ALL AROUND TOWN: The Photographs of Richard Samuel Roberts

by Dinah Johnson ‧ RELEASE DATE: Feb. 1, 1998

A moving album, combining a quiet, questioning text with sepia-toned photographs that self-taught Richard' Samuel Roberts took during the 1920s and '30s, in the African-American community of Columbia, South Carolina. Roberts's pictures may have been typical studio portraits of the time, but with the passage of years, and Johnson's comments, they provide a means for readers to travel into the past. Sometimes Johnson asks readers to search the photographs for the story behind those pictured, encouraging inquisitiveness and a form of interaction; other times she offers information (an author's note points out inventions), e.g., for two portraits of the same woman, ""With her apron on this lady was a maid./But without it she was a mother,/the best singer in the choir, a neighbor."" Text and photographs work a special magic to make the past feel new.

Pub Date: Feb. 1, 1998

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: 30

Publisher: Henry Holt

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 1998

Categories: CHILDREN'S