Tituba - Hardcover

Miller, William

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0152018972 ISBN 13: 9780152018979

Publisher: HMH Books for Young Readers, 2000

Synopsis

In the winter of 1692, trouble erupted in Salem Village. The fits and dreams of two young girls set off a witch-hunt. More than eighty villagers found themselves charged with witchcraft; twenty-five lost their lives.
At the center of the storm stood Tituba, a West Indian slave who was among the first accused. This is the story of her struggle and the profound questions she confronted: Was her folk wisdom really witchcraft? Would she have to offer a false confession to save her life? And where, amid so much anger and turmoil, could she turn for hope and strength?

About this title

About the Author:

William Miller is a poet and the author of many children's books. He teaches creative writing and African American literature at York College of Pennsylvania.

Leonard Jenkins is a fine artist who has illustrated several children's books, including Walter Dean Myers's Malcolm X: A Fire Burning Brightly. He lives in New York City, where he teaches painting at the School of Visual Arts.

From Publishers Weekly:

Miller (Zora Hurston and the Chinaberry Tree) offers a poetic, plaintive story about the Barbados-born slave who was accused of witchcraft during the Salem trials of 1692. After enduring the terrors of a voyage to Boston in the hold of a ship, Tituba greatly misses the island, where she told fortunes and communed with mice, macaws and the water spirits. But when she shares memories of her homeland with her master's daughter and niece, Elizabeth and Abigail, they have nightmares that lead to the accusations against Tituba. She originally denies the charges of witchcraft and is thrown into jail; told in court to "Confess or die," Tituba finally concedes the charge but remains jailed for many months. Sold to another master, Tituba comforts five young slaves newly arrived from Barbados, telling them that "A master might own your body, but he can never own your spirit.... Remember what your fathers and mothers told you about the spirit world." While Miller's sympathetic rendering of Tituba is likely to strike a chord with readers, his failure to develop the actions of Elizabeth and Abigail leaves important questions unanswered (Why, for example, do the girls fall to the floor in the courtroom, "writhing like snakes"?). Rendered in spray paint, acrylics and pastels, Jenkins's (Malcolm X: A Fire Burning Brightly) illustrations are occasionally stiff, yet offer effective contrasts between shadow and light and between vivid and somber colors. He affectingly evokes the anguish and loneliness of the title character. Ages 6-9.
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.

About this edition

• Publisher: HMH Books for Young Readers
• Publication date: 2000
• ISBN 10: 0152018972
• ISBN 13: 9780152018979
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 32
• Illustrator: Jenkins Leonard