A Poem for Peter

How did Ezra Jack Keats, born a century ago to a poor family of Jewish immigrants in Brooklyn, change the face of American children’s literature with his first picture book? How did his young, black protagonist, Peter, come to be? This is the story acclaimed author Andrea Davis Pinkney tells in verse, with evocative illustrations by Lou Fancher and Steve Johnson.

The story of Jack, a boy who aspired to be an artist, a dream that would be discouraged but not quite deferred. The story of Peter, a small child in a bright snowsuit, and of all the children who had never seen a character like Peter, like themselves, in a book before. These interconnected stories fuel the spirit of the timeless American classic The Snowy Day.

Like many children, Andrea recognized herself in Ezra Jack Keats’s iconic hero, Peter. She remembers, “I saw my brown-skinned self celebrated through Peter’s sense of wonder and discovery. I think I slept with my copy of The Snowy Day. That’s how much the book meant to me.”

Andrea grew up to write many award-winning books, ranging from children’s picture books to young adult novels to historical nonfiction. Her picture books include Rhythm Ride; Sit-In: How Four Friends Stood Up By Sitting Down; Sojourner Truth’s Step-Stomp Stride, Let it Shine: Stories of Black Women Freedom Fighters; and biographies of musical legends Duke Ellington and Ella Fitzgerald. Her most frequent collaborator is her husband, acclaimed illustrator Brian Pinkney.

Andrea’s sense of history may have played a part in her decision to write about Ezra’s life and times, but as a book editor at Scholastic, she also knows what contemporary young readers want: “Ezra Jack Keats is still bringing it home,100 years after he was born. And kids today are still rejoicing.”