Transcripts For CSPAN2 Author 20240703

Stephanie w mcdaniels is a longtime friend of the having served on the board of directors for many years. She is a professor of english and of the graduate school at the jackson state. Dr. Mcdaniels saw years. Okay of course i cant sit down. I just want to remind you all that whenever if you want to ask questions, mds, you will need to come to microphone at the podium right there, not try it no matter how loud your teacher voice is. Try not. We dont want you to shout it from your seat okay. Because as we we are filming this now. Great. Thank you and thank you guys for coming coming. Thank you for joining us with the art the panel and at this time, i have the pleasure of introducing our three distinguished panelists and their great works. First, we have maryemma graham. Shes a native of augusta, georgia. Shes the university. Distinguish professor of english at the university of kansas and founding director of. The history of black writing, which she established at the University Mississippi in 1983. The history of black has led national and International Initiatives to promote teaching and Public Engagement with black literary studies, with support from the National Endowment for the humanities, ford and mellon. Professor graham, the author of 12 books that have helped to redefine the field, especially the cambridge companion to the africanamerican novel. And with jerry ward, the cambridge history African American literature on the occasion of the history of black 40th anniversary and grahams retired from teaching to writing full time and answer just im sorry to interrupt generational panel of distinguished scholars gathered at the modern language associations january 2023 conference to celebrate ongoing significance and new ventures and archive programing and literary and its expanding community of digital scholars and practitioners graham lives in lawrence, kansas, is at work on two new books. Her book today that were looking at is entitled the house where my soul lives. The of margaret walker. And shell be at the book signing ten at 3 p. M. Today. I just wanted to mention modern language association. They were much lies and just everything was on. I couldnt even catch my plane. So people to really want to be there to be with you. Miriam mixed have wayne flynt wayne flynt is a southern history educator who retired teaching for decades at auburn university, where he directed more 60 graduate programs. He has lectured at such one university in china at queens university, belfast, northern ireland, at the university of newcastle, oxford, cambridge and sussex in Great Britain at the Franklin Roosevelt center in the netherlands and at the university of vienna. He is the author of books dealing with southern history white, poverty and culture, religion, art and music and, literature. His numerous award include the remembered pat patrick for florida history, the Lillian Smith prize for nonfiction from the Southern Regional council, the Alabama Library Association Award for nonfood auction three times the. Sea van woodward. John hope. Franklin prize by the fellowship of southern writers, the scott and Zelda Fitzgerald museum award for excellence in writing a nomination for. The Pulitzer Prize in 1989 and the alabama governors award for arts. His book is entitled afternoons with harper lee. He will be signing at three as well. And our third panelist, virginia magee butler, shes the daughter, a country pastor. She grew up in north mississippi, used willie, last in a book, she married allen butler, the Church Pianist from one of those churches the army drafted out shortly after she graduated from ole miss. She and their three children accompanied him for 24 years as he pursued military career. She taught kindergarten in san antonio, texas, second grade in kaiserslautern west germany and four in fort polk, louisiana, and gifted junior high Language Arts in leadville, louisiana. This last assignment helped her figure out just what she wanted to be when she up a writer attracted by the grumman childrens literature collection and the Francis Collins center for gifted studies at the university of southern mississippi, usm. She retired to hattiesburg in 2001, involvement with usc, instagram and childrens collection led to becoming the researcher for the 50th Anniversary Edition of the snowy day, where she found a biography that needed to be written, becoming Ezra Jack Keats was, published by the University Press of mississippi in 2023. Her writing appeared in highlights cricket cinema. The writer and the sabc wri bulletin and other publications. Each of her children has an approved spouse, she says. And there are ten grandchildren. Six boys, four girls she and al enjoy by two of the grandsons who live next door she can often can be found out at the grumman childrens literature or writing, and her blog called reading writing, but much arithmetic at ww u virginia mcgee butler dot com. In her book becoming ezra keats. Like the others, they be signing in the book tents at 3 p. M. So were going to open with our first question. So on the published schedule for the 2023 mississippi book festival, the Panel Summary blurb designed to describe this Panel Session and to get audience into this room and were glad you joined us. Is written as