and little leaders and a few books for teenagers who are really getting their information elsewhere but what i

did and why simpson why i love to hear people say that it really works is that i cross referenced the book's fifty five different ways so you can find them by title by their unions say fifty five nineteen fifty five million ways to fight means fifty and alphabetically my husband says the funniest writers death divorce and dinosaurs not fly get to that you know and but there's fantasy and religion and read aloud we allowed and that time and age appropriate are really important because children can understand stories that they can't read for themselves and people have tremendous pangs it mothers come up and say well you know johnny is so interested in dinosaurs and he's read all these books and i picked up this book and it says it's for five to eight year old and he's only four and you have to give them some eason and some reassurance that for

heaven's sakes if johnny knows a lot about dinosaurs of course he's ready for that all these easily <unk> so all these exactly guidelines are abstract you know the children you know who you're choosing a book for i can give you ways to narrow the focus but it's a child knew how well you you know if you said in two thousand that this subversive syrian title for the numbers are important because when i went back in the index first alerted phenomenon went to the patient was wrong you know each book number and so there are more than a thousand numbers now you said that there are two thousand titles and for example if i told you that you might fun and horton hatches and a about this is on page so and so he wouldn't mind if i played you trying to find out the number now you get in there to the number and you

will find as another horton book that is a subsidiary thailand it's not now but that's another time another doctor since tidal that i didn't do a main amazon but i talked about this a little i did write it and for its titles in a series or related titles the number the books are numbered one to one thousand thirty three and every time the title workers in every one of the inductees at next to any illustration the number stays the same direction number is what makes it possible to do this index because if you had to go back to different pages would be massively confusion oh just just sold it our audience really understands the late night i let you down this convoluted path questions that are not he's a guns then you're done an excellent job explain but but to really well i did very well and anne and the most simplistic way because

is very i mean it is a very simple format that you've put together and it's really the genius of oregon iron works is the judging is a book is that it that it's so easy to find anything in it me and you accept that we talk to say ah ha ha ha ha ha's help but it begins by saying as you said books without pictures and they get books without pictures in and then go and where you're gonna go word is word is they're easily buildable a picture of picture books the picture books we should explain to people who haven't been reading a calm lately part or maybe if they have a picture books are the ones that are most heavily illustrated and have the simplest stories storybooks have just that complicated convoluted often very powerful stories but lots of illustrations you'll find storybooks used in second third fourth grade classes with great sometimes and then we get into the reading books but what we do to get into reading books and you go well you you know

reading young adult book right that's right so that's those are the basic albert then you get in the indexes randy have an index to index is right the first index is a listing thousand thirty odd idol all the time every title it's in his book so if you know there's a book and you know what the title is you can find it there that's the year the next is that if you want to read about since leo you want a redo your job options they wanted john reid argued it was just i got to be a string of numbers they're dissolved and that's all the sins and you can work practices that there's an illustrated look him up and exactly right there is an index to tell now you mentioned the magic word illustrate and the phenomenal election of those to deny me look over my shoulder saying yeah that's why well i i thought i just sold breeze through here the publishing industry this is philippines autobiography built he was a disney animator

and his autobiography which is an early reader of metal reading book is just thrilling because as a mets fan that were doing it the nokia years those owl are a one thousand volunteers nate the great detective gus act of eighty one of the dinosaurs as it does so there's just above the hat and how the cat and i had bought this is speaking of the same having intel and that's brought calls the winter wren which is a wonderful book about the coming of spring and buffalo grass fed buffalo roam on the left this that's from a visit to william blake's in nonetheless walk together children as black americans

has a wonderful book for everybody to re arm i'm from where we are it as you see the publishers were in no honestly gender is how dedicated they were to helping adults find things that they liked so if i do things for fun we also tell people where i said in the introduction when we designed the book and it was it was a collaborative effort in order to have those wonderful pictures we had to make space for them but then we had this great big margins and you and i know that you're never supposed to write books we always tell the children that they're not supposed to write books but in fact we tell the grownups that those margins are a good place to take notes sure if you've got a passel of grandchildren and you're trying to remember who liked what when they read it there's an easy way to keep their muscle you you say this is due you tell us some literally all of this is

really a selective got through and there are for example books that are out of print the difference between the first edition and the second was the number of books that she did go out of print also the books that came back into print but we're at a time when children's books are a billion dollar year business there are over four thousand new ones published every year i wanted this to be a selective but generous an optimistic guy to open the door to give people a way of starting down the path for themselves i wanted them to see and get a feel for what the best is you can go through the byways and eighties by yourself well i was i was amazed by that but turn the expense of office when out and drifted through that the office index urban expected to find was there but i didn't expect this time steinbeck their

