Brown Angels by Walter Dean Meyers - 1993 First Edition - Vintage Child Book, Vintage Photographs, Black Children, Black History, Poetry

1993 edition of Brown Angels: An Album of Pictures and Verse by Walter Dean Myers.

Written by Walter Dean Myers. 1993, third printing. HarperCollins Publishers.

"I never dreamt
that tender blossoms
would be brown
Or precious angels
could come down
to live in the garden
of my giving heart
But here you are
brown angel"

INTRODUCTION

"Why do I love children? I think it is because the child in each of us is our most precious part. Children remind us of a time of innocence, a time of giving, and an unfettered love of life.

"Combing through dusty bins in antique shops, flea markets, auction houses, and museum collections to find these pictures of African-American children was a sheer delight. Seeing their faces scrubbed and beaming, seeing them dressed in their Sunday best for a traveling photographer, told what our grandparents and great-grandparents thought of their children. These pictures speak to me of hardworking people - of tenant farmers, porters, and teachers of the "colored" schools - who celebrated the lives of their babies as have all people before them and since. And they did so despite the difficulties of their own lives.

"First there were ten pictures that I cherished, then a hundred, then several hundred carefully tucked away in my files. I cherish the chance to publish these pictures. I cherish the chance to share the pride of parents and guardians who dressed them for the sitting. I cherish the chance to share the sensitivity of the photographers to their beauty. The poems were inspired sometimes by the pictures, sometimes by the memory of children I have known, and sometimes just by the joy of a summer day.

"I hope that these pictures bring you as much happiness as they have brought me. Perhaps they will send you to mothers, aunts, grandmothers, and great-grandmothers to search for pictures and memories of your own." - Walter Dean Meyers

Walter Dean Meyers (1937 – 2014) authored more than a hundred books and is best known for YA literature. He was a five-time winner of the Coretta Scott King Award for African-American authors. He also won a Newbery Honor Award, the Margaret Edwards Award and Michael Printz Award from the ALA, and in 2010 was nominated for the Hans Christian Andersen Award for lifetime contributions to children's literature. He may best be remembered for his 1988 YA novel Fallen Angels about the Vietnam War.

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Condition*: Near Fine/Very Good. Dust jacket: Small stain on the front, lower left. Pages are clean, undamaged, and complete.