follows biographies delve into the lives of notable authors whose works resonate with themes of resilience, cultural and universal human experiences deeply influencing literatures landscape. Focusing on the latter part, this blurb talk a bit about authors walker keats and lee body their bodies of work deeply influenced literatures landscapes, deeply influenced literatures landscapes. Miriam oh, thank you. Everybody in my ear ear. Thank you for being here today. And happy to be here as well. This is a really good question because this morning, what our volunteers for the book festival gave me a ride over and when and asked me how i got to mississippi and a story that i said that i came in 1973 to the Phillis Wheatley festival and she immediately said, oh, that sounds like a Founding Mission for what were doing today. And i said, you got exactly right. So she gave me my opening statement. Is that walkers work was foundation in every way, and writing her biography, i discovered just how foundational it was she. That intersection between, if she knew literature, was like, its not sufficient for to know it. I have to translate it to public spaces, i have to share it more a lot more broadly. My role as somebody has benefited from all this knowledge is to deliver it in different ways. And i think she was that that transit and that that person who needed to have a community who could be as richly endowed should i say as she was she felt she had had a Brilliant Education a first class education, a classical education greek, latin, the whole nine yards. But she, a poet and a novelist, but short of that she really figure out how to transfer and translate her experiences to a broader public and. So this morning, when i heard that someone was simply driving me here would say, she gave us the foundation, she did an many different ways in terms of poetry. The title of first collection for my people says it all. She was not just writing poetry in a modernist tradition, which is what era she was writing in. She was figuring out how to say in a way that it embraced her. People embraced everybody. She writing not only for herself, but she was the intersection between herself and people. And that something that she continued to do in all of the work that she did here in mississippi for all of her life. Virginia what about keats . When ezra . Jack keats wrote, the snowy day, which are so most you know about . He had been writing for ten years for had been illustrating for ten years for other writers. And he was really by what he saw and he had to illustrate the that he got had a book setting and all the children were white and he could look out his window at his studio and see children of various cultures playing outside. And he knew something was wrong with that. One of his assignments was to illustrate childrens reading and he taught those grade school you may know about panorama, he illustrated the entire reading for panorama. There is one one story in panorama that is of a child of color all the other stories, there were white kids. The story, the picture in the teachers manual of the school and the children coming has a stairway and the teacher standing the door. Of course, shes white. Every child coming up that stairway to go into school is white and class. That bothered him and he thought that children should all children should see themselves books the year that snowy day was published, the percentages of children of color would not have been enough in Childrens Books to have even been statistically significant. There was an Nancy Larrick article in september 1965, which is a couple of years after snowy day came out, called the all white world of Childrens Books, and she addresses in her statistics said that over the three year period, from 1962 to 1964, only four fires of 1 . You want to say that another way . Thats. 00. A thank you would you start over should start up. Did you hear what oak. Oak anyway that another way to say that is point 008 children straight books from 63 publishers told a story of a which was the word they used then other ethnicities would been similar and they were not even mentioned so. He started writing his snowy day in a time when you just did not find children from other ethnicities in books, there were are very very few here and there and even those frequent were in some of stereotypical fashion not as real children. So this year, this past 2022, the statistics were required if Childrens Book count. So at the University Madison a wisconsin madison which ran statistics on multiple cultural Childrens Books all time, said 40 were had at least one creator who was a person of color, 70 had at least one creator who was white. 46 had a person of color who was character in the book, and 0. 