Author's Inspiration Lives On

By Jan Sugar

David Saltzman was a freshman at Yale in 1986 when he met the acclaimed children's author Maurice Sendak at a tea. Sendak, author of many popular children's books including Where the Wild Things Are, invited David to his studio in Connecticut to see how he worked. After his visit, David called his mother in California. "This has been an extraordinary day," Barbara Saltzman remembers her son saying, "I want to write and illustrate children's books like Maurice Sendak."

David, who majored in art and literature, developed an idea for a book that he would write and illustrate for his senior project at Yale. It was an idea about a jester who temporarily loses his ability to make people laugh, but finds his calling again through perseverance and friendship. What he discovers and teaches is that laughter is inside all of us.

During his senior year when he was working on his book, David discovered that he had Hodgkin's disease. Through his 18 months of fighting the disease, including a bone marrow transplant, David continued to create his book. It became a kind of metaphor for his own struggle not to succumb to despair. He kept a journal of thoughts and drawings and finished his book called The Jester Has Lost His Jingle.

Concerned about his friends' and family's grief when he died, he wrote in his journal about his desire to live on in a different way in the event of his death:

"…for I would be like a seed planted in all of them, and when they would think of me, my memory, my spirit, I would blossom again, live again, be with you again, love you again and be alive within you."

David died in March 1990, 11 days before his 23rd birthday. He asked his family to make sure that somehow they got the book published. The Saltzmans honored his request by shipping it to the big publishing houses, but were told many times that although it was a wonderful book, the companies couldn't risk publishing such a lavishly illustrated book by an unknown author.

Call it the power of motherlove. With that, and an abiding faith that her son had something of lasting value to say to the children of the world, Barbara mortgaged the family home and independently published David's book.

In 1995 David's dream hit the bookstands. Since then the book has sold more than 280,000 copies, is available at all major bookstores and has been on the LA Times, New York Times and USA Today best-seller lists.

"David's book has a strong universal appeal. It's very layered, so the older a child is the more he gets from it," says Barbara. "I have read it thousands of times, and each time I get something new from it. I think that's what good children's literature is all about."

The book and its message have become a mission for Barbara who has created an organization she calls The Jester & Pharley Phund. More than 35,000 copies of the book have been donated to children with cancer, along with 30,000 Jester & Pharley dolls. The Phund raises money to cover the cost of the donated books through read-a-thons at schools across the country.

"Children raise up to $10 each by reading books, and donate the money to the Phund," says Barbara. "It's a way to enable children to help other children who are ill, and to promote literacy at the same time."

"David wrote this book for all children but it has a particular resonance for a children with a serious illness," says Barbara. "The book and the doll have become wonderful resources for families dealing with the stress of life-threatening illnesses. Hope and laughter need to be part of the treatment."

"It's up to us to make a difference. It's up to us to care."
-from The Jester Has Lost His Jingle

Barbara's goal is to donate a Jester & Pharley Smile Cart™ to every children's hospital and major pediatric center in the country. The Smile Carts, mobile vertical toy boxes equipped with a television, VCR, boom box and Jester books and dolls, are wheeled into children's hospital rooms when they need comfort.

Thousands of parents and children have written to say what the book, and its message of hope, has meant to them. "The best we can do is live life, enjoy it and know it is meant to be enjoyed," David wrote in his journal. "…And at the end of the day, say 'I have enjoyed it, I have really lived the moment.' That is all."

"David's feeling about life was always one of optimism," says his mother.

More than nine years after David's day at Sendak's studio, Barbara Saltzman contacted Sendak to show him the book that was inspired by his work. Sendak rewarded the call by writing the afterword for the book. It says in part:

"Our lives briefly touched. But I remember him among all the eager, talented young people I've bumped into along the way…It is difficult to remember all the bright promising youngsters. It is easy to remember David.
"…David was a natural craftsman and storyteller. His passionate book is issued out of a passionate heart. "David's Jester soars with life."

Being a mother myself, I felt compelled to ask Barbara Saltzman how she manages the pain of her son's death in her own life. "Every time I get a letter from a parent telling me that David's vision helped a child, it's as though it's kissing the hurt to help make it go away," she answered.

Information about the book, the doll, and the Jester & Pharley Phund's programs can be found on the Web at www.thejester.org, or by calling 800/9-JESTER. You can reach Barbara by email at thejester13@cox.net.

New Faces and Fond Farewells