Nora Ericson is an award-winning author of books for kids. She grew up in central New York and received a BA in art from Yale University and an MFA in Writing for Children and Young Adults from Vermont College of Fine Arts before settling in the west. She now makes her home in Portland, Oregon, where she enjoys watching her son play baseball, shopping for funky vintage sweaters with her daughter, and sampling as many street-tree plums as she can find around Mount Tabor. Her most recent release, Too Early, illustrated by Canadian paper artist Elly MacKay, received four starred reviews, was an ALA Notable Book, a Bank Street College Best Book of the Year, and the 2023 Margaret Wise Brown Prize Honor Book, an award given specifically for a picture book text. Too Early also won the 2024 Oregon Book Award for Children’s Literature (Eloise Jarvis McGraw Award). Her next book, The Bunny Ballet, will be released in the fall of 2025.
As winner of the 2024 Oregon Book Award for Children’s Literature, Nora Ericson is already known to many of us at Literary Arts as an empathetic and lyrical storyteller for some of the youngest readers among us. We’re thrilled, however, to get to know her—and to introduce her to you—in a fresh capacity as one of our newest teachers on the roster for our winter line-up of writing classes.
Nora will be teaching an in-person workshop on February 8 called ‘Poem or Picture Book: Writing the Lyrical Children’s Book’, which you can learn more about in this short interview below, alongside her thoughts on teaching and current creative inspirations.
How did you get involved with Literary Arts as a writing teacher?
I’ve been a fan of Literary Arts for many years, attending the Portland Book Festival every year and as much of the Portland Arts & Lectures programming as possible. My third picture book, Too Early, was lucky enough to receive the Eloise Jarvis McGraw Award for Children’s Literature as part of the 2024 Oregon Book Awards, and that has connected me to Literary Arts even more as I’ve been able to attend some wonderful events, such as Bookmark. And with the new building opening in Southeast Portland, which is where I live, it seemed like the perfect time to start teaching there!
Can you share a little about the class you plan on teaching?
I’m so excited to lead this workshop! We’ll have three hours to spend together taking a deep dive into the grey area between poem and picture book text—what separates these two forms and what unites them. The idea for this workshop developed when I was thinking about the recent trend of well-known poets, such as Ada Limón, coming out with picture books, as well as thinking about the early criticism I received for my manuscript of Too Early—that it was a good poem instead of a picture book, as if those two forms were mutually exclusive. But of course, as with all things in art, and most things in life, there is no hard line of separation. Many picture books are loved and praised specifically for their “lyrical” writing, and yet of course not every poem will necessarily make a good picture book. What is clear to me is that in the overlap—of poetry and story—there is great potential for learning.
What are some things you hope students will learn in this class?
I’m hoping that by studying some of the picture books written by renowned poets alongside some of the best examples of lyrical picture books, we can discover a commonality that makes them sing. It would be great if we get students from both backgrounds—poets who are maybe intrigued by picture books as well as picture book writers who are interested in making their work more poetic. That would offer such a wonderful opportunity to learn from each other!
What I always hope, when I take a class or lead a class, is that we all come away with some new perspective or insight which will give our writing a new spark. And you never know when a new spark, even a small one, will catch hold and really blaze.
If you were to describe your teaching style in five words or less, what would you say?
Collaborative and open.
How is your writing life shaped by the work you do as a teacher, or vice versa?
I definitely don’t see myself as a teacher INSTEAD of a student. I am still just as much a student of writing as I’ve ever been and take classes all the time. Over the many years I’ve been working and studying in this area, I feel I’ve gained enough knowledge to be able to lead a group and share some ideas, but I’m also sure I’ll learn from every person who joins me in the room!
Are there any other current sources of creative inspiration for you, literary or otherwise, you’d like to recommend?
Well, I’m surrounded by visual artists (my sister, my brother-in-law, my mother-in-law, even my ten-year-old daughter!) and I studied painting way back in college myself, so the visual arts are always a big backdrop to my creative life and a lot of story ideas come to me in pictures first. I’m currently taking an illustration class, which has been both fun and super challenging. In focusing on a lot of picture book art instead of text, I’ve discovered a bunch of fantastic new books, like those by the Shanghai artist Thea Lu. I also loved seeing Carson Ellis’s show at Nationale in Southeast Portland! I love her picture books and it was so interesting to see her work in a different format.
I read a lot of literary fiction too and the book that left the biggest impression on me recently was The Bee Sting by Paul Murray. I loved it, but then the end left me reeling—I’m still recovering! I also just read a beautiful book of poetry, That Place Where You Opened Your Hands, by Literary Arts’ own Director of Programs for Writers Susan Moore. It makes me wonder how many other people who work at Literary Arts are also writers, because of course it makes perfect sense!
Nature is always a big source of inspiration as well, even just through walks around my neighborhood in SE Portland, admiring our amazing Pacific Northwest trees, or listening to the owls in my backyard at night. And on a more global scale, both my kids and I were super inspired by Cara Giaimo’s presentation of Atlas Obscura: Wildlife at the Portland Book Festival! Endless wonder in those pages.
Do you have any recent or upcoming publications?
I have two books coming out next fall! One is the board book version of Too Early, which should be really fun. (I’ve always wanted to publish a board book after seeing my own kids accidentally rip so many pages of beloved picture books when they were little!) And the other is a new picture book entitled The Bunny Ballet, illustrated by Elly MacKay (who also did Too Early). It was really fun to work with Elly (and our editor, Emma Ledbetter, at Abrams) on a second, but very different book! The Bunny Ballet is a fantastical, rhyming celebration of lapin dancers (and the lucky children who discover them). It turned out beautifully and I can’t wait to be able to share it!
You can register for Nora Ericson’s upcoming workshop, ‘Poem or Picture Book’, here.
