Midnight Buck (Watercolor) By Aspen Clayon, 11 (Lisle, IL), published in the February 2022 issue of Stone Soup A note from Caleb Happy Saturday! First off, I’d like to congratulate members of the Stone Soup team Emma Wood and Conner Bassett on the birth of their child, Sawyer Cruz Bassett-Wood! On the business side, if you or anyone you know is a writing teacher up to eighth grade, you may be interested in a Stone Soup site license. In order for Stone Soup to succeed, we need to get back in the classroom! If you or a teacher you know might be interested in a site license, then please, with their permission, send us the teacher’s name, grade, and email address. You can write to us at education@stonesoup.com. This week, I’d like to shine a light on the Stone Soup blog. While there is no comparison to the brilliant issues compiled monthly by Emma Wood with the outstanding work of our contributors—for example Aspen Clayton’s stunning, impressionistic February cover art Midnight Buck—the Stone Soup blog provides a platform for a greater breadth of writers and artists. For those who haven’t yet found success within the magazine and for those who have, the blog offers a space to express themselves on a more regular basis and with more freedom of topic. For example, Emma Hoff, 9—one of our regular bloggers—recently wrote and published a hybrid book review/critical essay entitled “Conservatives Want to Ban All my Favorite Books.” While the magazine is the perfect medium for poetry, prose, and art, this type of writing is not often featured—though no less important! With the recent banning of books like Art Spiegelman’s Maus—a graphic novel about the Holocaust—Emma’s message has never been more relevant. Writing with more nuance and with a sharper eye than most of those I worked with in college, Emma dismantles the argument that “young people don’t have the ability to read difficult texts and think about their meaning,” arguing that “if [people] are concerned that young people will struggle with understanding these books on their own, all the more reason to teach them in schools.” As blog editor, I want to foster and empower voices like Emma’s. I am always looking for new contributors in all realms: poetry, prose, art, reviews, sports, videography, gaming, business, history, music—anything that you are passionate about and feel needs to be said. So please, don’t hesitate to submit your work via our Submittable to the standard blog, or our COVID blog. If you are interested in becoming a regular blogger, write a short paragraph explaining the type of work you’d like to contribute in the corresponding field. Sticking with the theme, for this week’s weekend project I’d like you to write about (or draw) whatever it is you are most passionate about, without thinking about if it is relevant or worth saying. Remember, anything you believe in is worth articulating. More than the “quality” of the writing, a reader will recognize passion and find themselves compelled. If you like what you’ve written, please send it to me or Emma for the blog or the magazine! Until next time, Emma Hoff, 9 (Bronx, NY) From the Stone Soup Blog Conservatives Want to Ban All My Favorite Books By Emma Hoff, 9 (Bronx, NY) Something I know from personal experience is that Melissa, by Alex Gino, is an amazing book that has been praised widely for its inclusion of the LGBTQ community. In 2016, it was awarded the Stonewall Children’s Book award. The book is about a transgender girl who wants to be Charlotte in her class production of Charlotte’s Web, but is not allowed to because her teacher says she is a “boy.” The novel used to be called George, but people complained that Alex Gino was deadnaming their character, and the title was changed to Melissa. While a lot of people think that Melissa is a great book that addresses the problems that transgender kids face, it has been banned by many school districts. The book has been moved up and down the American Library Association’s Top Ten Most Challenged Book list, from number three to number five to number one on the list, before becoming the first most banned book ever. The Wichita, Kansas public school system banned the book from its district libraries, and when the book was included in the Oregon Battle of the Books, two school districts removed their students from the competition in retaliation. Those critical of the novel said the book had “sexual content,” of which there is none whatsoever, thereby mixing up sex with gender identity. Some critics went as far as to say that Melissa just did not go with or reflect “community values.” However, it is important to learn about real issues like this in the world, and these “community values” should be expanded to include all people. Some people simply disliked the novel because they thought a book about a transgender girl was not appropriate for children. Children should know about the real world, and they shouldn’t be banned from learning about what actually happens. Insisting that young people shouldn’t read these books signifies that transgender people or members of the broader LGBTQ community are somehow “wrong” and that their existence should be hidden. ../MORE Stone Soup is published by Children’s Art Foundation-Stone Soup Inc., a 501(c)(3) educational nonprofit organization registered in the United States of America, EIN: 23-7317498. Stone Soup’s advisors: Abby Austin, Mike Axelrod, Annabelle Baird, Jem Burch, Evelyn Chen, Juliet Fraser, Zoe Hall, Montanna Harling, Alicia & Joe Havilland, Lara Katz, Rebecca Kilroy, Christine Leishman, Julie Minnis, Jessica Opolko, Tara Prakash, Denise Prata, Logan Roberts, Emily Tarco, Rebecca Ramos Velasquez, Susan Wilky.
