Rice Is Life [Hardcover]

Rita Golden Gelman (Author), Yangsook Choi (Illustrator)

Book Description

Age Level: 4 and up

In Bali, as in many parts of the world, rice is more than just a staple food-rice is life!

In Bali, life revolves around the planting and harvesting of rice. While eels slip through the mud and dragonflies flutter overhead, farmers plant seedlings in the wet rice field, or 'saweh.' Soon each plant is crowned with flowers, and tiny green kernels appear. Rain nourishes the kernels, which grow plump and sweet. The green plants turn golden and ripe, and everyone helps harvest the grain. When the harvest is finished, the farmers give thanks to the goddess of rice for a successful crop.

From planting the seeds to harvesting the ripe grain, this beautiful, poetic book tells the story of rice and of the Balinese people, for whom rice is life.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

In verse and in descriptive prose, Gelman (Queen Esther Saves Her People) tours the rice fields, or sawahs, of Bali. On each spread, a poem focuses on the creatures in the sawah (e.g., the eels, the bats that eat the mosquitoes, the mice that nibble at the crops) and a paragraph explains an aspect of the planting, cultivation and harvesting of rice, the staple of the Indonesian diet. The poems are inconsistent. Lyrical passages coexist with sing-song or stale lines ("In the darkness of the sawah/ With a yellow moon above/ Comes a serenade of frogs/ Singing out their songs of love"). The prose, however, is graceful, whether explaining how rice plants sprout or how children roast dragonflies for snacks. The lesson culminates with a farmer and his family offering thanks to Dewi Sri, goddess of rice. Choi's (The Sun Girl and the Moon Boy) brightly bordered panels offer radiant scenes of the sawah. Imaginatively framed, the illustrations glow with saturated colorDemerald green frogs, ruby red dragonflies, deep magenta sunsets, sunlit yellow grainDand make this book inviting as well as educational. Ages 4-9. (May)
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Booklist

Gelman lived for nine years on the island of Bali in Indonesia, researching Balinese culture. She presents her firsthand knowledge in a series of delicate poems and prose vignettes about the centrality of rice to the Balinese, who eat rice for every meal, and whose lives revolve around tending the sawah, or rice field. She shows the drama of a planting season, conveying the rhythm of planting, the richness of the natural environment above and below the water line, the threats to the rice presented by hungry birds and mice, the harvest, and the ceremony of thanksgiving. The information never crosses into encyclopedia-entry territory thanks to Gelman's light, poetic touch and Choi's oil-on-paper paintings. The page-and-a-quarter and double-page spreads pulsate with warmth and are filled with the creatures (eels, egrets, dragonflies, bats, frogs, spiders) that inhabit the sawah. A delight that will fascinate younger readers. Connie Fletcher
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

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Product Details

• Reading level: Ages 4 and up
  
• Hardcover: 32 pages
• Publisher: Henry Holt and Co. (BYR); 1st edition (May 1, 2000)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0805057196
• ISBN-13: 978-0805057195
• Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 9.2 x 0.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12.2 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #897,669 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #60 in Books > Children's Books > Science, Nature & How It Works > Agriculture

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5.0 out of 5 stars Great for a study of other cultures, February 9, 2009

By 

Laura S. Federico (Chattanooga, TN United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Rice Is Life (Hardcover)

I bought this book for a class study of Japan. It is actually set in Bali but is a great story about how rice grows. It is especially enlightening for those of us who have no personal knowledge of this process which many of the world's people would consider so common. The book also teaches about the entire ecosystem that has grow up around the rice production (animals, insects, etc) and it is all done as a beautiful rhyming timeline with a factual explanations on each opposite page. I will use this book every year in class.

5.0 out of 5 stars Rice Is Life is wonderful, December 29, 2007

By 

Ali Cat (Midwest, USA) - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Rice Is Life (Hardcover)

I love this book. The artwork is colorful and simple, a pleasing combination for the eye. Not cutesy or too complicated And the story is poignant and accurately told. As the author spent a good deal of time traveling the Bali countryside, she comes to the writing with a real story to tell of the people there. It's a great look at the circle of life in a rice-driven society. The best thing is the combination of poetry on the left pages and nonfiction prose on the right- what a great combination for kids. I highly recommend it!