Show & Tell Day - Hardcover

Anne Rockwell as everyone concerned with children knows, is the author and artist of more than one hundred books for young readers and listeners. Among her most popular books are The Three Bears and Fifteen Other Stories; The Robber Baby: Stories from the Greek Myths; The Acorn Tree and Other Folktales; The One-Eyed Giant and Other Monsters from the Greek Myths; Once Upon a Time This Morning (illustrated by Sucie Stevenson); and Long Ago Yesterday. Ms. Rockwell lives in Connecticut on the Shore of Long Island Sound.

In Her Own Words...

"I've been told that the first words I spoke were the colors of things, and I can't remember when I didn't make pictures.

"When I discovered the rich and exciting worlds to be found in books, I was fascinated by the art and civilization of Ancient Egypt. It wasn't only the detailed storytelling paintings by Egyptian artists that caused me to feel such a strong identity with that long-ago civilization. I also lived in a place called Memphis. My home, however, was not the ancient city on the banks of the fertile Nile River. I was born in that Egyptian city's namesake in Tennessee--on the wide and muddy Mississippi River.

"When I was five or six years old, I made a painting of a quite imaginary Queen Cleopatra floating down the Nile on a quite imaginary and super-colorful barge. When I won first prize in a children's art contest for this painting, I decided I had become, from that day on, a professional artist.

"Much as I loved drawing and painting, I also loved to read. My home was full of books on many subjects, and I probably read as many originally intended for adults as written for children. Rainy days were my favorites, for then I didn't have to go outside to play. Instead, I could stay indoors reading and making the kind of pictures missing from many books I read. I liked to read about things that were real and things that weren't. I was equally fascinated by the things people had actually achieved and those they had only dreamed of and imagined. This is still true.

"Books meant so much to me that I hoped, one day, to write a book other children would enjoy reading. And my book would be filled with the kind of pictures I craved. But I appreciated too much the difficulties inherent in finding just the right words for whatever I wanted to say. So writing remained a secret aspiration, for I was convinced I wasn't good at it. In fact, writing down my thoughts was the hardest thing I'd ever tried to do.

"Since then I've learned that the way to write is by writing. If my first try isn't as good as I'd hoped it would be (and it rarely is), then I rewrite. And when I read that, I usually rewrite some more. It is hard work, but work I love.

"By now I've written stories and painted pictures for many books for children. I've been very lucky, for like the heroines of so many of the fairy tales I loved, all that I've wished for has come true.

"Except for one thing. I still haven't been to Egypt."