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Helen Keller (Ethics (Ready Reference series))

Author Profile

At the age of eighteen months, Helen Keller suffered a severe illness that left her blind and deaf. She could not communicate with other people. When Helen was eight years old, her parents hired a teacher, Anne Sullivan, from the Perkins Institution for the Blind. Ms. Sullivan taught Helen a manual alphabet and finger-spelled the names of various objects. Within two years, Helen learned to read and write in Braille. At age ten, Helen learned to speak by feeling the vibrations of Ms. Sullivan’s vocal cords. In 1990, Anne Sullivan accompanied Helen Keller to Radcliffe College. Four years later, Helen graduated cum laude and began writing essays on the rights of the handicapped. Her published articles caused people to become more aware of handicapped people. She lectured worldwide and gained the support of famous people on improving the rights of the disabled. Her publications include The World I Live In (1908), Out of the Dark (1913), Helen Keller’s Journal (1938), and Teacher: Anne Sullivan Macy (1955). Helen Keller was an activist for the rights of the disabled until her death in 1968.

Bibliography

Blatt, Burton. “Friendly Letters.” Exceptional Children 51 (February, 1985). A notable article on Keller’s personal growth.

Brooks, Van Wyck. Helen Keller: Sketch for a Portrait. New York: Dutton, 1956. Worthwhile.

Einhorn, Lois J. Helen Keller, Public Speaker: Sightless but Seen, Deaf but Heard. Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press, 1998. From the series Great American Orators.

Harrity, Richard, and Ralph G. Martin. The Three Lives of Helen Keller. Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1962. Contains scores of photographs.

Herrmann, Dorothy. Helen Keller: A Life. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1998. A comprehensive, candid biography that describes Keller’s turbulent relationship with Annie Sullivan, her doomed love affair, her struggles to earn a living, her triumphs at Radcliffe College, and her work as an advocate for the disabled.

Houston, Jean. Public Like a Frog: Entering the Lives of Three Great Americans. Wheaton, Ill.: Theosophical Publishing, 1993. Concise biographical sketches of Emily Dickinson, Thomas Jefferson, and Helen Keller, highlighting their spirituality. This work is unique in that the biographies are interspersed with personal growth exercises that invite the reader’s imaginative participation in crucial moments of the subjects’ lives.

Lash, Joseph P. Helen and Teacher: The Story of Helen Keller and Anne Sullivan Macy. 1980. Reprint. New York: Addison-Wesley, 1997. An excellent biography and literary examination, for which the Keller archives were first opened.

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