Bryan, Ashley (1923-2022), was an American author and illustrator of many children’s books that explore African and African American culture. Bryan retold and illustrated many African and Caribbean folk tales and collections of African American spirituals (religious songs). He also illustrated books by such noted African American authors as Paul Laurence Dunbar, Nikki Giovanni, Langston Hughes, and Walter Dean Myers.
Bryan won three Coretta Scott King Awards for illustration. He won the 1981 award for Beat the Story-Drum, Pum-Pum (1980), the 2004 award for Beautiful Blackbird (2003), and the 2008 award for Let It Shine (2007). He also received the 2012 Coretta Scott King-Virginia Hamilton Award for Lifetime Achievement. Coretta Scott King Awards honor African American writers and illustrators of books for children. Bryan also received the Laura Ingalls Wilder Award (now called the Children’s Literature Legacy Award) in 2009. The award honors an author or illustrator whose books, published in the United States, have made an important contribution to literature for children. In 2011, Bryan received the Regina Medal, honoring an individual for a lifetime contribution to children’s literature. See Coretta Scott King Awards; Children’s Literature Legacy Award; Regina Medal.
Bryan adapted and illustrated the Caribbean folk tales The Dancing Granny (1977) and The Cat’s Purr (1985) and the African folk tale collection Lion and the Ostrich Chicks (1986). He illustrated several collections of spirituals. The collections are Walk Together Children (1974), I’m Going to Sing (1982), What a Morning!: The Christmas Story in Black Spirituals (1987), and All Night, All Day (1991). Who Built the Stable? A Nativity Poem (2012) is a Christmas book. Bryan also illustrated Blooming Beneath the Sun (2019), a collection of classic poems for children by Christina Rossetti, an English author of the 1800’s.
Bryan illustrated a collection of his own poetry, Sing to the Sun (1992). He also wrote and illustrated Ashley Bryan’s ABC of African American Poetry (1997), Ashley Bryan’s African Tales, Uh-Huh (1998), and Freedom Over Me: Eleven Slaves, Their Lives and Dreams Brought to Life by Ashley Bryan (2016). Ashley Bryan’s Puppets (2014) is a picture book that shows more than 30 puppets Bryan created out of the debris he found on the beach around his Maine island studio.
Ashley Frederick Bryan was born on July 13, 1923, in New York City. His parents had emigrated from the Caribbean Islands. Bryan attended Cooper Union as an art student, and then served in the United States Army during World War II (1939-1945). After the war, he completed his art degree at Cooper Union in 1946. He then attended Columbia University, where he graduated with a bachelor’s degree in philosophy in 1950. During the 1950’s, he also studied art in France at Aix-Marseille University and at the University of Freiburg in Germany. Later, Bryan taught art at Queens College, Lafayette College, and Dartmouth College. He also gave popular poetry readings and lectures on African American poets. Bryan wrote and illustrated his autobiography, Words to My Life’s Song (2009). He also wrote and illustrated Infinite Hope: A Black Artist’s Journey from World War II to Peace (2019) about his World War II experiences. Bryan died on Feb. 4, 2022.
