When one of America's best-loved, bestselling authors faces a life-altering crisis, she responds by creating a remarkable sequence of poems that offers hope and reassurance to others seeking comfort.
Jane Yolen has spent her life giving enjoyment to millions of readers with her award-winning books and poems. But when her husband was diagnosed with an inoperable tumor in his skull, she began to write to find solace. For the forty-three days that David underwent radiation treatment, Jane spent each night pouring her emotions into a sonnet. It was the only part of the day over which she felt she had any control. When Jane read some of those poems on NPR's All Things Considered, there was an immediate outpouring of support and a clamoring for her work from cancer patients, those who treat and care for them, and those listeners simply moved by her words. The Radiation Sonnets is for them.
The poems reflect not only what happened on a particular day--the naps and nausea, visits from family and friends, Jane's struggle to get food into her weakened husband--but also tell a larger story: of her deep love for her husband, her ambivalence about medical technology, her joy in small victories, her acknowledgment of life's utter precariousness, her humor in the face of fear, and her refusal to give up hope.
For caregivers and survivors alike, for anyone whose life has been touched by illness, The Radiation Sonnets is a triumphant celebration of the human spirit.
These 43 sonnets by Yolen, a bestselling children's author (How Do Dinosaurs Say Goodnight?), are written in the traditional rhymed form with three quatrains and a couplet. After her husband, David, was diagnosed with an inoperable brain tumor, she found that composing a sonnet every night, when he was undergoing daily radiation treatments, was a discipline that helped her get through this difficult time. Through her poetry, she deals with emotionally painful issues, such as the changes in her husband's appearance, the suffering he was experiencing and the love and concern they felt for one another during this time. Yolen beautifully conveys the distance that can come between an ill person and his or her caretaker when both formerly lived as healthy partners. Other sonnets describe the effect of David's illness on their grown children and Yolen's fear that he would not survive. Several inclusions describe her sometimes ineffectual attempts to encourage David to eat more. Best read as verse-memoir, this short collection is a welcome addition to the many books written about coping with illness and death. Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc.
Born and raised in New York City, Jane Yolen now lives in Hatfield, Massachusetts. She attended Smith College and received her master's degree in education from the University of Massachusetts. The distinguished author of more than 170 books, Jane Yolen is a person of many talents. When she is not writing, Yolen composes songs, is a professional storyteller on the stage, and is the busy wife of a university professor, the mother of three grown children, and a grandmother. Active in several organizations, Yolen has been on the Board of Directors of the Society of Children's Book Writers and Illustrators, was president of the Science Fiction Writers of America from 1986 to 1988, is on the editorial board of several magazines, and was a founding member of the Western New England Storytellers Guild, the Western Massachusetts Illustrators Guild, and the Bay State Writers Guild. For twenty years, she ran a monthly writer's workshop for new children's book authors. In 1980, when Yolen was awarded an honorary Doctor of Law degree by Our Lady of the Elms College in Chicopee, Massachusetts, the citation recognized that "throughout her writing career she has remained true to her primary source of inspiration--folk culture." Folklore is the "perfect second skin," writes Yolen. "From under its hide, we can see all the shimmering, shadowy uncertainties of the world." Folklore, she believes, is the universal human language, a language that children instinctively feel in their hearts. All of Yolen's stories and poems are somehow rooted in her sense of family and self. The Emperor and the Kite, which was a Caldecott Honor Book in 1983 for its intricate papercut illustrations by Ed Young, was based on Yolen's relationship with her late father, who was an international kite-flying champion. Owl Moon, winner of the 1988 Caldecott Medal for John Schoenherr's exquisite watercolors, was inspired by her husband's interest in birding. Yolen's graceful rhythms and outrageous rhymes have been gathered in numerous collections. She has earned many awards over the years: the Regina Medal, the Kerlan Award, the World Fantasy Award, the Society of Children's Book Writers Award, the Mythopoetic Society's Aslan Award, the Christopher Medal, the Boy's Club Jr. Book Award, the Garden State Children's Book Award, the Daedalus Award, a number of Parents' Choice Magazine Awards, and many more. Her books and stories have been translated into Japanese, French, Spanish, Chinese, German, Swedish, Norwegian, Danish, Afrikaans, !Xhosa, Portuguese, and Braille. With a versatility that has led her to be called "America's Hans Christian Andersen," Yolen, the child of two writers, is a gifted and natural storyteller. Perhaps the best explanation for her outstanding accomplishments comes from Jane Yolen herself: "I don't care whether the story is real or fantastical. I tell the story that needs to be told."
This review is from: The Radiation Sonnets: For My Love, in Sickness and in Health (Hardcover)
I heard the NPR broadcast of Jane Yolen reading from her collection of "Radiation Sonnets" and was astounded by how moving that excerpt was, so I ordered the book. The *whole book* is as moving and as brilliant.
Jane Yolen has made her reputation as a multi-award-winning author in a number of spheres: fantasy novels for adults (Sister Light, Sister Dark), for young adults (The Devil's Arithmetic), for children (Owl Moon, How do Dinosaurs Say Goodnight?) - but her poetry, especially this collection, is so honest and real that it reaches right out and grabs your heart.
I cannot say how deeply moved I have been reading this book. My husband came back from work and found me in tears: a dear cousin of mine died of a particularly vicious cancer a few years ago, and I wish to heaven that I could have sent this book to her husband at the time.
Of course it has a universal appeal to anyone who is caring for, or has cared for, someone undergoing radiation therapy - but there is also the obvious love story of Jane and her husband. The nearest I can come to a parallel would be 'A Grief Observed' by C.S. Lewis, in terms of the revelation of deep personal feelings, but Lewis (God rest his soul) was apparently a man who found it hard to deal with emotions - he married late and had no children. Jane Yolen has children and grandchildren and she is writing these sonnets for the man who has shared her whole life.
Powerful. Honest, true, painful and triumphant - what an astounding work. This is a book that will give comfort to the thousands of us who will almost certainly have, at some point, to deal with the maelstrom of emotions involved when a loved one has cancer. Read it. Buy a copy for your friend who could gain comfort from knowing that their feelings of love and hope and frustration and anger and fear are universal. Blessings on Jane Yolen for allowing the rest of us this glimpse of her deepest heart, and for letting us know that we are not alone.
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This review is from: The Radiation Sonnets: For My Love, in Sickness and in Health (Hardcover)
Crossing genres from Young Adult to Poetry, Jane Yolen surprises me yet again. There is nothing glib here in this collection of 42 sonnets, nothing that the poetry critics would call elegant. Considering the subject and the reader who might be the caretaker of someone seriously ill, the poetry enthusiast, or the poet, this is the book's strength. Each of these poems were written during a day of the 42 day regimen of radiation of Yolen's husband, and the work does way more than chronicle the horrid effects of the potential "salvation." She gets into the heart of the role she plays in this situation, into the heart of the wife, and of the marriage. Jane Yolen has succeeded with little artifice, little poetic device, just a heart she's opened and shared with her readership.
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This book is absolutely wonderful. I rarely buy books new, but this was absolutely worth it - these sonnets are so powerful, so well-written, that I am thrilled to own this beautiful little book.
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