Fortunately for the world of young people's literature, there are those authors who broaden our realms of experience by representing and exploring African-American culture. Lucille Clifton is one of the most prolific and accomplished of this number. In this context, her work is especially impressive when viewed as an entire oeuvre. Each book works in concert with the others to illuminate aspects of the communities, largely African-American, in which the characters live their lives. Everett Anderson's is one of the lives which is documented through a series of books. An examination of the Everett Anderson stories reveals the range and richness of this youngster's life and of the series book itself. This is especially true when examined within the context of the secondary function (intentional or not) of Clifton's telling of story: the exploration of Afro-American community and consciousness.

Everett Anderson is, in fact, the character most readily identified with Lucille Clifton. His story is both powerful and accessible precisely because of its inclusivity. It records not only memorable events such as births, but also the everyday. Everett Anderson can make any Wednesday afternoon into an adventure:

Who's black
and runs
and loves to hop?
Everett does.
Who's black
and was lost
in the candy shop?
Everett Anderson was.
Who's black
and noticed the
peppermint flowers?
Everett Anderson did.
Who's black
and was lost for
hours and hours?
Everett Anderson
                                                                      Hid!

(unpaged)

Considered carefully, these verses from Some of the Days of Everett Anderson are not as simplistic as they might appear upon cursory examination. They are complicated—communicating more than a child's adventure—by the one recurring line, “Who's black.”

A negative reaction to the line might include the argument that its prominent placement (not to mention its mere presence) is somewhat exclamatory and unjustifiable. What, after all, does being Black have to do with a trip to the candy store or playing hide and seek? This line of reasoning, however, obscures the more germane questions: Why is this particular detail included along with the unremarkable? One obvious answer is that this fact too should be unremarkable—unremarkable in the sense that it is so integral and organic a part of the character of Everett Anderson that it would be even more conspicuous in its absence.

Certainly the words “Who's black” are not called upon literally or blatantly in every episode that Clifton relates. But they are present in a spiritual and fundamental way. The point is that Everett is Black, as are many of his fellow characters. They are. And it is a condition of their being. This fact is simultaneously neither remarkable nor ignorable. It is for this reason that the boys share a brotherhood. When their blackness deserves or demands special attention, then it is accorded. When it deems no particular attention, it is left so. Everett's maturation process, like that of his peers, consists partly of learning how to mediate between the two levels of consciousness.

Everett Anderson is helped along in this process by his mother, the most significant force in his life. They are partners as well as mother and son. The reader is first introduced to her in Some of the Days—“Friday, Waiting for Mom”:

When I am seven
Mama can stay
from work and play with me
all day.
I won't go to school,
I'll pull up a seat
by her and we can talk and eat.
And we will laugh
at how it ends;
Mama and
Everett Anderson—
Friends.

(unpaged)

Their close friendship is evident in all of the stories. In Everett Anderson's Year, his seventh, Everett reaches the point at which he can verbalize his pride in this friendship. This kind of relationship is certainly the basic foundation for his trust in his mother and her respect towards him. It is also during this year that she advises him always to “Walk tall in the world.” Her respect for him, then, is manifested through her straight-forwardness with him about both the world he lives in and about their personal lives. Together, they work through everything from their identity as Black people to her relationship with a man other than Everett's father, from whom she is estranged.

Part of the strength of this mother figure that Clifton has created is her quietness and unspoken presence in these situations. For example, when Everett is thinking through some of his concerns while alone, his mother's influence is, essentially, taken for granted. This is the case especially in instances concerning Everett's sense of self; it is clear that his mother has been instilling certain values in him consistently and successfully. At the age of six, he evinces some significant crystallizations of her lessons. At bedtime he thinks:

Afraid of the dark
is afraid of Mom
and Daddy
and Papa
and Cousin Tom.
“I'd be as silly,
as I could be,
afraid of the dark
is afraid of me!”
Says ebony
Everett
Anderson.

(Some of the Days, unpaged)

At age seven, during “September” of Everett Anderson's Year, he asserts frankly:

I already know where Africa is
and I already know how to
count to ten and
I went to school every day last year,
why do I have to go again?

