Storystorm 2024 Day 8: Angela Burke Kunkel Takes the Road More Traveled

by Angela Burke Kunkel

In the Boston Public Garden, near the Charles Street gate, is a sculpture I’ve walked past dozens, if not hundreds, of times. Maybe you have, too. Locals and tourists do it every single day. The statue is Make Way for Ducklings, created in bronze by Nancy Schön and based on the book of the same name by Robert McCloskey.

Now, I’d seen the statue and read the book to my children (again, maybe you have, too), but I hadn’t really thought about either in years—both were so familiar they’d become part of the background, for lack of a better term. That is, until I learned that there’s a replica of Boston’s beloved ducklings in Moscow. And with that, the idea for a picture book began . . .

I didn’t end up writing about the Moscow ducklings (turns out gifts made in the name of Cold War-era diplomacy don’t make for very good picture books), but that little bit of trivia did help me see the familiar in a new way. The more I learned about McCloskey and Schön, the more appreciation I had for their individual creative lives, how they inspired each other as artists, and how they became friends.

Mixing the familiar with a new spark of curiosity resulted in MAKE WAY: The Story of Robert McCloskey, Nancy Schön, and Some Very Famous Ducklings (illustrated by Claire Keane and published by Random House Studio).

It’s worth noting here that Emma Bland Smith also wrote a wonderful biography, MR. MCCLOSKY’S MARVELOUS MALLARDS (Calkins Creek). Even though the books take on the same subject, I couldn’t have had the same approach. While I can’t speak for Emma’s process, I can say my own book took the shape that it did because for me, MAKE WAY FOR DUCKLINGS is very much tied up in a place. I love McCloskey’s work because of my years in Boston—I recognize and remember so many landmarks as I flip through the pages. And I love Nancy Schön’s sculpture equally, because that’s a landmark, too—it’s one of the first places my husband and I took our children to when we visited Boston as a young family.

Idea-wise, I didn’t think this familiar-becoming-new spark was likely to happen again. But it did, with Barbara Cooney’s MISS RUMPHIUS. Like MAKE WAY FOR DUCKLINGS, it’s a beloved classic I rediscovered with own children. But I never considered it as the subject for a book until listening to Betsy Bird’s Fuse8 n’ Kate podcast, where I learned there was a real “Lupine Lady” named Hilda Hamlin. Now, I thought I knew Miss Rumphius—I’d pored over the illustrations in childhood, and can recite most of the words from memory. But here was this new piece of information, and the very thing that sparked an idea for Cooney, too?

Much like those Moscow ducklings, there wasn’t quite enough there to make a book about Hamlin. But I turned back towards Barbara Cooney—and started to see ways in which her own life, travels, and artistic development aligned with the fictional Miss Rumphius. My picture book biography, WORLD MORE BEAUTIFUL: The Life and Art of Barbara Cooney, is illustrated by Becca Stadtlander and will be released by Random House Studio this August.

So here’s my advice, Storystormers—look at your influences, especially the ones that call to you over time (George Saunders has an amazing exercise for this). It’s OK to retread familiar territory! It’s great if ideas are Big, Expansive, Original—but also, don’t worry about it so much? What feels familiar about those Big Ideas? Why do they make your brain ping and your chest ache a little bit in recognition? What places, themes, and images keep recurring in your life? What keeps showing up for you, and how do you want to respond on the page?

Angela Burke Kunkel is giving away a copy of MAKE WAY: The Story of Robert McCloskey, Nancy Schön, and Some Very Famous Ducklings to one lucky winner.

You’re eligible to win if you’re a registered Storystorm 2024 participant and you have commented only once on today’s blog post.

Prizes will be distributed at the conclusion of Storystorm.

Angela Burke Kunkel is the author of DIGGING FOR WORDS: José Alberto Gutiérrez and the Library He Built, MAKE WAY: The Story of Robert McCloskey, Nancy Schön and Some Very Famous Ducklings, PENGUIN JOUURNEY, and the upcoming WORLD MORE BEAUTIFUL: The Life and Art of Barbara Cooney. She lives with her family in Vermont, where she works as a school librarian. They visit Boston and Maine as often as they can. You can visit Angela at her website, AngelaKunkel.com, follow her on Instagram @angkunkel, or subscribe to her Substack newsletter.