A fine biography, both enlightening and entertaining, on a critical topic.
Susan B. Anthony was among the earliest proponents of women’s rights and devoted most of her life to the cause.
In an in-depth biography of this important historical figure, Kanefield relies heavily on primary-source materials, especially Anthony’s own revealing words. Born to a Quaker father and a mother who refused to join the religion, Anthony was encouraged in childhood to be strong-willed. Once she became involved in furthering women’s very limited rights, she’d need every bit of that will, often speaking before hostile crowds at a time when women were expected to remain within their own sphere, managing a household and raising children. Gaining women the right to vote was always the ultimate goal, but Anthony also campaigned for married women to be able to own property and to leave abusive husbands. In her lifetime she saw remarkable advances in women’s rights although she died before the movement achieved its final goal. Anthony presciently predicted that one day women would be unaware that they hadn’t always had freedom and rights. “They have no idea of how every single inch of ground that she stands upon today has been gained by the hard work of some little handful of women of the past,” an unfortunate ignorance that this biography helps correct. The excellent backmatter includes notes, a timeline, excerpts from Anthony’s writing, a bibliography, and an index (the last not seen).
A fine biography, both enlightening and entertaining, on a critical topic. (Biography. 11-16)Pub Date: March 26, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-4197-3401-4
Page Count: 240
Publisher: Abrams
Review Posted Online: Dec. 15, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2019
Born in 1880 in a tiny backwater in Alabama, Helen Keller lived a life familiar to many from the play and movie The Miracle Worker, as well as countless biographies. There’s no denying the drama in the story of the deaf and blind child for whom the world of language became possible through a dedicated and fanatically stubborn teacher, Annie Sullivan. But Helen’s life after that is even more remarkable: she went to high school and then to Radcliffe; she was a radical political thinker and a member of the Wobblies; she supported herself by lecture tours and vaudeville excursions as well as through the kindness of many. Dash (The Longitude Prize, p. 1483) does a clear-sighted and absorbing job of examining Annie’s prickly personality and the tender family that she, Helen, and Annie’s husband John Macy formed. She touches on the family pressures that conspired to keep Helen from her own pursuit of love and marriage; she makes vivid not only Helen’s brilliant and vibrant intelligence and personality, but the support of many people who loved her, cared for her, and served her. She also does not shrink from the describing the social and class divisions that kept some from crediting Annie Sullivan and others intent on making Helen into a puppet and no more. Riveting reading for students in need of inspiration, or who’re overcoming disability or studying changing expectations for women. (Biography. 10-14)
Pub Date: Feb. 1, 2001
ISBN: 0-590-90715-8
Page Count: 256
Publisher: Scholastic
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2000
More a historical narrative than a character portrait, this account of Tecumseh’s efforts to create a tribal confederacy in the Old Northwest focuses on the great Shawnee leader’s many battles and negotiations with then–Territorial Governor William Henry Harrison and then his disastrous—ultimately fatal—alliance with the British during the War of 1812. Replete with side essays on such varied subtopics as the Northwest Territory, the New Madrid earthquakes of 1811-12 and the Battle of Lake Erie, it also boasts often–full-color illustrations from archival sources (many of these later paintings and old prints that are inaccurate, as the discursive captions often rightly note, and sometimes too small to make out anyway). In all, this will provide students a coherent view of events if not a clear understanding of Shawnee culture or Tecumseh’s heroic personal qualities. If it's not the 100-page holy grail of middle-grade biographies, it is still pretty close. (glossary, bibliography, source notes, index) (Biography. 11-13)
Pub Date: Oct. 1, 2010
ISBN: 978-1-4027-6847-7
Page Count: 124
Publisher: Sterling
Review Posted Online: Dec. 29, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2010
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