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Mama Miti: Wangari Maathai and the Trees of Kenya, by Donna Jo Napoli
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Through artful prose and beautiful illustrations, Donna Jo Napoli and Kadir Nelson tell the true story of Wangari Muta Maathai, known as “Mama Miti,” who in 1977 founded the Green Belt Movement, an African grassroots organization that has empowered many people to mobilize and combat deforestation, soil erosion, and environmental degradation. Today more than 30 million trees have been planted throughout Mama Miti’s native Kenya, and in 2004 she became the first African woman to win the Nobel Peace Prize. Wangari Muta Maathai has changed Kenya tree by tree—and with each page turned, children will realize their own ability to positively impact the future.
- Sales Rank: #112415 in Books
- Brand: Simon & Schuster/Paula Wiseman Books
- Published on: 2010-01-05
- Released on: 2010-01-05
- Original language: English
- Number of items: 1
- Dimensions: 12.00" h x .40" w x 9.00" l, 1.10 pounds
- Binding: Hardcover
- 40 pages
From Booklist
Luminous illustrations are the highlight of this third recent picture-book biography of Wangari Maathai, the Kenyan environmental activist who received the 2004 Nobel Peace Prize. In brief, poetic lines that have a folktale tone, Napoli describes how “wise Wangari” helped Kenyan village women solve problems from hunger to dirty water with the same solution: “Plant a tree.” Eventually, Maathai’s Green Belt movement became a worldwide mission. Jeanette Winter’s Wangari’s Trees of Peace: A True Story from Africa and Claire A. Nivola’s Planting the Trees of Kenya: The Story of Wangari Maathai (both 2008) integrate more background context, and readers encountering Maathai’s story for the first time here will need to start with the appended short biography in order to understand the story’s generalized references. Most noteworthy is Nelson’s vibrant collage artwork, which features soaring portraits and lush landscapes in oil paint and printed fabrics. An author’s note about sources and a glossary of Kikuyu and Swahili words used throughout the text close this moving tribute, which will partner well with Winter’s and Nivola’s titles. Grades K-3. --Gillian Engberg
Review
* “Nelson’s pictures, a jaw-dropping union of African textiles collaged with oil paintings, brilliantly capture the villagers’ clothing and the greening landscape…. This is, in a word, stunning.”
—Kirkus, STARRED REVIEW
* “Nelson’s (We Are the Ship) breathtaking portraits of Maathai often have a beatific quality; bright African textiles represent fields, mountains, and Maathai’s beloved trees… Napoli (The Earth Shook) creates a vivid portrait of the community from which Maathai’s tree-planting mission grows.”
—Publishers Weekly, STARRED REVIEW
“A beautiful introduction for children just learning about the Greenbelt Movement.”
—School Library Journal
“Luminous illustrations are the highlight of this third recent picture-book biography of Wangari Maathai, the Kenyan environmental activist who received the 2004 Nobel Peace Prize. In brief, poetic lines thathave a folktale tone, Napoli describes how “wise Wangari” helped Kenyan village women solve problems from hunger to dirty water with the same solution: “Plant a tree.” Most noteworthy is Nelson’s vibrant collage artwork, which features soaring portraits and lush landscapes in oil paint and printed fabrics.”
—Booklist
“Illustrator Kadir Nelson intensifies the text's tribute to East African culture, mixing oil paints and textiles in collages that capture the quest of women looking for answers as well as the beauty and vastness of Maathai's project . . Especially dazzling… Makes vibrantly clear how strong and resourceful Maathai and other African women have been in restoring trees and peace to their world.”
—The Washington Post
“This picture book glows from every page as Napoli and Nelson write and illustrate the inspiring story of ecologist and Nobel Peace Prize winner Wangari Maathai…. A lovely, stirring picture book with a simple message for us all: in the midst of change, development, and upheaval, there is always a place for wisdom and peace.”
