JacketFlap connects you to the work of more than 200,000 authors, illustrators, publishers and other creators of books for Children and Young Adults. The site is updated daily with information about every book, author, illustrator, and publisher in the children's / young adult book industry. Members include published authors and illustrators, librarians, agents, editors, publicists, booksellers, publishers and fans. Join now (it's free).
Login or Register for free to create your own customized page of blog posts from your favorite blogs. You can also add blogs by clicking the "Add to MyJacketFlap" links next to the blog name in each post.
Blog Posts by Tag
In the past 7 days
Blog Posts by Date
Click days in this calendar to see posts by day or month
Viewing: Blog Posts Tagged with: Rosemary Wells, Most Recent at Top [Help]
Results 1 - 25 of 32
How to use this Page
You are viewing the most recent posts tagged with the words: Rosemary Wells in the JacketFlap blog reader. What is a tag? Think of a tag as a keyword or category label. Tags can both help you find posts on JacketFlap.com as well as provide an easy way for you to "remember" and classify posts for later recall. Try adding a tag yourself by clicking "Add a tag" below a post's header. Scroll down through the list of Recent Posts in the left column and click on a post title that sounds interesting. You can view all posts from a specific blog by clicking the Blog name in the right column, or you can click a 'More Posts from this Blog' link in any individual post.
I don’t usually post anything aside from videos on Sunday but after attending the IBBY Conference in NYC this past weekend this topic came up and seemed well worth pursuing.
Not long ago I reviewed The Hired Girl by Laura Amy Schlitz. It’s a fine, unique historical novel about a 14-year-old girl who escapes a grim farm existence by running away to Baltimore to work as a hired girl. She’s the product of a cruel father who denies her any schooling leaving her little comfort except that which comes to her from books.
Recently this particular title has been the focus of a great deal of discussion over at Heavy Medals due to its mention of American Indians. Much to my surprise, people are commenting on the book’s merits due to a passage in which Joan thinks the following:
“It seemed to me–I mean, it doesn’t now, but it did then–as though Jewish people were like Indians: people from long ago; people in books. I know there are Indians out West, but they’re civilized now, and wear ordinary clothes. In the same way, I guess I knew there were still Jews, but I never expected to meet any.”
Folks appear to be mighty perturbed over this section of the story. It made me think a lot about what we demand of our historical protagonists in our contemporary children’s novels. Take Joan. Her education is that of a white working class girl in early 20th century America. She has a very limited world view and knows about Jewish people solely though the context of Ivanhoe. Now we look at that statement she thought. Considering white attitudes of the time, is it believable that Joan would think this of American Indians? Quite frankly, considering her schooling I found it, if anything, a little difficult to believe that her attitude wasn’t worse.
But let us not talk about being accurate to the attitudes of someone in Joan’s time and place and consider instead whether or not Ms. Schlitz should have included the passage at all. Is it harmful to her young readership to encounter a sympathetic protagonist with these opinions? Might they think them legitimate feelings? Might they not pick something up from such statements?
First, I’d like to address the question of whether or not children, or in this case middle school students, are capable of decoding an ignorant character’s prejudices if that prejudice is not specifically called out. Joan is wrong about a lot of things. You see this and you know this pretty early on. And while it is entirely possible that there will be young readers out there who have never encountered positive images and portrayals of American Indians in their children’s literature, the notion of white people “civilizing” other races and nations is not unique here. Do kids walk into historical novels with the understanding that people in the past thought things we cannot or should not think today? Is it the responsibility of the author instead to cut their all their sympathetic historical figures from a contemporary cloth and imbue them with our own attitudes towards race, gender, sexuality, etc.? I am reminded of a moment in Red Moon at Sharpsburg when author Rosemary Wells had her Southern Civil War era protagonist say of her corset that, “It constricts the mind.” A statement made by a young woman without outside influence or context, I might add. It felt wrong because it was wrong. A broad attempt to shoehorn contemporary attitudes into a historical tale.
But going back a bit, let’s again try to answer the question of why it was necessary for Ms. Schlitz to include this passage at all. It would have been easy to keep out. And Schlitz is not a writer who dashes off her prose without thought or consideration. So what is the value of its inclusion?
Does it come right out? It does! In fact, when you have a protagonist capable of awkward beliefs that are of their time, it would make so much sense to just not mention any of them, right? To do otherwise would be to offer a layer of complexity to an otherwise good character. Are books for young people capable of that complexity?
Let’s say the passage removed. Let’s say all passages of American Indians were removed (there’s more than one, you know). Let’s say mentions of American Indians were removed from all books for children written about this time period but only when those mentions were prejudiced. Let’s say all American Indians themselves were removed as well. See? Isn’t it so much easier to write historical fiction when you don’t have controversial topics to trip you up?
