Only a Pigeon by Jane Kurtz and
Christopher Kurtz. Illustrated by E.B. Lewis. (1997) Reading Level:
Ages 4-10. 32 pages. Simon & Schuster. ISBN: 0689800770.
This book
is available from Ethiopia Reads and sales benefit that organization.
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Background: Only a Pigeon
by Jane Kurtz and Christopher Kurtz
Illustrated by E. B. Lewis
Jane has memories of her childhood in Maji. She and her
four sisters--played together, made up and acted out stories together,
took baths together, attended school together, shared a room. Then,
when Jane was eight years old, she says, "My only brother was born. I
was used to thinking of my sister Cathy as the baby of the family. Now,
suddenly, there was a new baby--and I was old enough to think this was
a Very Big Deal!"
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"We lived in a society where it's very important to have at least
one boy in a family. The people around us called my brother,
Christopher, the crown prince. Everyone, including me, thought he was
special. We fought for our turn to hold him and take care of him.
Here's a picture of me holding Chris not long after he was born. (I'm
also the one holding Chris's hands in the family picture.)" |
"Two years later, a fifth sister, Jan, was born, and that was a big
thrill for me, too. I was always pretty much of a 'middle kid,' but
Chris and Jan got to be big time 'babies of the family.'"
Writers end up taking bits and pieces of their lives and
weaving them into their stories and other writing- -sometimes without
even noticing. That is what happened when Jane wrote Fire on the Mountain.
She says, I knew I needed to change the judge in the story to another
kind of character, since a judge doesn't play as much of a part in the
life of U.S. children as he does to Ethiopian children. It came to me
to make the judge into an older sister. It wasn't until I saw Earl
Lewis's art for the cover that I realized how much my own life went
into that book."
After Chris, Jane's brother, grew up, he decided to
spend some time with his family in Ethiopia, teaching. When he returned
to the United States, he talked about the pigeon boys in Addis Ababa
who had taught him to raise pigeons. "I was struck," Jane says, "by how
kids who have no toys, almost no stuff at all, still find a way to be
playful and hopeful and a way to take care of something or somebody.
Chris and Jane decided to write the book that became Only a Pigeon.
In spring of 1995, Chris and Earl Lewis, the illustrator, went to
Ethiopia together so that Earl could meet the pigeon boys for himself
and see what the pigeon coops looked like.
Writing a book with someone else is a collaborative
effort. It is often quite a challenge but can be fun as well. Together
a decision must be made as to who gets to do what. How to divide the
work and write the best possible story together. Jane says that the two
of them laughed, a lot, and sometimes got mad, too.
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