— Mark David Bradshaw, Watermark Books, Kansas
"Will inspire children of all ages.”
—Ellen Scott, The Bookworm, Omaha, Nebraska
"This is the true story of Wangari Muta Maathi, a Kenyan woman who helped to bring trees back to a sadly deforested country. Her grassroots efforts to help her people and the environment at the same time had a profound effect not only on Kenya, but on people all over the world who heard her story and who learned her lessons. With a lyrical text and stunning multimedia art, this picture book is a must for every reader, both young and not so young." -- Through the Looking Glass Children's Book Review
About the Author
Donna Jo Napoli is the acclaimed and award-winning author of many novels, both fantasies and contemporary stories. She won the Golden Kite Award for Stones in Water in 1997. Her novel Zel was named an American Bookseller Pick of the Lists, a Publishers Weekly Best Book, a Bulletin Blue Ribbon, and a School Library Journal Best Book, and a number of her novels have been selected as ALA Best Books. She is�a professor of linguistics�at Swarthmore College in Pennsylvania, where she lives with her husband. Visit her at DonnaJoNapoli.com.
Kadir Nelson is an award-winning American artist whose works have been exhibited in major national and international publications, institutions, art galleries, and museums. Nelson is the illustrator of many beloved, award-winning, and�bestselling picture books including, We Are the Ship: The Story of Negro League Baseball, winner of the Coretta Scott King and Robert F. Sibert Award;�Thunder Rose, written by Jerdine Nolen, which received a Coretta Scott King Illustrator Honor Award;�Ellington Was Not a Street, written by Ntozake Shange, which received a Coretta Scott King Illustrator Award;�Hewitt Anderson’s Great Big Life,�written by Jerdine Nolen, which won the 2005 Society of Illustrators Gold Medal; and�Mama Miti:�Wangari Maathai and the Trees of Kenya�by Donna Jo Napoli called “stunning” by Kirkus Reviews in a starred review.�He is also the illustrator of Deloris Jordan and Roslyn M. Jordan’s�Salt in His Shoes�and Spike Lee and Tonya Lewis Lee’s�Please, Baby, Please and�Please, Puppy, Please. Kadir Nelson lives in Los Angeles.
Most helpful customer reviews
9 of 9 people found the following review helpful.
Fantastic Illustrations, Inspiring Story -- But Fictionalized!
By ChristineMM
I'll confess when I agreed to accept a pre-publication review copy of this book for Amazon Vine, I didn't know who Wangari Maathai was. As I read the read this story about her life, I loved it. I thought, based on Donna Napoli's writing, that she learned about plants from her people and her elders, and later spread this knowledge on to others. She helped them by giving them knowledge that empowered them to help themselves, in what the author refers to as "the green belt of peace". The grassroots effort to restore the vitality of the land through the planting of trees was inspiring.
I feel that the story and its repeating phrases will be of interest to young children. It is perfect for a read-aloud.
As an adult reader I didn't feel the story was entirely clear to explain how planting the trees made Kenya more peaceful (there was a gap of content there), so I'm not sure that children aged 4-8 will understand that either. However I enjoyed the rest of it, and liked the good messages the book conveys.
I was enthralled by the story of living in harmony with nature, knowing the value and use of trees, and not JUST living in a sustainable way but of actually rejuvenating a land that had been abused, having been stripped of trees by man. The picture book has a message of pro-environmentalism, and is uplifting in tone and leaves the reader feeling hopeful. I am grateful the book has a positive tone not an oppressive one like some other books have that tell young kids that `the Earth is doomed'.
I can imagine this being used by school teachers and nature educators. It seems perfectly suited for inclusion in academic studies or pleasure reading about `green living' or `sustainable agriculture' or for general environmental content, or in a botany unit.
The fact that this is about Africa (Kenya) and features a powerful African woman means it will be appreciated by anyone seeking to use children's picture books featuring the topic of geography, Africa, or positive African-American role models. (Please read my review through to the end for more on this.)