(unpaged)

What is plain is that for Everett Anderson and for his mother, who has most probably done much of his early teaching, knowledge of Africa is just as fundamental as the skill of counting. His sense of self and identity is secure, and this is evident to any reader. This fact, for the young Black reader, functions as a stabilizing and assuring force. For the white reader, on the other hand, it should merely accentuate the sense of character behind Everett, thus proving in no way threatening to a reader's sense of identity.

The verse above is notable not only for what it says or implies, but for the way in which substance is combined with technical construction. Obviously it is poetic, which is significant when talking about literature for the very young. It is especially relevant here, in light of the fact that all seven Everett Anderson books are versified. In this regard, McCann and Richard warn of the “pitfalls of forced rhyme and uneven rhythm” insofar as they can distract from an ultimate goal of storytelling. They advise, furthermore, that “In a rhyming text words need to be chosen which are as logical for the content of the narrative as they would be in a work of prose; they should seem almost inevitable” (89). Clifton's adherence to this criterion is, for the most part, commendable, as is evident in the preceding verse. The rhythm, in fact, never slows down or changes pace. This technicality lends to the piece a feeling of breathlessness, suggestive of the manner in which Everett might have uttered it.

This lively rhythm adds to the credibility of the character of Everett through invoking a characteristic shared by many stories for and about children—humor. Whether Everett is being purposely ridiculous or completely serious in spite of his ill reasoning one does not know. In any case, the moment is recognized and appreciated for its candor and authenticity. This same flavor of sincerity is present throughout the Everett Anderson volumes both in form and substance.

In no context is this constant sincerity more deeply realized than in reference to the glaring and painful absence of Everett's father. His absence is mentioned in every book, with varying implications. At Christmas time, for instance, Everett, like any small boy, dreams of the gifts that he might receive—including those that his father might have given him if his father had been there (Everett Anderson's Year, unpaged). When Everett locks himself out of the apartment, he imagines that if his father were there he would call him only “a careless boy … and not be mad / and I'd be glad” (Everett Anderson's Friend, unpaged). And ironically enough, though recognizably realistic, there are even times when he misses the spankings his father used to give him (Everett Anderson's Year, unpaged). On a lonely Sunday in Some of the Days, the depth of Everett's feeling for his father is evident:

Daddy's back
is broad and black
and Everett Anderson loves to ride it.
Daddy's side
is black and wide
and Everett Anderson sits beside it.
Daddy's cheek
is black and sleek
and Everett Anderson kisses it.
Daddy space
is a black empty place
and Everett Anderson misses it.

(unpaged)

From a formal standpoint, one of the most powerful aspects of this particular poem is the way in which Clifton has utilized the same vocabulary to describe Everett's father as she uses throughout the series to describe Everett himself. Being Black is a basic characteristic. And particularly notable in this case is the fact that it is associated with worth and loving (in conjunction with but not confused with the negative connotations), intensifying Everett's own self-identity. Moreover, Clifton's usage of the technical device of repetition, in reference to the name “Everett Anderson,” achieves its ultimate function. “Anderson” is Everett's most tangible bond with this father. Its unceasing repetition is, each and every time, a reaffirmation of his identity and being.

His name continues to be an important issue, and perhaps even gains further importance when his mother remarries and is expecting another child:

Mama is Mrs. Perry now, and it's fun
that Mr. Tom Perry is almost a dad
and doesn't mind that Everett Anderson
plans to keep the name he had.

(Everett Anderson's Nine Month Long, unpaged)

What all this suggests, finally, is that Everett, young as he is, is an intelligent, creative, and well-adjusted youngster. He has a solid sense of self as well as appreciation for situations which he does not understand completely.

