Pink: A Women’s March Story

Now, Zimmerman has captured the experience of the Women’s March on Washington in her new children’s book, Pink: A Women’s March Story. Illustrated by Mary Newell DePalma, it captures the sights and sounds of that day — the honking cars, the energy of the crowd and notable figures like Gloria Steinem speaking in the distance. And of course, the knit pink hats, worn by nearly everyone, including the narrator Lina, a little girl who looks out on the crowd from atop her father’s shoulders and feels like “one little stitch in a great big beautiful hat.”

Zimmerman, now a professor of English at Bucknell, grew up in Northern Virginia, “in the shadow of government,” and even as a young child was aware of marches, protests and civic action in nearby D.C. Moreover, her mother was a volunteer poll worker who participated in groups like the League of Women Voters. As a result, Zimmerman grew up with the idea that “you have a voice and a role to play with civic responsibility and protest.”

Nonetheless, it was a challenge to take the “adult content behind the need for the book” and translate it to something relatable for 4- to 8-year-olds. Zimmerman chose to emphasize “the notion of strength in numbers, and that girls are amazing and valuable — and no one should say otherwise.”

Zimmerman never set out to become a children’s book author. But teaching classes on Victorian literature and children’s literature from the 19th century to the present, she had frequent conversations with students about themes like memory and childhood. The ideas sparked by those conversations eventually turned into The Rosemary Spell, a young adult novel from 2015 that “blends Shakespeare and magic in [an] enthralling story,” as Publishers Weekly puts it. (Another children’s book of hers, La finestra del temps, was published in Barcelona in 2012.)

Zimmerman says she hopes her latest work will inspire readers to be confident in their ability to effect change. “Even if, as an individual, you feel small or that you can’t make a difference, coming together with other people who share your concerns is a way to make a really big difference.”

Alumni Books

Leo V. Kanawada Jr. ’63
George Clinton: An American Founding Father and American Independence (self-published, 2022)
Kanawada, an education major who went on to a master’s and Ph.D. in history and a 30-year career in teaching, provides an enlightening snapshot of the early political life of George Clinton, the governor of New York during the Revolutionary War and fourth vice president of the United States. His case study sheds new light on Clinton’s decision on the question of independence.

Alan R. Davis ’68
Technopoetical Musings from the Metaverse (self-published, 2022)
Davis was a mathematics major at Bucknell who had a career in teaching, culminating as a professor of computer science and mathematics, but he also credits Bucknell for providing the foundation for his second life as a writer. His latest collection of poetry implores the reader to “use your imagination and your intellect” and travel into “a metaverse much older than that now associated with virtual reality.”

faculty and staff Books