Although it is not mentioned in the text of the book, Maathai was the winner of a Nobel Peace Prize this book so this can also be used in biography studies based on those winners which some schools and homeschools do. It can be used in earning the Cub Scout Bear rank (the requirement to read a book about a person who helped the environment).
The illustrations are fantastic. I could tell right away that the collages were composed of fabrics from Africa and I loved that! This is mixed-media, as illustrator Kadir Nelson used oil paints to paint the faces, hands and other body parts.
--
I'm struggling with my opinion of the book now that I've done more research after my curiosity was piqued by reading this book. After the second read-through I read the two pages of information at the back of the book written for adults. It tells more about Maathai, the Green Belt Movement and of her having been awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2004. It was in this section that I started to learn of the "deception by omission" of this book. I went on to read more on the Internet including direct quotes from Maathai and watching videos of her speaking about her life and work.
I understand this is a picture book for kids aged 4-8 and I am aware that complicated stories and biographies must be simplified and brought down to a certain level to be age-appropriate. However at present teachers, authors and publishers seem to have no issue with scaring kids about humans destroying the Earth and giving a message to take action to stop or fix the environmental problems that the adults before them created.
I would think then, that kids could handle the omitted facts that it is not common for girls in Kenya to go to primary school and college. Maathai defied the odds and both those things including earning a bachelor and master degree in America with scholarships. She studied for her PhD first in Germany and finished in Africa, being the first African woman to get a PhD. How much of her science degrees were to credit for teaching her the botanical information she used with the Green Belt Movement, I do not know (versus the story's depiction of this wisdom being passed down from elders in the village). It seems to me that all kids could stand to hear an inspiring story about formal education and college degrees being good and useful in the real world.
Maathai's experience in America witnessing free speech in action in Vietnam War protests and seeing the `common people' protesting and trying to make change is what she credits as the source of her inspiration to go on to create a grassroots movement in Kenya. The fact that ideas and freedoms in America (not something happening in Kenya at that time) played such a key role in who Maathai became as a person, and how it affected her life work is absent from the book. (What a shame.)
The issue of the negativity she faced and the discrediting the African men in the government and the community did just because this was a grassroots movement comprised of women is unbelievable. That she stood up to this to make real progress is commendable. Again, I don't know how much of this part of her story would be right for a children's picture book but my point is that Wangari Maathai's story is not all nicey-nice nor was it easy as Napoli's story implies.
In the end this book makes a good story pushing a couple of good environmental messages (which some may label as propaganda). My larger concern is that this book romanticizes what are actually the oppressive traditional African values that Maathai and other women struggled against.
As to the rating, I'm torn. If I didn't know the more complete story I'd rate this 5 stars for the writing and 5 stars for the illustration. However I'm bringing it down to 3 stars = It's Okay due to the fictionalization of this story for the intention of pushing certain messages to children while leaving out other positive messages.
Postscript: Lest you think I hate the book, I don't. I liked the book enough to have already purchased a copy to give as a gift to someone seeking books about botany and the environment.
7 of 7 people found the following review helpful.
"Trees of Life" Mama Miti: A Reader's Review
By Andre Lawrence
Mama Miti: Wangari Maathai and The Trees of Kenya is a fictionalized account of the early childhood of the 2004 Nobel Peace Prize Recipient, Dr. Wangari Maathai and her work to stop deforestization in the East African country of Kenya.
Mama Miti is part biography, part fiction; part Sunday morning sermon, part ecology lecture; part Dr. Seuss, part Kahlil Gibran.
"Mama Miti" as a young girl was taught by her tribal elders the significance of caring for the natural environment and, especially, for trees. She was also taught there was an indefinable spiritual link that enabled trees, by their mere presence or any of its parts, be it fruit or limb, to provide nourishment, protection or overall peace to the community. When trees were removed, Miti was taught, the foundation of a community was also destroyed. Miti carried this message into adulthood.
