Sally Hobart Alexander
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Sally Hobart Alexander is an American writer of children's literature. She is best known for her books about her experiences as a blind person.
Early life and education
Sally Hobart was born in Owensboro, Kentucky, the daughter of Robert Hobart and Kate Hobart.[1] She graduated from Hazelton High School,[2] and Bucknell University.[3] She earned a master's degree in social work at the University of Pittsburgh.[4]
Career
After her undergraduate degree, Alexander taught third-grade students in Southern California,[5] when a rare disease caused blood vessels in her retina to break, which eventually led to total blindness.[6] She told Contemporary Authors, "I was unhappy to leave that last year [of my teaching], when my visual difficulties began. I entered an excellent training program in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania for newly blinded adults. For a year afterward, I taught at the Greater Pittsburgh Guild for the Blind."[4]
Alexander embarked on a writing career in children's fiction with the publication of her first book, Mom Can't See Me (1990), in which Alexander depicts a loving family that has learned to cope with having a blind parent. She has published eight titles as of 2008,[7] including two memoirs, Taking Hold (1994) and On My Own (1997),[8][9] and a young readers' biography of Laura Bridgman.[10]
Alexander teaches literature and writing in the Chatham University Master of Fine Arts Program in Children's and Adolescent Writing.[4] She received the 1995 Christopher Award for Taking Hold: My Journey into Blindness.[1]
Personal life
Sally Hobart married Bob Alexander, an English professor. They have two children and live in the Squirrel Hill neighborhood of Pittsburgh.[11] In recent years, she has developed hearing loss, and wears hearing aids.[7] "Although I don't minimize the challenges of my deaf-blindness," she wrote in 2010, "I do believe that were I to lose all my hearing, I would still find meaning and joy in reading and writing books."[12]
Books
- Mom Can't See Me, children's semi-autobiographical (New York: Macmillan, 1990).[13]
- Sarah's Surprise, fiction (New York: Macmillan, 1990).[14]
- Mom's Best Friend, children's semi-autobiographical (New York: Macmillan, 1992).[15]
- Maggie's Whopper, fiction (New York: Macmillan, 1992).[16]
- Taking Hold: My Journey into Blindness , nonfiction autobiographical (New York: Macmillan, 1994).[9]
- On My Own: The Journey Continues, nonfiction autobiographical (New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1997).[17]
- Do You Remember the Color Blue? And Other Questions Kids Ask about Blindness, nonfiction (New York: Viking, 2000).[18]
- She Touched the World: Laura Bridgman, Deaf-Blind Pioneer, (co-author with Robert Alexander) nonfiction (New York: Clarion Books, 2008).[10]
Sources
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- ↑ a b c Contemporary Authors Online. The Gale Group, 2003. PEN (Permanent Entry Number): 0000119400.
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External links
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- Pages with script errors
- Living people
- Writers from Pittsburgh
- Chatham University faculty
- American children's writers
- Bucknell University alumni
- People from Hazleton, Pennsylvania
- American blind writers
- American deafblind people
- University of Pittsburgh alumni
- American women children's writers
- 20th-century American non-fiction writers
- 20th-century American women writers
- 21st-century American non-fiction writers
- 21st-century American women writers
- People from Owensboro, Kentucky
- Writers from Kentucky
- Deaf writers