39 had a primary character who was of color, in addition to that other things that have happened this year, year, 20, 22 newbery award and all the honor books newbery were women of color, which is also significant. But if go back and look at your guide for this festival and look at your panelist and look at the people who here presenting, you will see who are not all white white. I can go to my library at oak grove in lamar county on any given day of the week. Go the childrens section and i will see a multitude of entire seeing Childrens Books that represent children from many ethnicities. And that happens all the time thats the global picture of what happened when Ezra Jack Keats took it upon himself to a book about a little boy in the snow and decide that that little boy could be black. I mean, he does the same things in the snow that any kid would this now hes representative of all kids but he could be black thats the big picture individual or pictures are just as important counted one by one when my book my and i posted on my blog that it was out one of my followers is kid who used to sit in my class and i thought about him a lot when. I wrote the section about kate sitting in his english class in the back corner drawing pictures while teachers teaching about english. He knew what she said and occasion only would contribute if he had something to say. And when i read that, i thought about larry, who used to sit in the back corner of my class and draw pictures while i was teaching, he was a young black boy. When i posted this on my he posted under his comment and i want to read it. I wish you could see it as he had punctuation. I did it. But this is what he said keats was so for me, i the snowy day from his earliest and how his incrowd illustrations in parentheses got up i black all in caps little boy just like me impacted me. I was determined to live in the snow and eventually did all because of him. And now as an adult and design and illustrator professor, his works continue to impact and motivate me. And my students, brian collier, who is one of the best childrens illustrators, if you asked me because i have own opinion gave, a speech at the National Society of Childrens Book writers and illustrators and he was doing the keynote and he began speech by saying, when i was a little boy, my mother taught head start. She home, harold and the purple crayon and the snowy day and but the first time i saw myself in a picture book. One of my favorite kates books is pet snow, and its got a picture of the pet show with all the kids. And the kids are tall, short and fat, scrawny and of every ethnicity you could think about. And theyre all in a line for the judge, who strangely looks a little bit like ezra. Jack keats himself. The other thing did besides letting us know that all children be in books, every child should be able to find somebody in a picture book that looks a little bit like them. The other thing he did was to use his setting, his settings, brought the city to children before his writing most of the Childrens Books were in the country, the suburbs. But he found the beauty the city in all of his books or set in that environment when. You think about somebody who turned the world around. The saying is that ever the journey of a thousand, a thousand miles begins with one step. He made a giant step in getting diversity into our childrens literature and turning, turning the of childrens literature really on its head. Were not there yet, folks. Weve still got a lot to do. But he got it. Lane goes about harper lee. Of course, winning the Pulitzer Prize was. The most important moment in her life because it took one of the most private women i know in my lifetime and made her one of the most public women in terms of aspiration but not in terms of response to our goal in life was to be as private after the future as before the future. If you want to know why she didnt other books her answer was i have to. More particularly a book that still sells some even copies a year after all this year was the book she wanted to write the only book she went write. The outcome of that was that in a contest in australia, about five years ago. The question was what is your favorite american book and landslide . It was killer mockingbird and when i told her that right at the end of her life and in assisted living, she said waltzing matilda, matilda matilda, shes saying, than i did, she backed that up. You know that esquire, pbs a contest for six months of not long before she died and the contest was a very one of that is what is your Favorite Book and landslide of america your Favorite Book as responded to by pbs, was to kill a mockingbird. Most interestingly, or in 2021 and december of 2000, 21, the New York Times review section had a contest based on their leonardtown 35th anniversary of publishing the New York Times book review section. And the question was very simple as a four year question was, what is your Favorite Book and who is your favorite published in the last hundred and 25 years by a landslide it was to kill a mockingbird of i i dont really know what literary critics think of to kill a mockingbird theyre divided. I pretty much know readers worldwide think of phil morgan, bird. It is worlds most beloved book all these years after this book was published. Okay. Moving the question to. Thank you all. So in reading your works, i found so many profound passages which i couldnt wait to mark and share with my colleagues. So here im going to just ill refer to one quote. It passes from each of your books and ask you this to expound on that passage. So from becoming ezra, jack keats, im quoting here, reminiscent of my mothers lemonade, keats took, the tartness and flavor of own life, added and created an ideal ized childhood, overtly and subtly, he included people who were important to him in his storyline and in his artwork. The