I am reminded of the lesson of Patricia C. Wrede’s Thirteenth Child. Do you remember this controversy from 2009? It came up in the pre-Twitter era (it was around but not what it constitutes today) when outrage had a less constructive echo chamber in place, so you’d be forgiven for having forgotten it. The novel takes place in a historical America where magic is common and the Land Bridge never occurred. This America has woolly mammoths and slaves but no American Indians. In a conversation online in 2006, long before the book’s publication, the author said this about her title:
The current plan is to have the primary difference before 1492 be that the various pre-historic attempts to colonize the Americas were unsuccessful; thus, no Mayans, Incas, Aztecs, Mississippi Valley civilization, or Native Americans of any sort…. The absence of an indiginous population in the Americas is obviously going to have a significant impact on the way things develop during the exploration and colonization period, and I’m still feeling my way through how I’m going to finagle that to get to where I want.
Which is, basically: A North America in which the threat of Indians was replaced by the threat of un-extinct megafauna…
Dubbed “MammothFail”, people were incensed that an entire ethnic group could be done away with because they were (their words) inconvenient to the plot. It was the first time I saw an angry internet pile-on (the like of which we’re almost accustomed to these days) and it shocked me. At the same time, the anger was understandable.
So what did we learn? Excluding someone doesn’t mean you’re doing them some kind of a service.
If Joan’s thoughts about Indians are prejudiced or nasty is she no longer worth rooting for because we’ve seen another side to her? Or will the child reader recognize ignorance when they see it? Joan is ignorant about so many things in the world. This is just one of them.
I think a lot of this comes down to the degree to which we trust child readers. I don’t think for one second that Ms. Schlitz shares Joan’s opinions of American Indians and what it means to be “civilized”. What I do think is that she works as a school librarian and sees children every day. I think that over the years she has learned from them and seen the degree to which they are capable of catching on to the subtlety of a book. I think she knows that this passage reflects more about Joan than it does about American Indians of the time and she believes kids will recognize that too. The question I’m interested in is whether or not we believe that characters with personal prejudices should be presented to our young readers AT ALL because kids and teens can’t handle that kind of complexity.
In the end, can prejudiced/racist characters be heroes when they appear in books for youth? Or are there subtleties at work here that make this more than just a black and white issue? I like to think we’re capable of trusting our readers, regardless of age. The Hired Girl believes them capable for rejecting Joan’s dated opinions. We should extend to them that same respect.
21 Comments on Are Historical Heroes Allowed to Have Prejudices in Children’s Literature?, last added: 10/20/2015
Your post makes me think of Mildred D. Taylor’s 1997 ALAN acceptance speech, in which she grapples with writing scenes and using language that is potentially painful for readers in her historical fiction about the Logan family:
“I am hurt that any child would ever be hurt by my words. As a parent I understand not wanting a child to hear painful words, but as a parent I do not understand not wanting a child to learn about a history that is part of America, a history about a family representing millions of families that are strong and loving and who remain united and strong, despite the obstacles they face.
In the writing of my most recent work, titled The Land, I have found myself hesitating about using words that would have been spoken in the late 1800s because of my concern about our “politically correct” society. But just as I have had to be honest with myself in the telling of all my stories, I realize I must be true to the feelings of the people about whom I write and true to the stories told. My stories might not be “politically correct,” so there will be those who will be offended, but as we all know, racism is offensive.
The crucial difference is that you’re writing about the hero of the story holding and expressing racist perspective about , while Taylor is depicting white antagonists in the African-American Logan family’s. I’m eager to hear what others have to say about this.
Elissa Gershowitz said, on 10/18/2015 4:00:00 PM
Thanks, Betsy Bird. Who on earth is reading The Hired Girl and thinking, “That Joan — she really *gets* people”?
Sarah said, on 10/18/2015 4:31:00 PM
I’ve seen variations of this conversation in many places recently, and at bottom I’m not sure the question of this post’s title is really the one being asked. (Or at least, not the one being asked by people raising concerns about the treatment of prejudiced viewpoints in various children’s books.) To me, the question is one that can be more difficult to articulate– not whether a text should include bigoted or otherwise objectionable views, but *how* those views are presented and contextualized within the story. And often, that reading of “how” depends a great deal on one’s own perspective and experiences.
For example, my reading of Joan’s attempt to convert her Jewish employers is informed by my own experiences as a Jewish woman, and also by my knowledge of many other such stories– and the way that conversion is often used as a motif in books written by non-Jews about Jewish experiences. (One could call it a trope.) If I, in sharing my reading, raise issues with Joan’s conversion attempt, then the counter-argument that this element is historically accurate and true to Joan’s character doesn’t really address the issue of context that I’m raising. The question isn’t just about an author’s decision to include prejudiced views and actions, but about *how* the author’s contextual decisions often reflect views the author may or may not be aware of. It seems worth noting that these discussions occur most often in cases where authors are writing about experiences outside of their own identities.
