Press
“Sometimes I am Maya in the middle of the book, filled with pessimism about the future of the world. However, I spend more and more time in the same emotional space as Maya at the end of the book: feeling held by revolutionary Black women past and present, love for the many communities I am a part of, and confidence in our collective capacity to change this world for the better.”
Interview | November 10, 2023
Using her own history and experience with gardens and gardening, Gwendolyn’s stories remind us (no matter our age) that our gardens raise and tend to us as much as we raise and tend to them!
Podcast | November 9, 2023
“To be honest, my writing for adults and children tackles very similar issues and themes. I am fascinated by the stories people tell about the relationship between their bodies and their environments, and how histories of race and gender influence those stories. Every topic can be explained to children in an age-appropriate way.”
Interview | October 20, 2023
“As radical people, thinking about how we can incorporate children into our movements is really important; seeing them not as property but as people who have just as much to teach us as we have to teach them. As adults, if we can talk to children, if we can truly be in community with children, and see them as collaborators, that’s the best we can do. I think that makes the burden feel lighter for all of us.”
Interview | October 16, 2023
“Joy Takes Root is a story ‘about cultural retention ... about how we pass down traditions, and how we pass down hope and thankfulness even amongst these really, really hard and terrible histories,’ said Wallace. It reflects her experiences as a Black woman and descendant of the Gullah Geechee people.”
Article | July 8, 2023
“Joy Takes Root follows a Black girl named Joy as she explores her grandmother’s garden in South Carolina. As Joy connects with the plants, she also connects with herself, her grandmother, and her ancestors. It’s a story of mindfulness, gratitude, and intergenerational relationships. It also draws from my experiences gardening with my paternal grandmother in South Carolina!”
Interview | May 24, 2023
“I was not someone who considered myself very in touch with my body, but there was just something about feeling my bare feet in the soil, touching a leaf and learning to tell what my plant needed. . . searching on my hands and knees for strawberries, talking to my plants. . .those things made me feel connected to both myself and the earth in a way I hadn’t before…”
Article | May 12, 2023
‘“Courage” was the recurring call to action and inspiration at the eighth annual Kweli Color of Children’s Literature Conference, which took place from Friday, March 31 to Sunday, April 2. The event featured a notable lineup of authors, illustrators, and publishing professionals participating in the nation’s largest children’s book conference exclusively for Black, Indigenous, and other creators of color. For the first time since the pandemic began in 2020, the conference offered day-long, in-person sessions.’
Article | March 2, 2023
“This week, we're picking up a question that was lingering from our conversation with Layli: how do we know when we’re being unjust to children? In today’s episode, we’ll be speaking to Gwendolyn Wallace, a children’s book author, about how injustice is baked into the way we see and engage children, and how we can learn to be more just in our interactions with them.”
Podcast Episode | Feb 6, 2023
“‘After volunteering in numerous classrooms and working at summer camps, I realized how much we can learn from children if only we listen. I tell people that I have learned more about love, community, and justice from children than I ever have from adults. All children deserve books that are honest with them about this wild world, and I wasn’t seeing enough of that in the classrooms I worked in,’ said scholarship recipient Gwendolyn Wallace in her application.”
Article | May 11, 2022
“The Creative Writing Advisory Board (CWAB) is essential to reviewing submissions from the annual Elizabeth Alexander Creative Writing Award and ultimately, choosing its winners. This year, the CWAB chose Gwendolyn Maya Wallace as the winner of the award.
Gwendolyn Maya Wallace’s winning piece, “To Forage,” was published in Volume 20, Issue 2.”
Article | 2021
“Who better to help us imagine new worlds than kids, who have the biggest and brightest imaginations? And so I really wanted to write a book about socio-emotional learning for kids that took them out of their own head and asked ‘What is going on in my community? What is going on with the world around me? How can I make change? How do I find role models?’”
Podcast| October 6, 2023