stories he wrote sometimes mirrored his memories, and sometimes adjusted his own experience to a more kid friendly world. And for those of you have your books, thats on page 137. So virginia, im going to start with in which he adjusted it to, make it better when he was a boy he frequently got this disturbed by what was happening at home and one day he got and remembered that in his reading book at school hed heard about a little boy that put his baggage in a kerchief on the end of a stick and away from home. So he decided that was way he was going to take care of his problem as well. He came. His mother is cleaning the floor and so he tells her that hes going to run away from home. And instead of saying about staying at home, she says, well, look, youre your things not todd, right . Let me help you, todd. And so she sent him out the World Running away from home. And he spent an afternoon first outside with the boys playing cards and doing things, then wandered to uncle louie and eight roses out, stayed there. The family decided that maybe things were actually better at home, so he went back. The dark little scared as goes back and gets home, starts knocking on the door and his mother will not let him in. They having a party inside, she will not let him in. And he begs and begs. Finally, his father intercedes and says well just give him another chance. And so finally they let back in and he spends the next weeks being very careful to say yes, maam and yes, sir, and please thank you and all those Little Things to be. He doesnt get going again when he begins to write his book. He has who a little disturbed because the new sisters getting all of his furniture and peter decides to run away from home and i you can see the account get a glimpse of picture i know youre too far away, but peter runs away from home. This. He doesnt run very far. Hes right outside. The window of his house and sets up shop. There. And pretty soon his mother, instead of keeping him locked out, is at the window lane. Me over saying weve got something really good for lunch. Would you like to come in . So thats how he fixed that sitting as he got a little older he and boys were out one day and they were loud and roughhousing, running, screaming and doing things that boys do. And they ran across the garage door of the z8, who was holy man, who spent a lot of time prayer, and they did it enough. And he finally got mad and he comes storm out of the cellar and screams at him and said, i was trying to pray you boys go away. Scared as it were. So he ran and his brother went back and said, ill talk to the city for you. So his brother goes back and talks him and comes back and says, this idea, its not about you. Hes really a nice guy. Well, the next time ezra went by, the stage explodes. There was a board lying out by the garage, and ezra decided that zedek had left it for him to paint on. And he really is a nice guy in his book. Louie search. Louie is looking for a stepfather and he makes several attempts that dont quite work out and are not very good until he gets in trouble with the junk man. And theres a misunderstanding. The junk man yells at him and chases him through the junk man looks exactly like zaidi that ezra tells about. He was a little boy. The only difference is that the zodiac in this book has same face as ezra himself, and when louie finds out that the man is really a nice guy, they just had a misunderstanding. He figures out that the junk man is really a good person to be stepfather. So kids frequently did with his own life and took the things that seem wrong to him as a little boy and turned them into something that really fun in these classic Childrens Books that he wrote. So from afternoon with harper lee, im quoting one of lifes ironies is how people compartmentalize friendships. Some friends we know from childhood and never lose touch with other best friends faith from our conscious ness. When we leave for college, mary moved to a different changed ideologies or political affiliation. New friendships began in middle age or even later, after neil died. We often thought that if we had known earlier in our lives, we not have liked her so well or us. This is from pages 170 and 171. If have the book weighing sometimes write about oh folks they know its because of people or lifestyle and they write about people they know because theyre not like them and because of of no we would not have had a friendship. But for her stroke on april to 2005 and all of a sudden this incredibly independent woman who for instance never took a bus or a taxi when she was in new york city because she walked everywhere. So you can imagine her stamina. She was also extremely athletic up and so her independence part of a way in which she dealt with new york city when she dealt with Truman Capote in the way she protected when he was growing up in monroeville, or the way in which she fought boys. She would pick on him being a sissy. So so her personality is a really strong personality, but a very private personality. And i couldnt help but think of one day when she was telling us all because she knew i liked dogs and did not like cats. She knew my liked cats and didnt like dogs. She always sided with my wife on every kind of argument like that. And so she said we were okay, but we were sad family. And