Recall for instance Everett's hopes that at some point his mother will not have to work constantly, thus being able to spend more time with him. He knows, however, that it is a necessity that she work in some capacity: on the fourth of July he cannot make a birthday cake for America because “the sugar is almost gone / and payday's not till later on” (Everett Anderson's Year, unpaged). This sarcasm on Clifton's part is acceptable here largely because its mere articulation makes the reality of the situation more poignant. If children approach books with a certain lack of experience, it is, in part, this kind of process identification, no matter how simplistic, and articulation of circumstances that begins to compensate. Clearly though, as in Everett's case, it is possible on some level for a child, either character or reader, to integrate and to appreciate disparate ideas and events. His Thanksgiving prayer in Everett Anderson's Year states simply:

Thank you for the things we have,
thank you for Mama and turkey and fun,
thank you for Daddy wherever he is,
thank you for me, Everett Anderson.

(unpaged)

It is apparent that Everett Anderson's mother and father, if only through name, provide foundations for his identity.

A final element which must be considered is his environment or home, his sense of place. Everett's place, in fact, is virtually personified in many instances: Apartment 14A has a character of its own. It is, as Everett expresses in Everett Anderson's Christmas Coming, “a blessing” (unpaged).

In some ways 14A is the grandmother who is identified, traditionally, with the Afro-American extended family. It is the comforter and the refuge, a point of stability and permanence. Form 14A Everett can watch the pretty part of snow before it becomes slush. From 14A he can pretend that the noise of sirens is only other boys and girls playing, and not a sign of trouble. High up in 14A he can imagine “that the stars are where / apartment end” (Some of the Days of Everett Anderson, unpaged).

The import of 14A is also evident on another, more socially than individually based level, in Everett Anderson's 1-2-3. When his mother decides to remarry, Everett decides that “Three [people] can work and sing and dance / and not make a crowd in 14A.” And most significant in terms of the steadfastness of 14A in Everett's life is the announcement in Everett Anderson's Nine Month Long that “Something is growing in 14A.” The apartment is placed on an almost equal level with Everett's mother as a place of nourishment for a new life.

The element of “place” is so important because it eventually assumes a focal role in the development of, “brotherhood.” Not only does place have an enveloping and familiar quality (as with Everett and his new family members), but it also connotes a quality of expendability. Whether in a physical or psychological sense, it expands in a manner to encompass in turn new friends, a community, and a sense of relatedness to the world at large. All of these stages are reflected in the stories of Clifton's male characters.

In Everett Anderson's Friend, his sense of place begins to expand appreciably when “someone new has come to stay / next door in 13A.” This event marks the physical breaking of the limits of his own 14A—a 14A (before his sister's birth) that is characterized by the presence of little boys. When he finally spies the new neighbors, he softly bemoans, “Why did they have to be / a family of / shes?” Furthermore, this is the first time he and his friends have met a girl who can challenge them. Their reaction is a truthful: “Girls named Maria who / win at ball / are not a bit of fun / at all.”

With the introduction of a new neighbor Clifton marvelously and realistically advances Everett's maturity and experience on several levels. He does grow, after all, to consider Maria a friend—partly on the basis that he now has somewhere to go if he forgets his keys and that “Even if she beats at races it's / nicer to lose in familiar places.” So what is happening at least in part is an early barrier-breaking of sexism. Equally important is the subsequent barrier-breaking of ethnicity and cultural identity:

Maria's Mama makes little pies
called Tacos,
calls little boys Muchachos,
and likes to thank the Dios;
Oh, 13A is a lovely surprise
to Everett Anderson's eyes!

(unpaged)

This episode takes on all the more significance when considered in light of the following comment by Dorothy Broderick made in reference to Georgene Faulkner's Melindy's Happy Summer. By negative illustration, it illumines Clifton's achievement and function within the world of children's literature through her characterizations. This negative example is relevant in that, with children's literature, it is useful to examine that which is happening as well as that which is not. Broderick argues this:

The problem, of course, is that once an author has made up his or her mind to use a book to show that all children are alike, he or she eliminates the uniqueness of the black experience … This type of situation serves to reinforce the white child's (and the black's) idea that the closer the blacks come to thinking and acting “white” the more acceptable they are.

It is the cumulative effect and the overall lack of balance that gives rise to stereotype, not the presentation within any particular book.

