Hesse, Karen. (2003). Witness. New York: Scholastic. 176 pp.

Grade Range: 6-12

Genre: Historical Fiction

Summary and Critique

In Witness, Hesse presents a story of the Klan's attempt to recruit members of a small Vermont town in 1924 and the effect the Klan's presence has on various residents. Many influential males join the Klan, whereas other residents are not deceived by the Klan's"all American" philosophy. Some try to walk a careful line of neutrality until they realize the importance of taking a stand. Life is especially difficult—and dangerous—for 12-year-old Leanora, an African-American girl, and Esther, a 6-year-old Jewish girl. In the end, a climactic moment of violence forces all to decide what they really believe.

Hesse's free verse format allows each of the voices of eleven residents to come through distinctly. Readers experience the events from many perspectives and witness how hate and love, violence and peace, and terror and kindness reign in one small town. An economy of words often renders the viewpoints frank and harsh, and Hesse does not shy away from presenting this time in history as it truly was. Thus, Witness is an ideal selection reader's theater (grades 5 and up), as well as a perfect complement to studies of this time period and other time periods in which fear and prejudice mingled with kindness and hope.

Awards

The Christopher Award

ALA Notable Children's Book

2001 School Library Journal Best Book of the Year

2001 Publisher's Weekly Best Book of the Year

Broad Themes, Issues, Topics Addressed

Friends and Enemies

Race, Ethnicity, and Culture

Challenges and Triumphs

War and Peace

The Individual vs. Society

Author Information

Hesse was raised in Maryland and attended the University of Maryland where she received a Bachelor's degree in English. Her fifth-grade teacher's encouragement inspired Hesse to become a professional writer. It took her thirty years of writing on the side and working assorted jobs before realizing her goal. Some of Hesse's other works include Letters From Rifka (1992), Phoenix Rising (1994), A Time of Angels (1995), The Music of Dolphins (1996), Out of the Dust (1997), Just Juice (1998), and Stowaway (2000). Currently Hesse and her family reside in Vermont.

"Karen Hesse." (2001). Kids Read. Retrieved June 10, 2004, from

http://www.kidsreads.com/authors/au-hesse-karen.asp.

For more information on Karen Hesse:

http://www.kidsreads.com/authors/au-hesse-karen.asp - A biographical sketch of Karen Hesse

http://www.scholastic.com/titles/outofthedust/speech.htm Scholastic presents a transcript of Hesse's speech delivered June 27, 1998 after winning the Newbery medal for Out of the Dust.

Media Connections

Movies

A Dry White Season (1989) A Caucasian school teacher living in South Africa takes action against the apartheid government, despite opposition from his family and friends.

From Swastika to Jim Crow. Reveals the little-known story of German refugee scholars who were expelled from their homeland by the Nazis and found new lives at the historically African-American colleges in the American South. Call 1-800-723-5522.

Ghosts of Mississippi. (1996). Introduces the dangers of civil rights work in the South in the 1960s and the difficulties in obtaining justice for slain civil rights activists.

Good Conversation: A Talk with Karen Hesse. 20-minute video. Tim Podell Productions, P.O. Box 244, Scarborough, NY 10510. Call 1-800-642-4181.

Many Faces, Many Voices. In their own words, people from across the United States share personal and oftentimes compelling stories and points of view on a wide range of diversity issues. This video can be watched online at www.pbs.org by clicking on"Schedules," the letter"M," and then the title.

Schindler's List. (1993). Depicts the heroic actions of Oskar Schindler, a German war profiteer who, because of his fundamental humanity and great courage, saved more than 1,100 Jews from death in the Holocaust.

Music

"America the Beautiful" and "Stars and Stripes Forever." These songs are mentioned specifically in the text and could be compared to other patriotic songs, noting the time periods in which they were written. Other songs that depict our nation/world could be incorporated: Neil Diamond's "America" and Louis Armstrong's "What a Wonderful World" as examples.

Music from many cultures that speak to issues of social injustice can be researched online by going to www.yahoo.com and searching for "music and social injustice." Listings offer information about many cultures'music, including Indonesian, African-American, and Jewish, both historical and contemporary.

Audio

Witness, a multi-voice recording by Listening Library, a division of Random House. Two cassettes, including an interview with Karen Hesse. Call 1-800-243-4504.

Online Resources

Biographical information, book listings, and interviews: www.scholastic.com; http://www.edupaperback.org/showauth.cfm?authid=56; http://www.kidsreads.com/authors/au-hesse-karen.asp.

Reviews of Witness—all very favorable!: http://www.teenreads.com (all reviews by Teens ); http://www.bookreporter.com; http://www.uiowa.edu.

