My Seneca Village

by Marilyn Nelson

Overview

Poetry illustrated in the poet's own words - with brief prose descriptions of what she sees inside her work -- this exquisite collection takes readers back in time and deep into the mind's eye of Marilyn Nelson.

A girl ponders being free-but-not-free. Orphaned brothers get gold fever. A conjurer sees past his time and into ours. The voices of a multi-ethnic, multi-racial 19th century Manhattan neighborhood are rising again

One of America's most honored writers - a Newbery Honor medalist, Coretta Scott King Medalist and National Book Award nominee -draws upon history, and her astonishing imagination, to revive the long lost community of Seneca Village.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781608981977
Publisher:	namelos
Publication date:	04/30/2015
Edition description:	New Edition
Pages:	98
Product dimensions:	5.90(w) x 8.80(h) x 0.30(d)
Age Range:	10 - 13 Years

Editorial Reviews

★ 12/01/2015
Gr 5 Up—This beautifully crafted and powerful collection of poems deals with a brief period (1825–57) in New York City's storied past. Seneca Village, on Manhattan's Upper West Side, was a thriving multiethnic community of African Americans, Irish and German immigrants, and, possibly, some Native Americans, until it was decimated by the creation of Central Park. After poring over the written accounts and census records, renowned poet Nelson sat down to imagine the lives of a number of the residents, giving voice to individuals based on the names and identifying labels. Brief paragraphs set each scene, followed by a poem in the voice of the Seneca Villager. Readers hear from a bootblack, a conjure-man, a reverend, a hairdresser, a nurse, a mariner, schoolchildren, a music teacher, tub-men hauling sewage to the river, an elderly conductor on the Underground Railroad, and abolitionist and activist Maria W. Stewart. As in any impoverished community, the hardships are palpable—babies die of misunderstood diseases, people are victimized by their starving neighbors, there's violence and cruelty—but there is also resilience, hard-won independence, and hope for its children's futures. In the spirit of Edgar Lee Masters's Spoon River Anthology, this work touches on historical truths (footnoted throughout) but introduces a fleeting time and place through the everyday hopes and dreams of its residents. VERDICT This rich and diverse (a variety of poetic forms, including ones invented for certain speakers, are featured) piece of American literature belongs in every collection.—Luann Toth, School Library Journal

School Library Journal

★ 2015-08-05
The little-known story of the settlement that preceded Central Park. Newbery and multi-Coretta Scott King honoree Nelson here re-creates Seneca Village, a path-breaking 19th-century Manhattan community that included the first significant assemblage of African-American property owners living alongside Irish and German immigrants. In a series of poems, Nelson constructs the lives of more than 30 characters based on names found in census records. Their story is at once celebratory and tragic, highlighting the struggles and triumphs of this transformative moment as dirt-poor Irish immigrants escape the potato famine of 1845, German immigrants struggle to make it in the New World, and African-Americans negotiate the transition from slavery to freedom and property ownership: "Freed by a miraculous codicil, / I find myself the owner of one me, / two slightly swampy lots, one deeeep well, / one one-room palace, and opportunity." This incredibly integrated society comes to an end when the city executes powers of eminent domain to create Central Park. Nelson chooses prose narrative to connect these 40-some lyric fictional portraits that include schoolchildren, a mariner, a bootblack, a hairdresser, a musician, bar owners, lovers, and a fortuneteller, among others, along with poignant snapshots of famous historical figures Frederick Douglass and Maria Stewart, the first African-American woman to lecture on politics and religion. Artfully crafted, an engrossing and important collection of memories and moments from a pivotal time in American history. (foreword, notes on poetic forms) (Historical fiction/poetry. 10 & up)

Kirkus Reviews