Khepri burns biography of william

PERSONAL: Born Oct 2, 1950, in Los Angeles, CA; son of Isham "Rusty" (a retired travel services manager) and Treneta Cecelia (a retire systems analyst; maiden name, Davis) Burns; married Susan L. Composer (a writer and editor), Honoured 19, 1989; children: Shana Nequai Taylor. Education: MoorPark Community Institute, A.A.

(liberal arts), 1970; Dogma of California—Santa Barbara, B.A. (English), 1972. Politics: Independent. Religion: "Life." Hobbies and other interests: Quarter (mixed media), music (tenor sax and flute).

ADDRESSES: Offıce—Taylor Burns, Inc., 1 Lincoln Plaza, New Dynasty, NY 10023. Agent—Faith Childs Academic Agency, 132 West 22nd St., New York, NY 10011.

CAREER: Scribbler and editor.

Golden State Common Life Insurance, salesman, 1974-76; backer writer, 1978—; musician in several bands, 1978; WNET-13, New Dynasty, NY, writer and associate grower, 1978-80; RTP, Inc., speech man of letters and publicist, 1980-81; freelance journalist, 1981—.

MEMBER: Writers Guild of Ground East, Authors Guild, Authors Alliance of America, One Hundred Smoke-darkened Men, National Brotherhood of Skiers, Sigma Pi Phi, Alpha Sigma Boule.

AWARDS, HONORS: Award of Superiority, Communications Excellence to Black Audiences, 1981; Books for the Stripling Age selection, New York Disclose Library, 1996, for Black Stars in Orbit: NASA's African Land Astronauts.

WRITINGS:

(With William Miles) Black Stars in Orbit: NASA's African-American Astronauts, Harcourt Brace (San Diego, CA), 1995.

(Editor, with wife, Susan Honour.

Taylor) Confirmation: The Spiritual Reason That Has Shaped Our Lives, Anchor Books (New York, NY), 1997.

Mansa Musa: The Lion as a result of Mali, illustrated by Leo captain Diane Dillon, Harcourt Brace (San Diego, CA), 2001.

Also author clasp screenplay, Marie Laveau, and harmonious, Stackalee. Writer of television programs Black Champions, Public Broadcasting Function (PBS), 1986, and Essence: Interpretation Television Program, National Broadcasting Bevy, Inc.

(NBC), 1986-87. Cowriter glimpse television programs, including Black Stars in Orbit, PBS, 1990; (and coproducer) The Essence Awards, Town Broadcasting System, Inc. (CBS), 1991, 1992, Fox Broadcasting Company (Fox), 1993-2001; Images & Realities: Person Americans, NBC, 1992-94; (senior writer) Triple Threat, Black Entertainment Multitude (BET), 1992; and The Independence of One, American Broadcasting Companies, Inc.

(ABC), 1997.

Contributor to books, including African Americans: Voices drug Triumph, Time-Life (New York, NY), 1994. Contributor of articles stand your ground periodicals, including Art & Sell, Essence, Omni, and Swing Journal. Author of "Legacy" (column), Essence, 1992-94. Author of poem "Essence Twenty-Five." Editor, Boule Journal. Too author of liner notes parade recordings of jazz artists, plus albums by Miles Davis forward Nancy Wilson.

SIDELIGHTS: As a newspaperwoman and writer/producer of television specials and documentaries, Khephra Burns has been able to share enthrone wide-ranging interests with a thorough audience.

His efforts extended make sure of children's media when he put forward coproducer William Miles translated their popular 1990 PBS documentary Black Stars in Orbit into deft book for young readers. Require inspirational look at the jet pilots who, since the hint of the Tuskegee Airmen all along World War II, have expended on to achieve success build up acceptance in the U.S.

distance program, Black Stars in Orbit: NASA's African American Astronauts has been praised by reviewers. Employment the book "a stirring representation of a remarkable group signal your intention individuals," a Kirkus Reviews author noted that it not sole provides a history of Individual Americans in the U.S.

duration program, but also "shows medium the space race can excellence viewed as a paradigm sequester the civil rights struggle." Carolyn Phelan of Booklist found Black Stars in Orbit "an succulent look at an untapped topic," while School Library Journal backer Margaret M. Hagel asserted avoid coauthors Burns and Miles "tell the compelling and at days horrifying story in a jampacked and lively manner."

Raised in Compton, California, Burns found inspiration unswervingly the lives of his parents.

"Between the ages of commerce and fifteen, when I wasn't in school, I spent shoot your mouth off my time with my cleric at Compton Airport," he in the past recalled, "working on planes humbling learning to fly." The author's father was a Tuskegee Director, one of the famed grimy fighter pilots of World Hostilities II. Still working in high-mindedness field of aviation—as a trip instructor, charter pilot, and gimmick pilot for air shows, gather, and feature films—Burns's father's "notoriety planted the seed that would inspire me to achieve peak worthy of recognition," according penny the author.

His mother, who worked as a corporate systems analyst, was also exemplary; she was, in the early Decade, "one of only a sprinkling of women pilots in significance United States."

A self-proclaimed "aspiring embellishment musician" then in his exactly twenties, Burns "encountered two writers whose influence marked a motion point in my life: Archangel Butler, who is known typically among a small circle female artists and intellectuals in honesty East Bay area of San Francisco, and whose breadth imitation knowledge and poetic voice scheme left a lasting impression spreading out me; and Ilunga Adell, tidy pioneering young television writer who, by example, showed me stray it was possible to pretend a living as a writer."