Newsletter
Saturday Newsletter: February 5, 2022
Vibrance | Fujifilm XP Astrid Young, 12 (Brookline, MA), published in Stone Soup February 2022 A note from Emma This is the last newsletter I’m going to write for a few months—soon I’ll be on maternity leave with our second child, a boy! Since first becoming a mother not-quite two years ago, I have found myself especially attuned to the way parents, and particularly mothers, are portrayed in the writing I read for Stone Soup. So I was naturally intrigued by the very complex character of “Ma” in Fiona Clare Altschuler’s short story, “A Time to Run.” “A Time to Run” reads like a fairytale: it takes place in some alternate world, one where magic exists and there’s a city called “Izak,” but, unlike in sci-fi or fantasy–which work hard to “build” worlds–the world is not the focus of this story–it is simply matter of factly presented. As it would be in a fairytale. Hans loves his Ma, but he becomes aware of a darkness in her–she is angry at her brother, and vindictive, and though he loves her, he fears what she will do to his uncle. So, he helps his uncle run away, running away from his own mother to do so. I don’t want to spoil the ending, but I love that this story avoids falling into the black-and-white morality we often see in fairy tales: this character, this character is bad. Instead, each character, Ma included, is allowed to feel full, complicated, conflicted. Following Fiona’s lead, try to write your own fairy tale this weekend or this month, but with real, complex, human characters. Lastly, before I sign off, I want to also share that we have been feverishly preparing for a big relaunch and marketing push to schools: the way we can make Stone Soup sustainable again is by getting back in the schools, as schools never “age” out of us. If you are a parent of a middle schooler, or a middle school teacher yourself, please consider discussing a Stone Soup subscription with your school. Until later this year – Fiona Clare Altschuler, 11 Parkton, MD From Stone Soup February 2022 A Time to Run By Fiona Clare Altschuler, 11 (Parkton, MD) I was five years old when it happened, but I remember it well. I wish I could forget it, but that is not to be. The story begins before I was born, when my ma was a girl. My ma had a brother, Ferdinand, who one day disappeared. Then my ma’s parents died and my ma married my da and had me, Hans. I was like any boy, except that I had magic. One day when I was playing, a clear image of a man flashed through my head, hovered a moment, and flew away, leaving me wobbly and light-headed. I ran inside the cottage, calling. My ma looked up from her knitting. Her dark eyes softened. “My uncle’s at the gate. He’s wondering if his sister Thea is alive!” As always with the magic, the words tumbled out without me knowing what they meant. My ma blanched. “Find your uncle, and bring him here.” “Yes, Ma,” I said, turning, and dashed to the gate where our land ended, my sandals sinking into the sand, my tunic swishing around my legs. There I saw a man, cheeks hollow. I trotted up and said, “You’re Uncle Ferdinand—Ma’s brother?” He reeled back. “You are Thea’s son?” he whispered. “Yes.” I said. “I’m Hans.” Continue reading here… Stone Soup is published by Children’s Art Foundation-Stone Soup Inc., a 501(c)(3) educational nonprofit organization registered in the United States of America, EIN: 23-7317498. Stone Soup’s advisors: Abby Austin, Mike Axelrod, Annabelle Baird, Jem Burch, Evelyn Chen, Juliet Fraser, Zoe Hall, Montanna Harling, Alicia & Joe Havilland, Lara Katz, Rebecca Kilroy, Christine Leishman, Julie Minnis, Jessica Opolko, Tara Prakash, Denise Prata, Logan Roberts, Emily Tarco, Rebecca Ramos Velasquez, Susan Wilky.
