Last September I was on my way to Nebraska for a series of school visits, part of the Plum Creek Literacy Festival at Concordia University (a Christian institution). While at the Minneapolis airport waiting for my connecting flight, I received a call from a friend I had dinner with the night before in NY. He had just tested positive to Covid. So, instead of taking my plane to Nebraska, I self isolated for four days and then got tested. Fortunately I was negative, but I really felt bad not meeting those hundreds of children who were waiting for me. The festival got cancelled anyway, due to the withdrawal of many of the presenters in response to the university’s blatantly but not surprisingly disgusting anti-gay policies. I understand and sympathize with the people who chose to withdraw, but I had decided to still go because I believe it is extremely important for children to be exposed to different ideas and points of view, especially in communities where part of the adult world is so close-minded and malevolent. (To be clear, the festival itself does not follow those discriminatory rules, and if you want to know more about this issue, you can easily find a lot of information online.)

My school presentations are, of course, about my picture books and how I make them, but they are also about my personal story: where I come from, how I was as a child, what I like and dislike, etc. Without directly addressing issues that I would not be able to explain to five- or six-year-olds, especially in a crowd, I still get to talk about being different, choosing ways that are not conventional, having a natural preference for things that others might find weird, off, or not straight enough. Below you can see some of the slides that I would have included in my presentations at Plum Creek and that I hope I will be able to show to those same children in another occasion.

Thank you for reading.

Here’s my interview with Giuseppe Castellano at The Illustration Department, in which we chat about children’s books, Bosch, Giotto, Maurice Sendak, comic strips, Lane Smith, Alessandro Sanna, etc.

 

 

“An abecedarian catalog of delights. (…) This work adroitly bridges the more-than-half-century gap between two accomplished artists.”
— Kirkus Reviews (starred review)

“Each page offers its own adventure; taken together, the spreads create an irresistible, deliciously subversive invitation to turn one’s back on the tiresome.”
— Publishers Weekly (starred review)

“With a nod to the fanciful, this alphabetic listing of activities invites readers’ imaginations to soar.”
— School Library Journal (starred review)

“A natural choice for storytime…Inventive and original, Ruzzier pays homage to Krauss as well as Sendak, using a style all his own.”
— Booklist