Amistad Rising: A Story of Freedom - Hardcover

Chambers, Veronica; Lee, Paul

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0152018034 ISBN 13: 9780152018030

Publisher: Harcourt Childrens Books, 1998

Synopsis

A picture book account illustrates the plight of Joseph Cinque and his fellow slaves during the Amistad mutiny and how they triumphed with the help of former President John Quincy Adams.

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Reviews

Grade 3-6?The story of Joseph Cinque, leader of the African mutineers who seized the Amistad in 1839, is the focus of Chambers's dramatic picture-book narrative. By eliminating the many details of the frustrating two-year legal history of the Amistad case, and the many complex issues of states' rights and Cuban-American relations discussed in the courts, the role of Cinque takes on heroic and legendary status. Brief mention is made of the support of the abolitionists and the important participation of John Quincy Adams in arguing the case before the Supreme Court, but Cinque's bravery and inspirational leadership are the heart of the book. His speeches and feelings are the only elements of fiction in this story from history, for he was indeed a celebrity in the public eye and certainly the leader of the Africans seeking justice. The figures of the man and his followers are heroic in size in Lee's action-filled acrylic paintings. The dark tones and earth colors dramatize the violence, despair, and patient nobility of the Africans as they fight for freedom and the right to return to their homeland and are forced to wait through many months in a New England town. Amistad Rising serves well as an introduction to this chapter in American history. The brevity of facts and the poetic quality of emotional description make the book a fine read-aloud choice.?Shirley Wilton, Ocean County College, Toms River, NJ
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc.

If oceans could talk and shores could speak, according to Chambers, they would tell a story of Joseph Cinqu and his freedom fight aboard the Spanish slave ship Amistad. This gripping, fictionalized picture-book account outlines a shameful slice of American history that some children will know from the recent film. In the days when owning slaves was legal but the stealing and trafficking of human cargo was not, a band of African prisoners were herded onto the Amistad. Despite all attempts to break their spirit and render them chattel, a struggle on the high seas ensued, and the leader, Cinqu, overtook his captors. Complications landed the Africans in a Connecticut prison, sparking an international incident; the early American justice system did not fail the ``Black Prince'' and his fellow freedom fighters. The hero's journey is told in straightforward narration, bracketed by exalted musings about freedom. In Lee's first picture book, the strong lines and chiseled faces against dark backgrounds transmit the emotional trajectory of the story, taking it from the pages of history to a near-mythic tragedy. The hopeful outcome is succinctly communicated by the closing page's illustration of empty, open shackles. (Picture book. 8-11) -- Copyright ©1998, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

Gr. 3^-6. Like the Spielberg movie, this picture book is partly fictionalized. There is an inflated voice-over commentary about the "changing winds of fortune" and destiny's plans, but Chambers' narrative of the heroic rebellion is spare, from the facts of slavery ("Many slave traders had grown rich from selling human beings and they were reluctant to give it up") to Cinque's words in court. Lee's extraordinary acrylic paintings contrast the wild, stormy ocean with the tight confinement of people below deck. He focuses on Cinque's yearning, his restlessness. The close-up of the captive's hands as he picks open the lock of his shackles is as powerful as the portraits of Cinque and Adams on either side of a barred cell window. Hazel Rochman

Edition details

• Publisher: Harcourt Childrens Books
• Publication date: 1998
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0152018034
• ISBN 13: 9780152018030
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 40