| 词条 | A Taste of Blackberries |
| 释义 |
| name = A Taste of Blackberries | title_orig = | image = File:A Taste of Blackberries library binding.jpg | caption = First edition | author = Doris Buchanan Smith | illustrator = Charles Robinson | cover_artist = | country = United States | language = English | series = | genre = Children's novel | publisher = Thomas Y. Crowell Co. (now HarperCollins) | release_date = May 1973 | media_type = Print | pages = 85 (paperback) | awards = ALA Notable Children's Book, Georgia Children's Author of the Year, Georgia Children's Book Award, Georgia Author of the Year, Josette Frank Award, Zilveren Griffel | isbn = 9780064402385 | congress = | oclc = | preceded_by = | followed_by = }}A Taste of Blackberries (HarperCollins, 1973) is an award-winning children's book by Doris Buchanan Smith (June 1, 1934 - August 8, 2002).[1][2] Background and receptionWhen Doris Smith set out to find a publisher for A Taste of Blackberries, what she found instead was rejection. Children's editors believed the story was better suited to adults than to children. It fact it was the book's theme and style which set it apart from other children's books at the time.[3] If death had been a common theme in books for children, think Oliver Twist, it had long since become taboo, until E. B. White introduced the theme to young readers in his classic Charlotte's Web, in 1952.[4] For many years Charlotte's Web was the accepted template for addressing mortality in children's books. Then Smith's story appeared, a story in which animals do not stand-in for humans. In the 1970s, literary realism had taken hold, and Smith was at the vanguard of the movement,[5] acquainting young readers with "the darker, harsher side of life." According to author and blogger Pauline Dewan; "Many writers believe that authors do not help children by sheltering them from the problems of the real world."[6] Indeed, many young readers told the author "they liked it because it was sad."[7] Interviewed for the Dictionary of Literary Biography, Smith recalled that A Taste of Blackberries was supposed have been an adventure story, but an unexpected thought popped into her head while writing it. So upset was she with this idea that she put the story aside. Smith resumed her work by focusing on the different ways that children and adults responded to mortality, and wrote from the point of view of the young narrator, and the story was completed.[8] Rejected by as many as three publishers, A Taste of Blackberries was accepted by Thomas Y. Crowell Co., now HarperCollins, and released to wide acclaim in May, 1973. "Smith deals honestly and emphatically with the range of emotions," wrote Cynthia Westway in The Atlanta Journal, "the story is not, however, an elegy; but a celebration of the continuity of the life-death cycle."[9] In the Times Literary Supplement, David Rees wrote, "It will be difficult to find a children's book this autumn by a new author as good as Doris Buchanan Smith's A Taste of Blackberries . . . Smith's success lies in knowing how to handle the theme with exactly the right balance of sensitivity, humour and open emotion."[10] Plot summaryAs told from the point of view of the unnamed narrator, the story begins as he and his best friend Jamie go blackberry picking. We follow the boys as they take part in a series of exploits - some told in current narrative time, some revealed in poignant flashbacks - allowing the reader to witness their world and shared experience. When one of the boys tragically dies as a result of an allergic reaction to bee stings, the narrator struggles to cope with denial, grief, guilt, and loneliness, before coming to terms with the loss. The story is set in a suburb of Washington, D.C., the author's birthplace. Characters
Literary significance"In dealing directly with the death of a child's playmate, it broke a taboo of twentieth-century American children's fiction," wrote Hugh T. Keenan, in the St. James Guide to Young Adult Writers.[11] British author, lecturer and reviewer David Rees drew parallels between Charlotte's Web and A Taste of Blackberries in The Marble in the Water: Essays on Contemporary Writers of Fiction for Children and Young Adults (1980). He writes that "in A Taste of Blackberries we do have a story for young children in which death - sudden and inexplicable - is the main theme, and it is a book in which the characters are not talking animals." "The chief purpose of the book," Rees argues, "is to write about death in a fashion that young readers can take, and in this Doris Buchanan Smith succeeds admirably." "These two authors are saying things that are necessary, and which help children to cope and to grow."[12] A Taste of Blackberries is "one of the seminal children's books on the subject of death."