It’s the end of the year, when list-making becomes the national pastime! Most major book review sites have announced their favorites of the year. From School Library Journal(opens in a new window) to Publisher’s Weekly(opens in a new window) to the The Washington Post(opens in a new window) and more, everyone is rushing to chime in with their favorites.
In early January, the American Library Association will give out their annual literary awards(opens in a new window). The Newbery Award is given to the most outstanding written work for children up to age 14, by an American author, and the Printz Award is given to the most outstanding written work for teenagers, regardless of nationality.
Predicting these awards is another popular pastime in children’s literature circles. (If I had to guess, I’d choose Gary Schmidt’s wonderful The Wednesday Wars for Newbery and Sherman Alexie’s The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-time Indian, which also won the Young People’s National Book Award, for Printz.)And I’ll weigh in on these and some other contenders in the weeks leading up to the announcement.
There are some interesting titles in contention this year —- Shaun Tan’s The Arrival is a wordless picture book about the life of an immigrant. Can a wordless book be a great book of literature? Brian Selznick’s The Invention of Hugo Cabret is a fascinating book in which the pictures are nearly as important as the words. Yet the Newbery only considers the words.
As children’s literature continues to evolve and change, how will the awards committees deal with these changes?