Resources for teaching Hesse and Witness: http://www.geocities.com; http://www.secondaryenglish.com.

On the subject of racial prejudice: http://www.splcenter.org; http://www.teachingtolerance.org; http://www.adl.org; http://www.facinghistory.org.

Related Texts

Wolff, Virginia E. (1998). Bat 6. New York: Scholastic. 230pp. The tradition of a sixth-grade girls'softball game between two rival towns—narrated in the voice of all eighteen girls on the two teams is disrupted in the late 1940s by a prejudice born of World War II.

Hooks, William. (1982). Circle of Fire. New York: Atheneum. 147pp. In the tidewater country of North Carolina in 1936, three children try to thwart the plans of the Ku Klux Klan to destroy an encampment of Irish tinkers.

Uchida, Yoshiko. (1984). Desert Exile: The Uprooting of a Japanese-American Family. Seattle: University of Washington Press. 154pp. After the attack on Pearl Harbor by Japan and the outbreak of World War II, Uchida's family endures the fate suffered by many other Japanese-Americans—forced to abandon their home and relocated to an internment camp in Utah. See others by Uchida on the same subject.

Strasser, Todd. (2000). Give a Boy a Gun. New York: Simon & Schuster. 146pp. Peer pressure, cliques, bullying, and teacher apathy all lead to a climax of violence in one high school of today, as told in the voices of many participants and an outside reporter.

D'Angelo, Laura. (1999). Hate Crimes. Philadelphia: Chelsea House. 95pp. Discusses violence directed against individuals or groups based on differences in race, ethnicity, religion, or sexual preference, and features highly publicized cases in the United States.

Blakeslee, Ann R. (2000). Summer Battles. New York: Marshall Cavendish. 127pp. Eleven-year-old Kath and her sister are spending the summer with their grandfather, a minister in Peaceable, Indiana, in 1926, when he is targeted by the local Klan for preaching against their message and for employing a black housekeeper.

Cohn, Janice. (1995). The Christmas Menorahs: How a Town Fought Hate. Morton Grove: Whitman. 39pp. Based on a true incident that occurred in Billings, Montana. Townspeople stand up against hatred when anti-Semitic skinheads throw rocks through the windows of Jewish homes displaying Hanukkah menorahs.

Altman, Linda Jacobs. (1997). The Decade That Roared: America During Prohibition. New York: Twenty-first Century Books. 110pp. A look at the social impact of Prohibition, an unprecedented regulatory step, which involved many larger-than-life characters, including gangsters and revivalists.

Yolen, Jane. (1990). The Devil's Arithmetic. New York: Puffin. 170pp. Hannah resents the traditions of her Jewish culture until she travels back in time to a Jewish village in Nazi-occupied Poland.

Strasser, Todd. (1981). The Wave. New York: Dell Laurel Leaf. 144pp. Based on a true incident that occurred in a high school history class in California in 1969. A teacher demonstrates to his students the powerful forces of group pressure and their devastating effect on individual rights.

Lee, Harper. (1960). To Kill a Mockingbird. New York: HarperCollins. 323pp. Set in Maycomb, Alabama, in the 1930s, and told by the young daughter of the town's principled lawyer, Atticus Finch, this is an enduring story of race, class, justice, and the terrible consequences of prejudice. (Film also available.)

Teaching Ideas

BEFORE READING / AFTER READING

(1) "Biographical Impressions." Take advantage of the black-and-white photographs at the front of the book by asking each student—before reading any of the textmdash;to write a short biography for any single character. After reading, have each student explore the ways in which his/her biography does and does not match what readers learn about the character. Then launch a discussion about the theme of appearances versus reality and the ways in which acting on our first impressions of someone/something can lead us awry.

WHILE READING

(2) "Tracking Who's Who." Because the characters speak for themselves, readers learn a great deal about each of them. The hard part is keeping them all straight. To help, have each student become an "expert tracker" for one of the characters. Each student keeps a list called "Ten Things You Should Know About ___." These lists, because they provide "summaries" at a glance, can enhance discussions that occur while/after reading the text. (Adapted from Notes Plus, August 2000.)

AFTER READING

(3) "‘Identity'and a Sense of Self." Read Julio Noboa Polanco's poem"Identity." Have students decide which characters in Witness fit Polanco's depiction of a weed and which fit the depiction of a flower. Students should use textual evidence to support their choices. Students can then discuss the situations in which they themselves are/have been weeds and flowers. (Adapted from Notes Plus, October 1994.)

(written by Charles Fuhrken and edited by Jennifer Moore)