works are not forgotten forever lonely it did come right back and so i'm really i'm really i'm really excited about it i you know i think it's a book thats if people keep around pass on to their children will income mothers well there's the trick is and has to do with the business of books and that's a separate separate subject there really was need to revise it after three years i suppose i'll if it if it finds a home i'll need to do it again and for five years hence island books do go out of print books or coming into paperback books are going there is a reading rainbow index because of course that's a wonderful way that children find books there are so many pressures i'm on books and reading its it's meant to be a starter book it's meant to be a used book and if it works at all it's going to

get worn out or shredded in that role well that's well new york times as a way of printing books that will be shredded of run through about dozen crossword puzzle mike shiner i need a novel as we see it as we speak the toward the crossword booklet of my the act a bit of them dictionary to come close but it really sometimes you do it and think i'd do it and he was great ha ha ha ha ha you know there are some all the money i've bedtime stories of adventure stories and there are some adventure stories the good bedtime story ocean what those two index sections really take you through some exciting possibilities now you say going in that it's not enough to say the job though we now know that that's the really serious problem you know and i know that we're both involved with newspapers that

there are two crucial problems facing this country day one as illiteracy which is really under an eighth grade level which means you can call on the highways but you need help on the driving test the americas a literacy is turning away from words because they're hard because they're complicated because they present frustrations it's very easy to read with little children everybody knows that when you read with little children they snuggle up in your lap and it's cozy and it warm and it's a wonderfully intimate and satisfying experience for you and for the child and then they go to sleep and you have the rest of the evening the real issue and what has changed in the three years since i did the first version of this book is reading with the fourth fifth sixth and seventh graders the children who are terrific at nintendo who have seven game boyd gaines who are involved with genuinely interesting and intellectually

challenging teams that are always dead and that involved a very narrow finger skills and and mental focus that are games of conquest and conquering and are emotionally the limit that comes just at the time that the books that they're reading are getting hard the stories don't necessarily have happy endings they have complicated vocabulary because they're upset and they're disturbing their baffling and you have to go away from your friends close up your world and read them is by yourself to do it and so it's more important now than i think it's ever been for parents and grandparents and concerned adults who know kids to read with the older children and they say oh what would you be read with the older children what i've got a television game or whatever to watch it doesn't mean that much reading but it means a chapter here and there a

poem before bedtime a conversation about a book that you've given following through using the index to pick out something from home work or school or one of the social problems that they're having their friendship indexes their sibling indexes think this is just a place to start there are plenty of other books that point is that if you continue to read with children and if you read yourself in front of it if they see you reading newspapers and magazines and books if they continue to have the whole model of adults reading then they'll continue to read through this time in their lives if they turn it off now what will happen is they go what will happen when they deal with the challenging work in high school and in college what will happen as they look for how to behave as citizens and our complicated world you have a similar speech was also eloquent quotation that you cite i think an interruption

early on the book it says this is chris on all for the poems and books come alive when you were to retire when you read the debates there they're there you know being eleven years old and minor bed maybe with the extra careful in case your mom didn't know you took a poll and a book that you've read before but it's a rainy afternoon and just wanna go there and what you bought a favorite books but i go back to almost every year for some reason the last two other little car was terrific in any love politics is a larger orbit the uk i mean it's you know last fall me every time i go and and in a different way the red pony is it is it is it is a classic and i know what it is that makes certain books classics for some people know someone asked me how does an author go about writing a classic book

an axis with guest to myself and symbol the author doesn't do it right or sits down to solve a problem to to ask a series of questions to see what happens as they play with an idea it's the world that makes it a classic if the world finds the resonance and and keeps it going one of the things that happened in doing the indexes for this book was discovering how many of these titles are genuinely classic were published before nineteen sixty eight so that if you're a boomer apparent with you if you were born and raised in the fifties and sixties when incidentally and this is relevant when the united states government spends more per capita on education and books and at any time before or since you remember lots and lots of books being around and be available whether you have them at home or not and those books aren't there and they're just as good as you well i you know

when i started looking into index out of my first thought was one of my kids are fine something that should be there it's not there and so i will look to people and of course i shouldn't she's there and they're there and as well she should be as controversy was as bad as they are really lay as mayor for judy blume is is a writer a classic tune and then i said well adventure stories the lair in the bedtime stories of their own and that she's taken me through with ollie off those who should be there but controversy in the first place i turn was death of course death was there now if you were me where would be the next place you turn at the death warrant these well was to birth over to that set out cause she's afraid of pregnancy birth is not there and the earth is there and

