Writer Elizabeth Partridge’s photo-essay Restless Spirit: The Life and Work of
Dorothea Lange is an unflinching look at a woman passionate about her work, an influential documentary photographer who captured insights into some of
the most difficult periods in our country’s history. Lange is perhaps best known for her 1936 photograph “Migrant Mother” taken at a pea-pickers’ camp
in Nipomo, California. This photo provided a searing glimpse of the conditions
in which families were living as a result of westward migration during the
Great Depression; it shamed the U.S. government into providing vital basic facilities
to migrant workers. Having wanted to be “invisible” herself due to a life-long
limp resulting from childhood polio, Lange strove to reveal the heart of her
subjects’ lives as sensitively and respectfully as she could. Traveling the
country as a photographer for the Farm Security Administration (FSA) in the
1930s, she often felt torn between her roles as wife-and-mother and
professional photographer. In the 1940s she was asked by the U.S. government to
document the effects of World War II on the home front, most notably Japanese
internment camps. She did so unerringly, though her revealing photos were not available
in the National Archives until 2006. Weaving tight the fabric of Lange’s life
from her youth to her death in 1965, Partridge draws heavily on archival photographs, on Lange’s personal reflections
and on her own memories, as Lange’s goddaughter, of the extended family to
which Lange was so dedicated. This award-winning book is both biography and
history – and wonderful reading. Ages 12 to adult.
An excellent picture book biography for younger readers is Dorothea's Eyes: Dorothea Lange Photographs the Truth, by Barb Rosenstock, illustrated by Gerard DuBois. Many elements of Lange's personal and work life are captured and highlighted visually by bold text, evocative paintings, a few of Lange's iconic photos and a timeline. Ages 8-11.