she said, when my brother had the fourth of the children who are unfortunate he died way too young but at and picked up their tab it was just a little tiny boy and he had watched his mother and dad throw pieces of wood and the fire and he just or picked up the cat and threw the cat in the fire. That was not her cat, which deeply offended so the cat traipsed over to ed and paul slept and says thats is with harper lee, basically a book of storytelling. But i found photograph the simons island. And its cat if you cant see it reading to kill mountain bird and i couldnt wait i drove my wife lunch and weve got to go to munro. Ive got to show this thing now. This is what she said. We were fed people cash, independent cash or confident dogs require constant attention. Dont take care themselves or dependent and are far too much trouble to. As i respond, that sounds to me as if you are describing the difference between women and men, not difference between cats and dogs. Which said not one word, but smirked for quite a long time. So from the house where my soul is and quoting just after, just after classes began in the fall of 1969, threatened with kidney failure and complications caused by a malfunctioning parathyroid gland, walker entered the hospital, spending time in hospitals had become such a regular part of her that she approached each stay as if it were her last resolute woman that she she diligently sought to understand and as much as possible about, how the world and the universe operated. But the revolution is had not forced out of an abiding fear that life would end before. She had accomplished all that she had desired, and thats on pages 391 and 392. If you the book. Miriam yeah thats a passage i think i wanted readers to fully grasp the contradictions walker faced throughout her life. First of all, when i see that this myth here, who knows that very well that he was a doctor, she was a very fragile woman in terms of her health. She had a number of medical conditions. She diabetic. And so she was in the hospital frequently. And she didnt follow the doctors advice, which landed her the hospital even more often, as you can imagine. And yet her idea of herself and what she was able to accomplish was huge with this fragile health. And i to show the contrast in terms of her understanding of what she needed to do was to rest and while in the hospital. But she also used it to planning another big thing to think about book she needed to write. And so there was never a lost, so to speak. She would bring she would fuss with her children to say, you were supposed to bring me my journals if im in the hospital. She was writing journals the house but so never a waste in moment. Always thinking about what she was planning, what she was doing, and wanting to accomplish it. And there was a fear often, if i dont get done what i set to do, what does it mean . So when i think about that passage, my family and ive been talking about the idea of the servant leader tradition and this not in the book theres one chapter titled it comes close to that. I think that that chapter title is is to teach to lead, to change the world. Thats just one chapter in the book. But think we we were trying to talk about this tradition of servant leader that we know mostly as a male tradition Martin Luther king etc. But what happens when woman embraces this idea of i born to serve, i was born to lead, i was born to give to people in the best i can. Now im a poet. Im a writer. And i do that well. But is it sufficient . Is it enough . And it never was until she could do these other things. So the hospital was this quiet place where nobody bothered her. She didnt have to cook dinner because did do that every day. And she could go to the next thing, she could figure out the next thing. So thank you for choosing that passage because it really does give a full sense of how she operated. You know, her her body might have been not as strong and she was a small, but her mind was huge. And her planning and thinking and accomplishments just amazing. But it had do with that resilience. It had to do with her fearlessness. And even when i met her, i would constantly ask, how did you do this . That was always my question. How did you think you could do this . Because it seemed impossible. But when she planned, she executed, and often a lot of planning was from the hospital bed because. She was there to pretty often do things she considered safe a community leader. Yeah. Yeah. Okay, im moving to my third question and then im going to come to the audience. So as authors, you are probably very used to reading reviews of your own work and. And at least two of you, probably all of you have spent decades critiquing work of other authors as well. So if you were assigned reviewer of your own work on this biography, please tell us how you would assess both how well you achieved what you had hoped to accomplish when you completed and published this biography, when, i guess my biggest problem with the book was that almost every writer wants to on the and early in the process a what part of literature youre about represents is it fiction is it nonfiction . Is it history of, whatever it is and printed on an historian and preference have been mainly in alabama story. And so ive written multiple books out about every part