A Girl from Yamhill, and My Own Two Feet

A Girl From Yamhill
My Own Two Feet
two autobiographies by Beverly Cleary
****
My own introduction to Beverly Cleary was in the mid-50's at perhaps age 9 or 10, when at a weekly visit to the Emerson Stone Branch Library I came across Henry Huggins. I became an immediate fan and went back looking for more from this author. I read the few available Beverly Cleary books in our little library and re-read them from time to time.

When my friend passed these two autobiographies (published in 1988 and 1995, respectively) to me to read, I was not sure I was interested (and I wondered why two autobiographies). I did enjoy them, however. A Girl from Yamhill takes Beverly from her earliest memories only to junior high school. My Own Two Feet picks up from there, taking you through public school, the Depression, college, marriage, World War II, and finally the publication of her first book.

As you read of her life, you soon realize that her children's books are so successful because her stories come from real life experiences.

Beverly was an only child, born in 1919 and still living today. She was well cared for despite many financial struggles her family faced. She recalls a happy childhood filled with fun and adventure that kids are bound to find when left to their own devices. Her parents were not restrictive in her younger years while they lived on a large farm in Yamhill. Beverly enjoyed less freedom after they moved to Portland when the farm could no longer support them during the Depression. As Beverly grew older, her mother become more and more possessive and even jealous of her daughter's youth and friends and fun, but Beverly rarely rebelled until college age. Beverly was always eager to leave home and become independent, and in college studied to be a professional librarian. At an early age she discovered a desire to write, and found she had a knack for storytelling, especially to children. She was offended when teachers asked her if her stories were original, thinking a young girl could not have written so well. She was in her late 20s before she finally sat down and started her first novel, Henry Huggins.

If you are a fan of Beverly Cleary books, you will enjoy both of these well-written books, which also include pages of photographs of Beverly and the people in her life during those growing up years.

Sky Burial

Sky Burial
by Xinran
*****

UPDATE: I have learned this is not a true story after all, and am somewhat disappointed at being led to believe it was. Still, I recommend the book, it is a good read. The book jacket says:

It was 1994 when Xinran, a journalist and the author of The Good Women of China, received a telephone call asking her to travel four hours to meet an oddly dressed woman who had just crossed the border from Tibet into China. Xinran made the trip and met the woman, called Shu Wen, who recounted the story of her thirty-year odyssey in the vast landscape of Tibet.

Shu Wen and her husband had been married for only a few months in the 1950s when he joined the Chinese army and was sent to Tibet for the purpose of unification of the two countries. Shortly after he left she was notified that he had been killed, although no details were given. Determined to find the truth, Shu Wen joined a militia unit going to the Tibetan north, where she soon was separated from the regiment. Without supplies and knowledge of the language, she wandered, trying to find her way until, on the brink of death, she was rescued by a family of nomads under whose protection she moved from place to place with the seasons and eventually came to discover the details of her husband's death.

This story will grab your attention and grab your heart. It is hard to imagine the twentieth century life in Tibet she describes. Things changed so little from centuries past for the little nomadic family of sheepherders who saved her life and then took her into their family. As you read you become aware there must be some great passage of time, but only a couple of times does the author reveal to you just how many years have passed during Wen's sojourn in Tibet.

The book is just over 200 pages in length, small pages at that, and easily read in a single cozy afternoon. It has all the elements I love most in a book: stories of women and their loves and their friendships, stories of unfamiliar cultures (I am particularly drawn to stories of the far east), stories of love and struggle, and stories that are true.

I won't tell you the outcome of Wen's quest to find her husband as you need to read it in the words told by Wen herself.

After the story was related to her, the author [claims] she lost track of Wen, and has since desperately tried to find her or the nomadic family with whom she lived.

I highly recommend this splendid book