[13] Smith won the Josette Frank Award, for "outstanding literary merit in which children or young people deal in a positive and realistic way with difficulties in their world and grow emotionally and morally," The author also won the Georgia Children's Book Award,[14] the Children's Best Book Prize in the Netherlands (Zilveren Griffel), and was named Georgia Author of the Year, all for A Taste of Blackberries. In addition to 19 English language editions, the book has been translated into Dutch, Danish, French, Spanish and Japanese. A Taste of Blackberries was nominated for the prestigious Newbery Medal in 1974, and is an ALA Notable Children's Book.[15]"It blazed the way for the many other grief books that quickly followed, but few have approached the place of honor this one holds," wrote Jim Trelease in The Read-Aloud Handbook (Penguin Books, 2006).[16] References1. ^{{cite news|last=Derrick|first=Henry|title=Obituaries: Hayesville, NC: Doris Buchanan Smith, 68, Wrote for Adolescents|pages=P.C6|url=http://find.galegroup.com/gps/infomark.do?&contentSet=IAC-Documents&type=retrieve&tabID=T004&prodId=IPS&docId=CJ121436858&source=gale&srcprod=ITOF&userGroupName=nypl&version=1.0|accessdate=19 April 2011|newspaper=Atlanta Journal-Constitution|date=14 August 2002}} {{Reflist|group=Bibliography}}{{Reflist|group=Biography}}2. ^{{cite web|title=Doris Buchanan Smith|url=http://ic.galegroup.com/ic/bic1/ReferenceDetailsPage/ReferenceDetailsWindow?displayGroupName=Reference&disableHighlighting=false&prodId=BIC1&action=e&windowstate=normal&catId=&documentId=GALE%7CK1663000396&mode=view&userGroupName=nypl&jsid=3ce48fd1879e2c4e7ba70c5f5862ea9a|work=St. James Guide to Young Adult Writers|publisher=Gale Biography In Context|accessdate=29 April 2011}} 3. ^{{cite news|last=Scherer|first=Sally|title=Author of Children’s Books Found Success by Breaking Rules|newspaper=The Macon Telegraph|date=18 April 1996}} 4. ^{{cite journal|author1=Lois Rauch Gibson|author2=Laura M. Zaidman|title=Death in Children's Literature: Taboo or Not Taboo?|journal=Children's Literature Association Quarterly|date=Winter 1991|volume=16| issue = 4|pages=232–234|url=http://muse.jhu.edu/journals/childrens_literature_association_quarterly/summary/v016/16.4.gibson.html|accessdate=30 August 2012|doi=10.1353/chq.0.0855}} 5. ^{{cite news|last=Habich|first=John|title=She tells kids the bitter and the sweet|newspaper=Tallahassee Democrat|date=December 1980}} 6. ^{{cite web|last=Dewan|first=Pauline|title=Children’s Literary Classics: The Realistic Genre|url=http://childliterature.net/childlit/realistic/index.html|accessdate=29 October 2012}} 7. ^{{cite news|last=Davis|first=Jingle|title=A Realist in Children's Books|newspaper=The Atlanta Journal|date=December 10, 1978}} 8. ^{{cite journal|last=Keenan|first=Hugh T.|title=Doris Buchanan Smith|journal=Dictionary of Literary Biography|year=1981|volume=52|page=353}} 9. ^{{cite news|last=Westway|first=Cynthia|title=How a Child Responds to Facts of Death|newspaper=The Atlanta Journal|date=August 5, 1973}} 10. ^{{cite news|last=Rees|first=David|title=The most difficult problem|newspaper=Times Literary Supplement|date=September 19, 1975}} 11. ^{{cite web|title=Doris Buchanan Smith|url=http://ic.galegroup.com/ic/bic1/ReferenceDetailsPage/ReferenceDetailsWindow?displayGroupName=Reference&disableHighlighting=false&prodId=BIC1&action=e&windowstate=normal&catId=&documentId=GALE%7CK1663000396&mode=view&userGroupName=nypl&jsid=3ce48fd1879e2c4e7ba70c5f5862ea9a|work=St. James Guide to Young Adult Writers|publisher=Gale Biography In Contex|accessdate=29 April 2011}} 12. ^{{cite book|last=Rees|first=David|title=The Marble in the Water: E. B. White and Doris Buchanan Smith|year=1980|publisher=The Horn Book|isbn=0-87675-281-4|pages=66–77}} 13. ^{{cite journal|last=Welton|first=Ann|title=Buchanan Smith, Doris Un sabor a moras (A Taste of Blackberries)|journal=School Library Journal|date=December 2002|volume=48|issue=12|pages=p.S60|url=http://find.galegroup.com/gps/infomark.do?&contentSet=IAC-Documents&type=retrieve&tabID=T003&prodId=IPS&docId=A95528664&source=gale&srcprod=BCPM&userGroupName=nypl&version=1.0|accessdate=20 April 2011}} 14. ^{{cite web|title=Georgia Children's Book Award|url= http://gcba.coe.uga.edu/gcba-awards/past-book-award-winners-grades-4-8/|publisher=College of Education at the University of Georgia|accessdate=11 March 2014}} 15. ^{{cite web|title=Doris Buchanan Smith|url=http://ic.galegroup.com/ic/bic1/ReferenceDetailsPage/ReferenceDetailsWindow?displayGroupName=Reference&prodId=BIC1&action=e&windowstate=normal&catId=&documentId=GALE%7CK1617001845&mode=view&userGroupName=nypl&jsid=7481e5a51f310a721b285ed3c6bd1627|work=Major Authors and Illustrators for Children and Young Adults|publisher=Gale Biography In Context|accessdate=24 April 2011}} 16. ^{{cite book|last=Trelease|first=Jim|title=The Read-Aloud Handbook|year=2006|publisher=Penguin Group (USA) Incorporated|location=New York|isbn=978-0-14-303739-2|pages=236}} External links
6 : 1973 American novels|American children's novels|Books about friendship|Novels set in Maryland|Thomas Y. Crowell Co. books|1973 children's books |
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