of alabama and therefore when people found i was writing about part of it, they said, oh, we did a history of harper lee or library. No, youre not going to get about that. If you read the true one a biography written and respected her desire to have a biography written on her what i would call this, is a story. It was a book of stories is about 64 afternoons with a woman who never wanted to live in alabama after she left the university of alabama for new york city, she loved new city. She never wanted to live anywhere but in new york city. And one of the great tragedies of my life that as you a wealthy scholar and, millsaps college, and on two occasions as rich as well into better and rich relatives. Since youre an alabama historian do you know anything about harper lee i should shes broke our closest friend. Alabama. She said. I cant believe and i should. Would you like to meet harper. Tasha brownlee give anything to meet . So i said. Well, we will come over and pick you up in jackson at christmas because she comes home at thanksgiving and she stays at christmas. We will take you to, monroeville, and you can spend the day. And what im really thinking is my wife and i tend to be the only ones there listening quite without saying a word rather than people so i called Louise Conner nells little sister and i said could you call now and see if you know what to read to spend an evening with eudora welty . Your house 30 miles from our house. Astronomical miraculous. Harper lees i would love to spend an evening with eudora welty so i think weve got the most magical day in the history of literature to me my opinion these were just sitting there talking each other about the grander of southern literature. When we before that was supposed to happen i get a call from mills sister was gone when shes back down. Should what i should happen i know shes home i know shes in my room and she you know she came home she is terrified at being in the room with eudora welty for an evening and what she would say and what she would do to impress this welty to impress french royalty. What would she do . And i thought what an incredible incredible insight to harper. I also thought what a tragedy to the world of literature. That no one heard that nonexistent conversation. So when i started writing book, i was on. Youre an historian, but this not going to be a history. Youve written two biographies, but this is not going to be a biography. What is this going to be and im pretty much content to let it 64 or afternoon of storytelling with the dual world in remarkably closed off many people have had that experience im maybe in that regard miriam thats a good the jury is still out i guess i would start by saying the Publishing Industry has changed radically so weve had to figure out i say we i had to work with a partner a publicist to decide how to place this book now that same issue had confronted me when i was writing the book what kind of biography do i want to write . And it depends on thinking about your readers. Do i . Literary people just to tell me if ive gotten this womans develop met her contribution, what she wanted to accomplish, if i got it right. Do i want the average woman to understand the difficulties of being a woman at a particular moment this history of our country and in the south where she chose to live her life and and so on. There were different populations. I was thinking about. And so the success for me, do i am i going to get those readers . Are those people to read this book . And knowing that she had a very diverse audience. So i tried to combine the sort of literary biography with the intellectual story and an audience every womans life. And when i say ordinary woman, i mean one who has a family with children, cooks three meals a day, figures out. How to make a living, keep a job and do everything. She wants to do and more and so when i say the jury still out, i mean, i think those different audiences are gradually coming to the book different readers, giving me different kinds of feedback im getting comments, notes from people who say this is my grandmothers story. If it werent for just the books she wrote, this sounds just like what happened to my grandmother and i like ive accomplished something when i get a comment like that so a blended biography, i guess i could call it is a more difficult sell if its not you know if youre not a Pulitzer Prize winning then everybody looking for your story. Walker was a prize winning author, not a Pulitzer Prize winning author, but everybodys looking for her story. Or if youre somebody whose history is filled with all kinds of intrigue and secret love affairs and that kind of stuff, then you need have a tell all biography. So there was a little bit of that, but not lot because this was a woman with great integrity and you know, her sensibilities were such that she was a victorian woman, the twenties living in the 20th century. And so she would not have tolerated that even if she did it. You werent supposed to talk about it publicly. So i talk about it a little bit, but not a lot. So i dont know if i have been successful, if i were a reader or, a reviewer of this book. I think i would say i did do a good job of reaching multiple audiences. Everybody can see something about, the experience they know or familiar with or have