![]() ![]() The work is divided into two sections, "Falling In" and "Falling Out," and attempts to capture the breadth of feelings in a teenager's first love-the crush, the kiss, the bewilderment, and the betrayal. I am Wings: Poems about Love, Fletcher's first young adult work, is a collection of short unrhymed poems chronicling a romance, from start to finish, narrated by a boy named Lee. The father of four sons, Fletcher resides in Durham, New Hampshire, and continues to work as a nationally known educational consultant, speaker, and writer in the U.S., Europe, and the Middle East. He became an educational consultant in 1985, and in 1994, he published his first book for young adults, I am Wings. During this period, Fletcher discovered children's literature and decided he wanted to write for children, citing Cynthia Rylant, Katherine Paterson, Jane Yolen, Gary Paulsen, William Steig, Lois Lowry, and Aliki, among his major influences. He participated in writing workshops and worked for three years with the Teachers College Writing Project, assisting in staff development. in fiction writing from Columbia University in 1983. When he was twenty-eight years old, Fletcher returned to college, receiving an M.F.A. Reading parties with his family and friends, with everyone bringing his or her own poem. His brother's death also inspired Fletcher to begin writing poetry and, for many years, he held poetry The experience later served as the inspiration for Fletcher's first novel Fig Pudding (1995). When Fletcher was twenty-one, his seventeen-year-old brother, Bob, was killed in an automobile accident. in 1975, and participated in two foreign study programs, living briefly in Tonga in the South Pacific and Sierra Leone in West Africa. He attended Dartmouth College, graduating with his B.A. He began writing at an early age with the encouragement of his junior high school and high school teachers. As a young boy, Fletcher became a voracious reader, with a particular interest in sports stories, the works of Edgar Allen Poe, and Jack London's Call of the Wild. His father, Ralph Sr., was a textbook publisher. BIOGRAPHICAL INFORMATIONįletcher was born on March 17, 1953, the eldest of nine children. Fletcher is also an educational consultant and has written extensively on the craft of writing-particularly for adolescents hoping to become writers-in such works as How Writers Work: Finding a Process that Works for You (2000) and Poetry Matters: Writing a Poem from the Inside Out (2002). ![]() He has won acclaim for his ability to accurately reflect the speech and thoughts of his well-drawn protagonists and, through them, speak to his teenaged readers. His first few published titles appeared in the early 1990s, but it was his 1994 volume of poetry for young adults, I am Wings: Poems about Love, that garnered him solid reviews and established him as a popular writer with adolescent readers. INTRODUCTIONĪn eclectic writer, Fletcher is the author of a number of well received volumes of fiction and poetry for young readers. The following entry presents an overview of Fletcher's career through 2003. American young adult poet, nonfiction writer, young adult novelist, and author of picture books.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |