Black History Month continues with Faith Ringgold, renown artist and author of the children’s classic Tar Beach. Ringgold grew up in the Depression era in Harlem in the 1930s. As a young girl, she saw the injustices of money and race firsthand during the latter years of the Harlem Renaissance.
Ringgold not only created beautiful art from her experiences, but she decided to take a chance and write Tar Beach. This book centers on little Cassie Lightfoot, a black girl protagonist. She uses the rooftop of her Harlem apartment building (her “tar beach”) as a launch pad to fly all over Harlem, especially to segregated areas, which Cassie, as a black girl, would not have been allowed.
Tar Beach gives permission for black children, and all children for that matter, to dream and dream big. That’s the beauty of Cassie’s story: she’s a dreamer and she can accomplish things others could never even fathom. So take a trip down memory lane with us and think back to the time when you were a dreamer with our article entitled Faith Ringgold’s Tar Beach, A Literary Review.
And please note, this is just the start of our Harlem articles. Next week will be entirely dedicated to the Harlem Renaissance on LT.net! So stay tuned …
