Jen Bryant introduces her readers to the life and poetry of William Carlos Williams in her picture book biography, A River of Words. Williams is portrayed as having an idyllic childhood growing up in the late 1800s wandering through woods and fields by the Passaic River. From his high school English class, he began a love for poetry that he continued throughout his life, even as he pursued a career as a physician. In her illustrator's note Melissa Sweet shares how she used endpapers from an old book, a book cover, and various other ephemera she had been saving to create the colorful pictures that share space with bits of Williams' poetry throughout the book.
This 2009 Caldecott Honor book would be a great book to share with elementary students to spark creativity and nuture a love for poetry. It also functions as an easy introduction into the life and poetry of one of America's most infuential poets.
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