Miss Rumphius
by Barbara Cooney
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Book Summary Information
Author: Barbara CooneyBrand: Puffin Books
Edition: Mass Market Paperback
Audio: English (Unknown); English (Original Language); English (Published)
Published: 1985-11-06
ISBN: 0140505393
Number of pages: 32
Publisher: Puffin
Product features:
- ISBN13: 9780140505399
- Condition: New
- Notes: BRAND NEW FROM PUBLISHER! 100% Satisfaction Guarantee. Tracking provided on most orders. Buy with Confidence! Millions of books sold!
Book Reviews of Miss Rumphius
Book Review: A book of sheer poetry and beauty
Summary: 5 Stars
Sometimes these Caldecott gold medal winners are quite a puzzle. Take "Miss Rumphius," for example. This is such an esoteric book, who would think it suitable for children? I read it--or tried to read it--to my five-year-old great-niece. Halfway through, she took the book, closed it, and said, "Let's save this for later," and pulled another book from the stack for me to read.
"Miss Rumphius" is unlike other children's books in that the story is really several levels above the average child's intelligence. Calling for adult understanding and reaction, this Caldecott must have appealed to the judges, as it did to me. You see, "Miss Rumphius" is about character development, maturity, beauty, exotic travel, experience--things a child is typically not asked to understand. Bottom line: The child who can "read" the message is a special child indeed and will "suck out the marrow" of life in his/her time as did Miss Rumphius.
Miss Rumphius lives near the sea where her foreign-born grandfather settled. He taught her two things: her desire to travel the world because her grandfather did, and to "do something to make the world more beautiful." Any such commands from beloved grandparents must surely be met! So she traveled, but still had not figured out how to make the world more beautiful.
One day she discovered that the seeds of the lupines she had planted had come up. She planted more, and more grew up. Then she decided to sow her five bushels of lupine seeds everywhere. The next spring lupines came up everywhere.
The last thing she did was to advise her great-niece, narrator of this story, to "make the world more beautiful," just as she had been told all those many years earlier. History has a way of repeating itself, especially if it has a solid lesson behind it.
The narrator, by bringing her friends to listen to her aunt's (Miss Rumphius) stories (just as Miss Rumphius did all those years before), then picking flowers to take home, and spreading seed in new and wilder places, is repeating history.
Oh yes, Miss Rumphius, you are so deserving of the Caldecott! I just hope all readers--no matter their age--appreciate you!
Summary of Miss Rumphius
Seeking adventure in faraway places, Miss Rumphius fulfills her dream and then sets out to make the world more beautiful.Literature Books
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