Some time had passed and Miti was now a vendor who sat beneath a palm tree in the center of Kenya. Miti also developed a reputation as a renaissance woman whose advice brought prosperity ("Thayu nyumba") to those who sought it.
One by one, women came from all over, "Mama Miti...our goats are starving...wild animals steal my chickens...our stream is too dirty to drink from...my home fell apart." Each time, her response was "plant a tree!"
Not immediately, but over the course of time, Kenya flourished. Open fields became green with vegetation, communities grew, and peace abound.
***** ******** ******
The spiritual connection to trees and plant life was verified to me when, in a discussion with Kenyan scholars, I learned that the book didn't express the full extent of how trees are revered by many of Kenya's ethnic tribes.
According to them, many religious services are held underneath a tree and only if a tree is available. Some sects even mandate that burial services be held at designated tree(s). This (or these) tree served as burial markers with the explicit warning that that tree is not to be desecrated or removed by fear of some form of esoteric retribution.
***** ******** ******
The real life Wangari Maathai's life was not too far from the fictionalized account. A native Kenyan, Ms. Maathai went to school abroad and was the first African woman to earn a PhD (1968). While working with her husband, a populist politician, in the 70's & 80's, Maathai joined many local and international relief efforts to bring economic revitalization and ecological advancements to her native country. Soon she started her own NGO, "The Green Belt Movement," which had as its primary purpose to plant trees in desolate places. For her many efforts, Dr. Maathai was awarded the Nobel Prize, the first for an African Woman.
5 of 5 people found the following review helpful.
A Beautiful Award-Worthy Book
By M. Allen Greenbaum
Another tour de force for Kadir Nelson, who's fast becoming one of the country's pre-eminent book illustrators. Here, he uses a dazzling array of textures, colors, patterns, and cinematic techniques (a panoramic long shot on one page, a close-up on another) to capture the large (the environment, the diversity of life) and small (the personal) forces that propel the poor to seek help from "Wangari." For those who come to the book naiively (like me), the revelation that the saint-like Wangari is Wangari Muta Maathai, the first African American women to win the Nobel Peace Prize (in 2004) is astonishing. Her story, from veterinary medicine to founding the Green Belt Movement to halt deforestation in Kenya, is even more astonishing because it's true.
Although these facts are included in the informative afterward, Napoli downsizes the story to the toddler and elementary school-age set by focusing on Wangari's aid to individuals and families. Wangari helps them by recommending different varieties of trees: Mukinduri for firewood, mukawa to protect wildstock from predators, muthakwa wa athi to cure sick cattle, even a tree "which acts as nature's filter to cleam streams"--the giant sacred fig. Donna Jo Napoli and Nelson create an almost mythic tableau, supported by Napoli's short descriptive sentences (interspersed with words spoken by Kenyan natives) that evoke an oral story-telling structure.
Here, a woman who has lost her job, worried about feeding her family comes to her for help: "Wangari took the woman's hands and turned them over. She took the children's hands one by one. 'These are strong hands. Here are seedlings of the mubiru mubiru tree. Plant them. Plant as many as you can. Eat the berries."Like any useful knowledge, these words spread throughout the land, forming (as illustrated by the talented Nelson) a quilt of lands and families helped by Wangari.
Napoli and Nelson tap into Wangari's spirit: A deeply humanity runs through the book, and Wangari seemed blessed by the gentle and generous power of nature. At the same time, the story takes on real problems with practical solutions, showing that small steps can build into something greater. Together, the story and jaw-dropping illustrations (Nelson states in the "Illustrator Notes" that he used oil paints and printed fabrics on gessoed board--although I still don't know how he did it) make this an ideal book for any classroom or home. The age-appropriate story covers many important personal and social issues with gorgeous illustrations and a melodious, easy-flowing text.
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