Wilson Bentley loves the snow and like all things beautiful he wants to find a way to capture the beautiful snowflakes and keep them forever. He tries and tries and after a life dedicated to recording the unique and beautiful images he captures a book, his gift to the world, is published. His life ended due to the thing he lived for, a snow storm, but in his home town a museum and memorial honor his life's work.
Bibliographic Citation:
Martin, J.B. (1998). Snowflake Bentley. Boston, MA: Houghton Mifflin Company.
My Impression:
The 1999 Caldecott winner, this nonfiction narrative is an incredible story of a man who truly loved the snow. As a reader who also loves the snow this book greatly appealed to me, but would also be a good read for anyone interested in science or photography or throughout the Wintery months of the year. Azarian's illustrations allowed me as a reader to put myself in the story beyond the words. It is hard to capture the magic and mystery of the snow but both the story and the illustrations do just that while telling and showing a story about doing the same.
Reviews:
"With Mary Azarian’s superb woodcuts to illustrate it this fascinating book captures the essence of a man who did what he loved even though he was made fun of and even though he did not make any money from his passion. Bentley took his photographs because the beauty of snow fascinated him and because he wanted to share the beauty that he saw with others. We are able to see that though he was a scientist who studied the weather and snow formation, he was also an artist at heart who was happiest when he was capturing the images of snowflakes on plates of glass."
http://www.lookingglassreview.com/html/snowflake_bentley.html
How to use this book in your library:
What better way than to show the magic of the snowflake than to use this book? Encourage children to look for beauty in all object and perhaps find a method of collecting what they find a beautiful.
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