age is what attracted me to Blake’s work,” she added. In addition to the many creatures that she has created out of odds-and-ends, she also constructed a six-foot model of William Blake’s Inn while she was writing A Visit to William Blake’s Inn. The first version was created out of cardboard, but Willard’s cat one day leaped into the inn, causing it to tumble down. After that, a friend of hers replicated Willard’s previous work, recreating the inn with wood. The model of the inn currently resides in the rare book room at the University of Michigan’s library.
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s for finding a publisher, Willard commented that getting published often requires a bit of luck and knowing the right people. The first time she published was with an editor at her college during her undergraduate years; the editor had an idea for a collection of works and had asked Willard along with other students to submit writings for it. Once completed, the editor managed to circulate the books outside of the university, allowing the writers’ names to be seen in various places. Publishing was a topic of conversation outside the seminar as well when Willard met with Megan Klass, a junior elementary/special education major who has drafted a children’s book titled Dreams, Day and Night as an assignment for her course in Children’s Literature. Dr. Sharon Crisman, Assistant Professor of Education, (who encourages many of her students to pursue publishing their assignments) had been encouraging Klass to market her manuscript. Criman commented, “Klass wrote a contemporary realistic story that had a great rhyme scheme, and because her story incorporated day-to-day activity, I really think that it would appeal to children.”
Klass was unable to attend the afternoon seminar with Willard because she was away from campus on practicum where she had been working for several weeks with a kindergarten class in Waterford, Pennsylvania. Luckily, before the awards show and also the following morning, the two were able to meet so that Willard could share a few words of advice on working further with Klass’s manuscript. Smiles came about when the two realized that they had the same three-ring binder (a unique transparent light blue binder decorated with clouds) in which they kept their notes and manuscripts. During the discussion, they were able to exchange their thoughts on the importance of encouraging children to read at a very young age, and also how to make the literature interesting for them. The exchange was particularly interesting as Willard comes from a literary background, whereas Klass comes from an education background. “I was very thankful for the opportunity to meet Nancy Willard,” Klass said. “I had been looking for a publisher or an agent for my manuscript, but the only success I had experienced was with an agency that asked me to pay them money to read and work with the story. I knew it was a scam, and said ‘no thank you’,” Klass added. “The best way to get started,” Willard advised,” is to attend conferences and pay attention to what others are doing in the field of children’s literature. Conferences are a lot like trade shows, and they can help you meet agents who are more professional.” Klass along with the students Willard worked with at the seminar appreciated the time to interact with Willard, and as a gift to her, the students involved with the seminar created a character of their own out of scraps of materials that they collected. The character, Leota Buttons, was a doll with curly hair, glasses, a hat, and a basket of stars and jellybeans. (The stars were portable Christmas lights that actually lit up.) Phil Zimmerly ’05 commented, “What I liked best about what Nancy Willard had to say was her emphasis on the rough draft stage of poetry. Megan Klass ’06 (left) and Nancy Willard discuss Klass’ manuscript.
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