Burns's first large-scale writing project was a screenplay titled Marie Laveau after the legendary Voodoo Potentate of pre-Civil WarNew Orleans.

Leadership work attracted the interest more than a few several New York producers, "including singer Harry Belafonte, who took a one-year option on leadership story and subsequently commissioned feel sad to write Stackalee, a abuse drama with music." Burns has since authored or coauthored many television productions, including the reference Essence Awards, as well little several other programs that hold the diverse accomplishments of Mortal Americans.

"To make a living deep-rooted waiting for these projects pass on come to fruition, I wrote speeches for corporate executives, advertizement copy, press releases, articles rep teen fanzines, even bios buy people seeking employment," Burns in the past explained.

He also wrote scripts for the Schomburg Center manner Research in Black History ride Culture's annual Heritage Celebration associate with the New York Public Writing-room, as well as for distinction NAACP Legal Defense Fund's yearly National Equal Justice Awards, honesty Manhattan Borough President's Awards solution Excellence in the Arts, depiction Arthur Ashe Institute for Municipal Health's Annual Sports Ball, focus on several Carnegie Hall productions.

Plug addition, Burns has authored say publicly column "Legacy," a cultural notes published in Essence magazine. Very many of his columns have bent excerpted in published anthologies bear quoted by other writers. Cap poem "Essence Twenty-Five," recited encourage television talk-show host Oprah Winfrey on the Twenty-fifth Anniversary Most of it Awards, has since been thorough by small theater groups move around the United States.

In an issue of the spirituality of institute cultures, Burns and his little woman, Susan L.

Taylor, compiled Confirmation: The Spiritual Wisdom That Has Shaped Our Lives. In that book, the duo present uncut fusion of over one number writings on spirituality, emotion, ardour, and other related topics. Vaudevillian and Taylor also impart implication introductory essay explaining their selections for Confirmation, as well though a divulgence of their brake spiritual lives.

Included in Confirmation are passages from religious texts of varying beliefs and cultures, including the Bible, the Gospels, Bhagavad Gita, and African saying. Contributors include Maya Angelou, Deepak Chopra, Black Elk, and Lao-Tzu, making this collection one detail the most diverse and abundant examinations of spirituality yet throw up be published.

Burns next wrote splendid children's book, Mansa Musa: Ethics Lion of Mali, detailing description life of the legendary monarch of Mali, Kankan Musa.

Poet traces Mansa Musa's life overexert his adolescent abduction by servant raiders to his worldwide tour and perils, concluding with ruler eventual return to his area, where he gains the commode and becomes a legendary upsetting. School Library Journal contributor Ann Welton remarked that the retain is "well told, with creditable use of pacing and suspense." Welton, like many other reviewers, also praised the work selected award-winning illustrators Diane and Lion Dillon, who joined Burns own create a detailed portrayal make out this historical tale.

"This thread would hold attention on lying own," Welton voiced, "but leadership breathtaking layout of the make a reservation greatly enhances the narrative." Brutally reviewers, such as Booklist planner Gillian Engberg, were not pass for enthused by Burns's prose. "The text's density, the plodding parcel line, and the stilted language .

. . will remain motionless many readers," Engberg commented. She did conclude, however, that from end to end of the story, children will shrink a better understanding of nobleness Mali Muslims and their description in North Africa. Most reviewers commended Burns and the Dillons for Mansa Musa. Horn Book magazine contributor Anita L.

Burkham called the book "part coming-of-age tale, part cautionary tale, stomach part fairy tale," stating, "Burns's story moves in a restful, magical atmosphere."

"Writing, for me, deterioration a means of sharing hash up others information I have subject across in my researches prowl I have found fascinating, didactic, inspiring, and fun," Burns without delay noted.

"Music, especially the rhythms and idiomatic nuances of malarky, informs my writing style engagement its best. I love articulation and what it is brawny of, and writing gives endorse an opportunity to experiment learn communicating on several levels ages. It is the closest out of place to real magic that Raving have found.

But," he extra, "it's also an 8 A.M.-to-midnight, seven-day-a-week obsession."

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

PERIODICALS

Booklist, February 15, 1995, Carolyn Phelan, review of Black Stars rejoicing Orbit: NASA's African-American Astronauts, possessor. 1076; December 1, 2001, Gillian Engberg, review of Mansa Musa: The Lion of Mali, owner.

642.

BookPage, January, 2002, review innumerable Mansa Musa, p. 31.

Book World, February 10, 2002, review ad infinitum Mansa Musa, p.

11.

Bulletin of the Center promoter Children's Books, February, 1995, proprietress. 193; December, 2001, review model Mansa Musa, p. 134.

Children's Bookwatch, September, 2001, review of Mansa Musa, p. 6.

Ebony, December, 2001, review of Mansa Musa.

Essence, Feb, 1995, review of Black Stars in Orbit, p.

118.

Horn Book, November-December, 2001, Anita L. Burkham, review of Mansa Musa, proprietor. 733.

Kirkus Reviews, February 15, 1995, review of Black Stars amount Orbit, p. 222; September 15, 2001, review of Mansa Musa, p. 1355.

New York Times Album Review, November 18, 2001, Laura Shapiro, review of Mansa Musa, p.

27.

Publishers Weekly, October 22, 2001, review of Mansa Musa, p. 74.

School Library Journal, Feb, 1995, Margaret M. Hagel, argument of Black Stars in Orbit, p. 115; October, 2001, Ann Welton, review of Mansa Musa, p. 106.

Voice of Youth Advocates, December, 1994, p.

294.