Saturday Newsletter: January 29, 2022
“Mirrored” (iPhone 11 Pro) by Sabrina Lu, 12 (Ashburn, VA), published in the January 2022 issue of Stone Soup A note from William Dear Stone Soup Friends, It is a gorgeous end of January where I live in California. I went on a bike ride today along a path with the Pacific Ocean on one side of the path, and wildflowers blooming along the other side. Acacia trees are in bloom, clusters of bright yellow flowers filling the air with sweet perfume. I don’t know how those of who live where it snows do it! Stone Soup site licenses! Thanks to all of you generous donors, all of us at Stone Soup—with the help of Naomi at the Society of Young Inklings—are busy working on curriculum to help teachers use Stone Soup in their classroom, and on improving our website so that it is easier to navigate and, we hope, looks better. Shortly, we are going to be sending out thousands of emails to find teachers willing to sign up for a FREE school-wide license as beta testers. When we started Stone Soup almost 50 years ago there was no Internet! So, right now we are really rethinking Stone Soup magazine, the website, and the Stone Soup creative writing project for the modern classroom. After beta testers have given us feedback so we can fine tune the project, we will then start offering the site licenses for sale. Getting Stone Soup into the classroom is crucial for the long-term success of the magazine. We’ve made it 50 years; we need schools to adopt our online platform to make it another 50 years. We need your help to succeed. Here is what you can do. Please talk to teachers you know who teach creative writing in the classroom. This is through eighth grade. If the teacher doesn’t know about Stone Soup, then please show them the website and share your enthusiasm. If the teacher might be interested in a site license, then please, with their permission, send us the teacher’s name, grade, and email address. You can write to us at education@stonesoup.com. We will then write your teacher friend to confirm their interest, and then start getting them set up so every classroom in the school can access the website without logging in, and every student and teacher can log into the website from home using the school email address. Our goal in 2022 is to begin growing again! Thank you for your help. If you have marketing suggestions, and/or are good at marketing and think you might be able to help us, then please write to us at education@stonesoup.com. Now, business aside, just look at that photograph by Sabrina Lu. What can I say but, “wow!”? I know it’s not a very articulate thing to say about the work of art, but that is the first word that came to my mind when I looked at Sabrina Lu’s photograph, Mirrored. Brilliant is too weak a word to describe this masterful photograph. Imaginary forest. Real forest. Real sky. Reflected sky. Reflected sky as water so the snow ball becomes an island in the middle of a lake reflected by still waters. And there is so much more! Stare at the ball, and dream! Based on Sabrina’s photograph, the weekend project is simple: take a photograph, or write a scene that describes Mirrored. If you want to work in photography then I want you to work with reflections. Reflections in windows, in mirrors on polished table tops, polished cars, puddles, lakes, streams, maybe even a sink. Reflections are about repeated images, sometimes clear, sometimes distorted. If you can add something into the reflection, as Sabrina did, then so much the better. If you want to write about this scene you will be writing what is called a vignette. There is no story. No plot. You can describe this with the voice of an omniscient narrator—meaning a voice that knows all and sees all—or you can write your story so that we see this scene through the eyes of a character. Read the poem, below, “One Day a Blizzard Came,” by Rainer Paska for one approach to writing about this piece. In Rainer’s poem, the character, the protagonist may live inside the globe! Until next week, Rainer Pasca, 14 (Bay Shore, NY) From Stone Soup January 2022 One Day a Blizzard Came By Rainer Pasca, 14 (Bay Shore, NY) I live in a snow globe. A little lamp shines in on me. I talk to the lamp, maybe it’s lonely. A door opens. My brain is full of water, but I am not alone. Johnni, Adrian and Oliver are here. Johnni says, Look out, everyone! It’s a blizzard. Oliver counts five pieces of snow on his nose and Adrian jumps like glitter. Everyone stares for a second. Then, their lungs remember to breathe Continue reading the January 2022 isue here… Stone Soup is published by Children’s Art Foundation-Stone Soup Inc., a 501(c)(3) educational nonprofit organization registered in the United States of America, EIN: 23-7317498. Stone Soup’s advisors: Abby Austin, Mike Axelrod, Annabelle Baird, Jem Burch, Evelyn Chen, Juliet Fraser, Zoe Hall, Montanna Harling, Alicia & Joe Havilland, Lara Katz, Rebecca Kilroy, Christine Leishman, Julie Minnis, Jessica Opolko, Tara Prakash, Denise Prata, Logan Roberts, Emily Tarco, Rebecca Ramos Velasquez, Susan Wilky.
