Reviews

Silent Music: A Story of Baghdad by James Rumford

jcroom's review against another edition

Silent Music: A Story of Baghdad, tells the story of Ali, a boy that is much like other boys in his city. He likes to play soccer in the streets, listen to music and dance, but there is one thing that sets Ali apart from the other kids, he enjoys the art of calligraphy. Ali gets lost in his art of writing calligraphy, and uses it as a form of escape. Calligraphy is his silent music that drowns out the war going on outside his door. This story brings together many different elements, connecting cultures, as well as connecting the past to the present. The book is filled with lively images of Ali and his family, as well as pictures and diagrams that give the reader a better idea of his culture. The background images were filled with example of Arabic text and give the reader a better understanding of their writing system. For many students this type of text is completely new and different. The letters used in Arabic are different than what we see here in the English language. Also, they write from right to left, where as we write from left to right. I really enjoyed the fact that there were so many little cultural details given throughout the story. There were images of different aspects of their culture such as, soccer, their money, different words.

This book would be great for K-3 grade readers. It is interesting and engaging enough to keep their attention, and the illustrations were insightful and provided a lot of extra information that wasn’t detailed in the text. This would be a good book to look at if you were going into a unit on cursive or calligraphy. It gives students a better understanding of different styles of writing.

Rumford, J. (2008). Silent music: A story of Baghdad. New York: Roaring Brook Press.

pussreboots's review against another edition

5.0

Silent Music by James Rumford tells the story of Ali who lives in Baghdad, loves loud music and soccer. When the bombings get too scary, he turns to the art of calligraphy, the "silent music" for comfort. His art is inspired by the words of master calligrapher Yakat who lived and worked 800 years ago.

Accompanying the text are intricate illustrations that weave together Ali's calligraphy with pictures from his life and that of Yakat's. It's done in a style evocative of Arabic mosaics. They appear to be multimedia collages but were apparently done in pencil and finished on the computer.

Although it's a picture book, it would best be suited for upper elementary grades. Besides the history and language lessons of Arabic script, the book covers the invasion and bombing of Baghdad. The book could be used in tandem with a social studies or history unit.

Before using the book in class, read the Blogs Burt Lit post. It has an in depth analysis of the book in terms of language, themes, and historical context.

bethmitcham's review

4.0

Lovely collage illustrations back up the calligraphy examples In this story of a boy who likes to make pictures — music — with his pen.