Another Review at MyShelf.Com

Jackie Robinson: Strong Inside and Out
Time for Kids Biographies

By Denise Lewis Patrick and the editors of Time for Kids

     The focus of this biography of Jackie Robinson is strength -- primarily the strength required to walk away from confrontation. Robinson lived in a country that didn't really admire men who walked away from a fight. Today, young men feel even more strongly about it. We see player on player fights at sporting events. We see athletes attack fans. The motto seems to be "When dissed, fight." But Jackie Robinson was disrespected by his country, his teammates, and his fans, but he did not fight. He had promised he would not and he proved to be a man of his word. Thus, the authors of this biography take an unabashed stance of admiration for Jackie Robinson.

     I agree with the book, there is definitely material for admiration here. In fact, in the entire book, I only took exception to one remark about a few of Jackie's teammates who didn't want to play with him. The author says "they kept their southern ideas about race." Remarks like that make it sound like racism was only a regional issue and downplay the national need for the civil rights movement. Racism isn't a regional issue -- it's a human one. And what of those people in the South who abhorred racism -- were they somehow not Southern? But other than passing along a long held myth that racism was strictly a regional problem, I enjoyed the book very much. As a story of determination and honor, it's a winner.

 

 

The Book

Harper Collins Publishers
January 4th, 2005
Hardbound
0660576014
Nonfiction/Ages 7-9
More at Amazon.com 

Excerpt

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The Reviewer

Jan Fields
Reviewed 2005
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© 2005 MyShelf.com