Wangari Maathai: The Woman Who Planted Millions of Trees by Franck Prévot (review)

This French picture-book biography chronicles the life and achievements of Wangari Maathai, the late Kenyan politician and Nobel Peace Prize–winner. The book treats her childhood in colonial Kenya and discusses her 1977 creation of the Green Belt movement, her economic/environmental initiative that gave village women a bonus for each tree they grow. It also explores her challenge to Kenyan president Daniel arap Moi, which resulted in her being jailed several times, and looks at her political career following Moi’s fall. While the text tips initially into the romantic a little, the coverage overall (though focusing on the professional rather than the personal) is much fuller than in previous picture-book biographies of Maathai, contextualizing her efforts as political as well as environmental and situating her activism in regional and personal history. Full-bleed illustrations feature mixed-media art that combines saturated painterly colors in a rich and moody palette with rhythmic and delicate pencil-drawn details in foliage and clothing; the elongated figures in wide spaces recall those of Jude Daly (Cunnane’s Chirchir Is Singing, BCCB 10/11), while the atmospheric intricacies lend a folkloric flavor. Maathai is an important activist figure, and it’s useful to have a biography that gives full credit to her political significance and can sit alongside treatments of other post-colonial leaders and activists. Extensive end matter includes a timeline, an overview (including map) of contemporary Kenya, some details about the Kenyan forests, and a list of books and websites, with black and white photographs of Maathai scattered throughout.