The Dreamer

Ryan, Pam Munoz and Sis, Peter. The Dreamer. New York: Scholastic Press, 2010.

The Dreamer is a fictionalized account of Chilean poet Pablo Neruda's childhood, written by Pam Munoz Ryan and illustrated by Peter Sis. It is an ALA Notable Children's Book for Older Readers. When Neruda was a child, he was known as Neftalí Reyes. He began to use Neruda as his pen name, taken from his favorite poet, and later legally changed his name to reflect this.

In the book, Neftalí is a daydreamer who finds beauty in many things. Rather than do his schoolwork, he imagines numbers on his page lazily floating around as he listens to raindrops. Neftalí's father is not supportive of his creativity and wants his son to have a "real job" in the future. Neftalí's father is a source of anguish and intimidation. Eventually, Neftalí gets a job at a newspaper with his uncle and publishes a political article that upsets his father. Neftalí's father ransacks his bedroom and burns all of his writing notebooks. Neftalí worries because he is set to publish a poem in local and university newspaper later that week. He decides to use the pen name Pablo Neruda. Neftalí says "he would use this name to save Father the humiliation of having a son who was a poet. Maybe he would use the name only until he became lost enough to find himself. Maybe he would even keep the name. It might take him places. After all, it had a rhythm like a locomotive chugging uphill."

It's hard to classify the genre of this book - it combines fiction, biography, poetry, and illustration into one sensory journey. I felt that the book was a bit difficult to follow at times, as the storylines jump around and are interrupted by poems and drawings, but these are also great interruptions that might prompt moments of introspection and analysis from readers. This book would work well at the middle school level, and would be great for students who are drawn to the arts. The end of the book also contains selected poems by Pablo Neruda. This book, then, would work well to tie together an author study unit about Neruda - students would read poetry, fiction, and could supplant with some biography.