it's there if they're and so many ways can i tell you about the very first time i did a radio call it show when i went out to talk about this book and i was an experienced and it was a whole world and the very nice and was taking calls and a woman said oh your guess to some nice and she's been so friendly and helpful and i need a sex but for a three year old you know it was a terrible toys lie to you baby and i said well i don't think of that as a sex but i think we have both had that sibling thing we have books about families and we have books about how that science and information but sex per se is called for a little you know i mean death is there and the death and you would think to look at birth now you really do some wrapping up on the family now well i kind of family and under siblings

and then the juicy cross reference it and so many here lies on and i understand under friendship and problems and also understand it you can i know kind of note here that this accounting command on the new brochure just out by the first lady laura bush and this is a brochure that has been called up to help families like freedom in her council on onlookers has done terrific things and if you look at that so sure you find on the back page the new york times' parents died diverse books for children by eden ross lipson congratulations as we know it and they called me up and said no we we thought you should know that this is being distributed and would you like to see a copy of what he said just please just heard about why

iran you know that you get booked if you know program like this on the books caught on and through the mail and just look at him and say well we're truly it got that on your toes three thick and parents got the children and that's all the way i reacted parents can screw and in our final ten years it's wonderful if it is absolutely well so much fun at you know one of the things that i enjoyed doing where that the regional an ethnic and historical in texas and i'm so delighted because this is my first visit to tennessee and yet how many books that we read and how have i had the chance to read again and plowing through this an amazingly rich fields speaking of which how thinking of ways whoever we're sitting here now in nashville ryan what would you think if i told you that she

has a book listed he titled no one goes to nashville farmers found out about you i think that's not what it does a bright light is not as you can take them no one goes to last five of why is she coming down the effort to promote this book and twelve nea you're right it's not about the people in the medical needs it is a family story of family reconciliation and rather lovely story out there by and there are so many and also i know that's right but you should see the lyrics it evokes there and there's some pretty funny ones there too my one of my twenties and all of those new york islanders don't know everyone comes they just may not stay well now

after you've done that this manual years we should select that audience in on you i mean you are heavy into books and they are very very heavy heavy talk about the recreated well that it is it is it is it is in itself a god and the god or eating in this country the times book review is as separate freestanding section on books that is the largest general circulation publication about books in this country since the newspapers sunday circulation has about two million in addition there is an independent circulation of over eighty thousand which consists of people in the publishing industry who were terribly anxious to find out what the book review says and a wonderful group of demographically rare people that the times would love to know more about who don't want to work really just want the book review and what we know again from all those research and

marketing people is that the book review is the most thoroughly read a section of the paper that in this country where people read so selectively they want to know enough about books to go out to dinner to go to the bookstore to figure out what they need to know and it's nice to know that we helped them to do that it's a tremendously interesting place to work you you really do see the social issues forming and the fights developing that become the politics have become the trend that you've worked with some great job and an end the ten minute test a distinguished group of journalists and then the name mike mitchell leather purses and then when we were named balls jumped off the page at you might

get my best regards i think that the book review section has been enriched since it began to gauge to give occasional and more frequent attention to children's books where it's part of that has to do with the economy in the years that i've done the business has boomed the boomers are having babies at the same time at the federal money was being cut back we found that these now middle class children of the fifties and sixties had absorbed the idea that books were important for their children and in the last ten or twelve years freestanding children's only bookstores have sprung up around the country theyre in fact over three hundred of them and they have affected the business of children's books so i was really the beneficiary of a surge of interest and with it that corollary search of

do they really well i've always thought that the separation of church and state is absolute number of leaders but it supports us for the two special issues that i do and the we have they are why they are wonderful you must love cleveland together it's very nice for all of us that i'm i sit on both sides of the aisle because and for instance in the most recent children tissue i was able to persuade barry lopez who is a very distinguished writer who does not review as he hastened to tell me six times before he agreed to review over twenty books on columbus and were able to get people who are known and in children's books and now an adult books and simply known to write and comment and that's lots of fun we'll do it it but who has a child

wants to write about to report on all about to vote until it's what i do have i do have an index in my head about plus author of the new york times' parents' guide to the best books for children jaros says ben johnson this program was produced in the studios of the bbc and national fb