Margaret Edwards Luncheon, ALA Annual Conference, Day Two
Saturday afternoon, I attended the Margaret Edwards Award Luncheon. Sadly, the honoree, Terry Pratchett, was not able to come to accept the award in person, due to health concerns. However, people spoke about him, they showed a video clip of a speech he prepared, and when that didn’t work, his editor read the speech. We signed cards for him and all received signed copies of The Wee Free Men, as well as the issue of School Library Journal including an interview with Terry Pratchett.
I’m a bit ashamed to admit that I’ve never read a Terry Pratchett book. Now that I have a signed copy of The Wee Free Men, I will have to remedy that.
I jotted down some quotations I liked from the speeches. The first one is Terry Pratchett quoted, and the rest are from Sir Terry’s speech:
“The opposite of funny is not serious. The opposite of funny is not funny. The opposite of serious is not serious. Laughter can get through the keyhole while seriousness is still knocking on the door.”
“When you fill up with books, you overflow.”
“Fantasy is uni-age.”
“The shining path of books spans ages.”
“‘What book do you recommend for a child of eight?’ A book for a child of nine.”
I was happy that an author of humorous books for children won this serious award. The luncheon celebrated that such books, when well-written, do worlds of good for children of all ages.
After the luncheon, I took the shuttle bus back to the Convention Center where I attended the most practically helpful program for me of the weekend: Readers’ Advisory Research and Trends, with Nancy Pearl. I’ll blog about that tomorrow.