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The Newbery Medal is the oldest children's book award in the world. It was established in 1921 and is awarded annually by the American Library Association. Named after John Newbery, a British bookseller and publisher who specialized in children's books, this prestigious award recognizes the most distinguished American children's book published the previous year. As it turns out, only three books of poetry have ever won the Newbery Medal. The first was Nancy Willard's A Visit to William Blake's Inn: Poems for Innocent
and Experienced Travelers, which won in 1982. The book includes such delightfully titled poems as "The Wise Cow Enjoys A Cloud" and "The Marmalade Man Makes A Dance To Mend Us," and was also a Caldecott Honor Book, thanks to the illustrations of Alice and Martin Provensen. The other two poetry books to snag the award were Joyful Noise: Poems for Two Voices by Paul Fleischman (1989) and Out of the Dust by Karen Hesse (1998). What does it feel like to win a Newbery Medal? See
Nancy Willard's reaction. Apparently she took Blake's words, "Exuberance is beauty," to heart.
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