heard about in this book, and readers can find them in the book. But i ask you to tell me if you get a chance to read the book, if you can find yourself inside your story, because walker, in many ways a very ordinary woman, but she was also extraordinary and that interesting combination is very hard to kind of tackle somebody who is ordinary, an extraordinary accomplished things, unimaginable things in her lifetime. And yet had a very everyday that characterizes the lives of so many women, southern women in particular. So ill have to wait for you to tell me youll be you have to be my book. Well i will share it. If i heard you tell virginia before we came out of the holding room that you had lately been getting a critique out there, youre the lady with the word with the. Yeah. The big book. That is the books nickname. You see it. Writing virginia. Oh, okay. Well, you know, as you mentioned, i was a researcher for 50th anniversary of the snowy day. And when they sent me back into the gorman files, the grammar collection has Ezra Jack Keats ever touched . Almost. I mean, it is extensive, including six boxes of his attempt to write his autobiography. So when i went back in there to get some things to go in the 50th anniversary was on a deadline and i kept thinking as i went through, all of those things i wish i known this when i was using his books with my kindergartners second graders. Oh, how i wish had known this. You know, it just going on. Well, i had to get through fast so i did and then i headed back to the grumman hoping to get something that people who are using his books could see and that would him to those books that are really in childrens literature they are is up to date today they were the day that he wrote them and they have such intimate experiences of children that are universal. So i wanted it in the hands of people who would use it with their kids. So kind of like you are. I dont think im a good person. Decide how well this was done. Its kind of like you asking me to evaluate my ten grandchildren and i can tell you there are. And i feel kind of like that with the book, the reaction i have gotten the most. The book are people who say i read your book and now want to go back and read his books. And thats really what i wanted people to do. I have had one really special thing that has happened that may lead to something i hadnt even thought about. Oh, one of my sons, best friends when he was in high school is now teaching in atlanta. And predominantly black school and shes teaching ap and when i went out there for a visit and a book signing out there came and got my book and she said this fall i would like to use this with my students and have you a zoom call with us so thinking that the book is going not just appeal teachers and students, but to older students who are on the on fringes of trying to decide what do want to do with their lives. That was such a big issue with gates. So so far ive been very pleased. I have had good reviews and good who are interested in the book. So im hoping im you im hoping this is going to go well and that you will enjoy. I think we can take one question. And you have to go to the mic. If youre going to ask a question i see you making this move into the mind. Can each of you discuss any concessions that you had to make in writing your book . Either that you werent able to get in, that you wanted or something that you didnt want get in, that the publishers kind of had to make make. You do. Yeah, thats an interesting question. This is a big ask book and it was a big that it was expected to be, but i felt like i had one shot at it and i needed to be as complete as possible. Carolyn brown an introductory, a young adult biography of walker, which really helped a lot, and it left to do the rest of the story, right . So. I, i mean, i didnt i didnt leave out what they probably would have wanted me to leave out because i decided that there was not a chance for a second book on this subject. And if i had so much richness, all of her journals, all of her papers on her documents, i was the guardian and i needed to give it the best shot i could so. That was the purpose. That was the challenge i had but it was also a challenge that i think i had stood up to with with regard the publisher. But it was definitely bigger than that was expected. Any concession. I was extremely fortunate both the do grumman collection, the Ezra Jack Keats foundation, have been supporting off of this book from the very beginning and have even given me extra resources that were not in the collection and places to go and look. That would give me more information than was in there. So i have absolutely that i felt like i needed to in there that is not there. And when i intentionally left out most of what you would like to know because i really do believe a human being has a right to be private. If she wants to be private, and if she tells a story, i will tell her stories and i will tell the stories that dont affect what she was like. But on the other hand. It just sometimes you should not know about a person. Absolutely. So i want to thank our wonderful authors here, our panelists. Lets give them here andharrisb. Dr. Andrew wiest sitting in the middle is University Professor of history in the school of humanities at the university of southern where