I think the related question– about whether writers should have faith in young readers’ ability to negotiate contextual clues and not take prejudiced views or actions at face value– also falls within this framework. Often, what I see is writers (and critics) discounting the perspectives of young readers who are able to contextualize the *author’s* viewpoint in ways that go against a dominant reading.
For anyone in these discussions who hasn’t read it, I highly recommend Toni Morrison’s book Playing in the Dark: Whiteness and the Literary Imagination. See, for example, her reading of Huck Finn. Many might argue that Twain offered an accurate portrayal of the racism of his time period, and that he trusted his readers to see that this is a commentary on racism and not an endorsement of such views. But Morrison’s reading gets at the deeper question I see being asked in these discussions– about how Twain’s decisions as a writer reflect on his own, biased, imagination.
Nina Lindsay said, on 10/18/2015 8:54:00 PM
Betsy, while I appreciate you taking this on, you take an argument in which I question one line I one book, in the context of a Newbery Award discussion, to suggest that such a questioning means I distrust child readers In toto, and any controversial passages at all.
We have to be able to talk about issues of race in children’s books, as passionately as we do about the rest of it, without making this a “Black or white” discussion.
Angie Manfredi said, on 10/18/2015 9:43:00 PM
The one question I think we can start with is: why did you put the question about what a Native kid reading the book might think as your last concern? Why aren’t we all making that our first concern? Well, because we’re centering our whiteness, is why. Because our entire society centers whiteness, is why. Because we want to get derailed in BUT ARE WE ALLOWED TO EVEN WRITE THIS (clutches pearls clutches pearls). You’re allowed to write any darn thing you want. But that means we, the critical adult audience, are also allowed to then ask hard, uncomfortable questions about that thing you wrote. That’s just part of the deal.
I find that, often, one part of this argument is – you must be the kind of person who only wants NICE things to happen in fiction. You must not care about THE TRUTH. To which, of course, the only response is: depends on who you’re asking to tell you the truth. Let’s take a look at Tim Tingle’s HOW I BECAME A GHOST. There’s a book that is raw and unblinking in its portrayal of what happened to the Choctaw people as they were forced onto the Trail of Tears. Would anyone who has read it say that it is “sanitized” or “nice” version of history? Certainly not. And yet examples like this rarely come up in these conversations about “REAL history isn’t gentle!” Yes, marginalized people know this more than anyone.
I’d also come back to your final line: kid readers, like all of us, can reject something as untrue and still be impacted by it. Sarah raises a good point – “historically accurate, tho!!” doesn’t address the larger issues of what happens when a reader in the here and now interacts with this text. To say that they will simply say, “Well, that’s how it was back then!” and go about their merry way doesn’t address that, in many cases, that’s how it still is today.
Debbie Reese said, on 10/19/2015 5:42:00 AM
I would love to trust readers, too, but trust itself rests on respect, and that respect has not been there for so many people/peoples who have been othered by the media, whether we’re talking about children’s books or films, or whether we’re talking about the past or the present day.
Did anyone click on the link that Jonathan provided? Not the one to my site but the one to his Google search? I think it actually makes my point. Go look. The first three images in the first line (Men/Women/Male Native) are stereotypical–but more important–they are costumes that people can get for Halloween. Because THAT is what comes up first, I think it tells us a lot about what people know about respect for Native people–or rather that they do NOT respect Native people. Maybe they dress up that way out of ignorance, or out of a misguided sense of what it means to honor a people, but I do think it speaks volumes about why we cannot trust the reader.
Kate B. said, on 10/19/2015 6:12:00 AM
Once you’re at the point where we’re looking at a particularly book (that someone has already made the decision to publish and promote) and a character and a time period, it certainly makes sense for that particular character to have particular misconceptions and bigotries built into her way of seeing the world.
But when it starts to feel like the primary role of American Indians or people of color in the body of juvenile historical fiction is to provoke white people’s prejudices (or demonstrate what a hero they are for NOT holding those prejudices), or to spur white people to action… that’s a problem for me. When I find myself getting frustrated and exhausted by the way male authors write about women, I can retreat to a big pile of books by women, about women, to reset my internal expectations. (And I hope that men are reading them, too.) Native kids (and non-Native kids who walk around in our current, still-racist world, as Debbie points out) have a MUCH smaller pile of books to resort to–far too few for a kid who’s a prolific reader.
So I guess my question would be “how much more historical fiction about white people do we really need?”
Amy Rae Weaver said, on 10/19/2015 8:40:00 AM
So I guess my question would be “how much more historical fiction about white people do we really need?”
