Mama Africa!: How Miriam Makeba Spread Hope with Her Song

by Kathryn Erskine, Charly Palmer (Illustrator)

Overview

An inspiring picture-book biography of iconic singer and activist Miriam Makeba by National Book Award winner Kathryn Erskine.

Miriam Makeba, a Grammy Award–winning South African singer, rose to fame in the hearts of her people at the pinnacle of apartheid—a brutal system of segregation similar to American Jim Crow laws. Mama Africa, as they called her, raised her voice to help combat these injustices at jazz clubs in Johannesburg; in exile, at a rally beside Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.; and before the United Nations.

Set defiantly in the present tense, this biography offers readers an intimate view of Makeba’s fight for equality. Kathryn Erskine’s call-and-response style text and Charly Palmer’s bold illustrations come together in a raw, riveting duet of protest song and praise poem. A testament to how a single voice helped to shake up the world—and can continue to do so.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780374303013
Publisher:	Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Publication date:	10/10/2017
Pages:	48
Product dimensions:	7.90(w) x 11.20(h) x 0.50(d)
Age Range:	6 - 10 Years

About the Author

Kathryn Erskine is the National Book Award–winning author of Mockingbird. She has also written Seeing Red, The Absolute Value of Mike, and The Badger Knight. She lived in South Africa for part of her childhood, and grew up listening to Miriam Makeba's songs. Mama Africa! is her first picture book.

Charly Palmer is a graphic designer, illustrator, and fine artist. As a child, he was fascinated by Ezra Jack Keats’s illustrations for The Snowy Day, which inspired Charly’s own use of color and geometric shapes. He studied art and design at the American Academy of Art and the School of the Art Institute, both in Chicago. Mama Africa! is his first picture book.

Editorial Reviews

★ 10/09/2017
National Book Award–winner Erskine (Mockingbird) takes readers to the South Africa of her childhood as she follows the rise of singer/activist Miriam Makeba. The injustice of apartheid, omnipresent in Makeba’s life, extends into the book’s design: sections of text about the white “baases” in power appear in white boxes, while passages about Makeba and anti-apartheid movements are set in separate black boxes: “She sings to her people to be brave. ‘Jolinkomo!’ She sings of police raids. ‘Khawuleza!’ ” In his first children’s book, Palmer uses thick, forceful brushstrokes to create vibrant, abstracted portraits of Makeba and her South African home. This rousing account of how Makeba used her music to fight for equality concludes with a timeline and extensive author’s note. Ages 6–10. Author’s agent: Kendra Marcus, Bookstop Literary. (Oct.)

Publishers Weekly

Coretta Scott King John Steptoe New Talent Illustrator Award Winner
Children's Africana Book Awards Committee: 2018 Best Book for Young Children
One of Kirkus's Best Books of 2017!

"An excellent perspective from which American readers can learn about apartheid and one of the pioneers who fought it through her art." —Kirkus Reviews starred review

"Erskine’s prose style is expressionistic, with lyrical sentences that alight on significant events...Potent quotes and song lyrics keep the intensity high, as does the clever use of words in a fierce red, often repeated to begin the subsequent page, lending the text a driving propulsion." —The Horn Book starred review

"Debut illustrator Palmer’s painterly spreads shine in rich colors and bold brushstrokes, capturing the passion of Makeba mid-song... A welcome addition to picture book biography collections." —School Library Journal

From the Publisher

09/01/2017
Gr 2–5—Miriam Makeba was a South African singer who used her talent to challenge apartheid and to encourage South Africans to rail against injustice. Early in her career, Makeba decided to sing in Setswana, IsiXhosa, and IsiZulu precisely because the white ruling class did not speak those languages. A sense of rising tension is unmistakable throughout the text, and each of Makeba's hopeful successes is followed by further struggle, finally culminating in Nelson Mandela's release from prison and the slow end of apartheid in South Africa. Debut illustrator Palmer's painterly spreads shine in rich colors and bold brushstrokes, capturing the passion of Makeba mid-song. In other spreads, scenes of an armed white police officer demanding the transit pass of a black man who has stepped outside of his neighborhood boundary, and a lone child who has survived the massacre of school children at Soweto, all speak acutely to the landscape of apartheid that shaped Mama Africa's career. Erksine spent some of her childhood living in apartheid South Africa, and she shares her own experiences and connection to Makeba's music at length in the back matter. VERDICT A welcome addition to picture book biography collections.—Lauren Younger, New York Public Library

School Library Journal

★ 2017-08-02
Buoyed by the work of Nelson Mandela and the music of Billie Holiday and Ella Fitzgerald, Miriam sang to make black South Africans free.Born in 1932 near Johannesburg, Miriam Makeba "sang as soon as she could talk." Growing up in apartheid-era South Africa, she rebelled against unjust laws restricting where blacks could go and what they could do, and she fought that racism with her songs, even singing subversively in languages the government officials could not understand. Eventually, Miriam illegally left South Africa to sing internationally and tell the world that blacks were dying because of apartheid. Throughout the book, white rectangular text boxes convey the discriminatory actions of the baases (white ruling class), while black-backgrounded text boxes present Makeba's words and efforts to fight racism—making white negative and black positive. Palmer's densely illustrated, painterly scenes give readers a strong sense of the culture and beauty of South Africa. His images of people, however, often include just enough detail to reveal their emotions. The backmatter offers a single timeline of Makeba's life and the U.S. civil rights movement, a glossary, and copious research resources. Erskine, a white woman who, as a child, lived in South Africa during apartheid, includes photos of her young self working for social justice. An excellent perspective from which American readers can learn about apartheid and one of the pioneers who fought it through her art. (Picture book/biography. 6-10)

Kirkus Reviews