(125)

It is clear that Clifton adroitly circumvents the problems that Broderick outlines. In Everett Anderson's Friend, certainly, she invokes the question of ethnic identities. As seen throughout the Everett Anderson series, in fact, its implications are of inherent import. However, Clifton never resorts to overstatement to achieve this sense. Instead, she sometimes makes no apparent statement whatsoever or simply reformulates issues of ethnicity in terms of economic class or level of social consciousness, still adding to a sense of maturation in the characters.

Just as Clifton's work contributes to the equilibrium that Broderick urges, the moral that Everett takes away from his experience with Maria is that “things have a way of / balancing out”—“Lose a key, / win a friend.” Likewise, nature's ultimate balancing act between life and death is poignantly portrayed with the two texts Everett Anderson's Nine Month Long, anticipating the birth of his half-sister, and Everett Anderson's Goodbye, in which he mourns his father's death.

When considering the Everett Anderson series in relationship to African-American consciousness, we discern one overriding idea: the more firmly one is grounded and sustained, personally and communally, within his or her identity and culture, the more receptive one is to novel experiences. Similarly, if African-American youth are consistently exposed to books which render them visible, through illustration, language or story, perhaps these youngsters will be that much more open to the world of books in general.

The Everett Anderson series is a dynamic example of the personal and cultural development of one child—a development which could be chronicled, for young readers, only through the form of the series. This form is useful because it allows Clifton to treat various issues independently, placing emphasis on an issue such as death or friendship, while simultaneously exhibiting the interrelatedness of various issues. For example, references to Everett's father and his apartment appear in numerous books, though each of these subjects is also treated separately in some of the verses quoted earlier in this discussion.

It is also significant that all of the Everett Anderson books address human relationships, whether they be friendships, family relationships, or the relationship between the individual and the culture which he is growing into. Events which seem merely unimportant occurrences of everyday life assume larger proportions for children: meeting a new friend, splashing in rain puddles, facing one's fear of a dark bedroom. Other events serve as markers of time for both young people and adults, but are experienced differently by different generations: beginning a new school year, preparing of holidays. And finally, there are those events which are equally momentous to both young and old, but which, for adults are understood as components in the cycle of living: births and deaths. Clifton addresses such events in Everett Anderson's Nine Month Long and in Everett Anderson's Goodbye.

One of many gifts of children's literature is its ability to help young people to explore the immensity of human experience, while still appreciating themselves. The form of the series book is a potent way in which children's book writers offer this gift. The series makes this kind of exploration very accessible to the young reader because, with a familiar character, the reader is broadening his or her experience while remaining within a familiar frame of reference. One of the many achievements of the Everett Anderson series in particular is that it illustrates the life of one little Black boy, in its fullness. He is a boy who is aware of his blackness and of his humanity. The picture series is the only form through which his identity could be explored adequately for the very young reader. Through literature, children learn about our society and our world, in their complexity. And the African-American reader in particular, leaves the Everett Anderson series with a greater appreciation of the self, sharing Everett's stance when he ends his grace saying, “thank you for me, Everett Anderson” (Everett Anderson's Year, unpaged).

Works Cited

Broderick, Dorothy. Image of the Black in Children's Fiction. New York and London. R. R. Bowker Company, 1973.

Clifton, Lucille. Everett Anderson's Christmas Coming. Illus. by Evaline Ness. New York: Holt, 1971.

———. Everett Anderson's Friend. Illus. by Ann Grifalconi. New York: Holt, 1976.

———. Everett Anderson's Goodbye. Illus. by Ann Grifalconi. New York: Holt, 1983.

———. Everett Anderson's Nine Month Long. Illus. by Ann Grifalconi. New York: Holt, 1974.

———. Everett Anderson's 1-2-3. Illus. by Ann Grifalconi. New York: Holt, 1976.

———. Everett Anderson's Year. Illus. by Ann Grifalconi. New York: Holt, 1974.

———. Some of the Days of Everett Anderson. New York: Holt, 1970.

Faulkner, Georgene. Melindy's Happy Summer. New York: Julian Messner, 1979.

MacCann, Donnarae and Olga Richard. The Child's First Books: A Critical Study of Pictures and Text. New York: H. W. Wilson Company, 1973.