I would argue that stories about lower-class white characters that do more than play on poor-but-good stereotypes, especially in certain historical time periods, are still necessary. The rampant fetishization of the Victorian and Edwardian upper class among adults interested in the time period (just look at vast swaths of steampunk or some of the uglier ends of Downton Abbey fandom), to the detriment of discussions of poverty and the working classes that made that kind of living possible, suggests to me that books like The Hired Girl still absolutely have a place. And as a Catholic child who was often frustrated by depictions of nominal Protestant Christianity in books (The Baby-Sitters Club and Little Women both come to mind as examples that confused and surprised me), the presence of an explicitly Catholic main character like Joan, however imperfect she is, would have meant a great deal to me.
Are those needs as pressing as the need for books that reflect greater racial diversity and respect for audiences of colour? No, I don’t think so. Do those books need to include lines like the one in question here? No, I don’t think so, either. But I question the notion that we’ve exhausted historical fiction about white characters entirely, when there are intersectional issues that remain underwritten and underpublished.
tanita said, on 10/19/2015 9:04:00 AM
Particularly because my next book tells the story of a prejudiced white character being temporarily fostered by a black family, this discussion has been close to home for me. I felt like it was appropriate to put the character’s assumptions about black people right out front and to make it clear from whence they came (her grandmother) – but I felt like it was equally important to correct those assumptions within the text. Maybe that’s me not trusting my readers to get it right, but it’s like that comedian who quit because he wasn’t sure people were laughing at the right part of his jokes — you don’t want to hold up something to ridicule (or, at least *I* don’t) and let a reader walk away with the idea that the idea is correct. To my mind, there are indeed subtleties in this – racism is insidious in its pervasiveness, as is sexism, etc.. I know it’s gauche for writers to “send messages” in our work, and we have all recently heard and rehashed the big argument against having an “diversity agenda” in writing, but I believe we all write with purpose, if we are wise. There are choices to be made in subtly asserting our beliefs and gently righting misconceptions, as it were… And all writers make a choice to acknowledge this or not, I guess, based on what we feel is important.
Books like THE HIRED GIRL, which have a lot to like in them despite the issues, provide the means for us to learn how to be fans of problematic things, to learn how to listen and sit with the discomfort of maybe not catching things which upset other people, and for me, at least, to be a better writer. I know thinking about this won’t help me produce a perfect book – good luck with that, huh? – but a more thoughtful book in this world of reflexive, unrepentant and systemic prejudice can only be a good thing.
Which book will hurt which reader how? - The Horn said, on 10/19/2015 9:09:00 AM
[…] are some lively debates going on at Heavy Medal and Fuse #8 about Laura Amy Schlitz’s The Hired Girl, a presumed favorite for 2016 Newbery consideration. […]
Mirka Breen said, on 10/19/2015 9:21:00 AM
I’m with the writer of this article all the way. Ms. Bird is correct that falsification of history (and our ancestors’ sensibilities) for the sake of contemporary political correctness not only shortchanges the readers, it robs them of the opportunity to know where mankind has been and how far we’ve come. It’s one of my peeves with so much “historical” fiction. It isn’t historical at all. It’s contemporary with decorations of older superficial details.
Writing for young readers is a responsibility, and writing about other times and places for any age is a greater responsibility still. Tell the characters’ truth.
Kate B. said, on 10/19/2015 9:24:00 AM
Sure! To be clear, I don’t think the answer to my question is “none.” But as people who are outside the Newbery committee, we have the luxury of looking at this particular text as a part of a larger field of literature. My first, lizard-brain, instinctive pushback to “but it’s historically accurate!” is often “but this might be the only line a student reads about American Indians all year!”, and that’s a problem that this book alone can’t solve, and that I don’t expect it to.
I do consider plucky lower-class historical white girls to be overrepresented (without having actually done a count), but you’re right that many of them appear in poor-but-good morality tales, and I’d believe that few of them are explicitly and accurately Catholic.
Nina Lindsay said, on 10/19/2015 9:58:00 AM
Betsy, I responded above in defense against your two paragraphs starting “Does it come right out…” as I felt that was putting words in my mouth, but perhaps I was only choosing to take personal offense. I do think that’s skewing the argument I was trying to make at Heavy Medal. If we can put that aside, I agree with nearly everything you say, except for your final assessment of how well this all works in HIRED GIRL. I’ve tried to explain why here: http://blogs.slj.com/heavymedal/2015/10/15/the-hired-girl/#comment-218683
Hilary said, on 10/19/2015 11:34:00 AM
Into this discussion, and by no means to turn it into a discussion about something else, I just want to interject that we need more Roman Catholic characters in children’s lit. When I first read The Hired Girl I cringed for Joan’s behavior regularly (who didn’t?), but one of my first thoughts was that I couldn’t believe she *was* Roman Catholic. It blew my socks off! She’s the main character too, not a secondary character! All through reading the book I felt grateful for that.
Joe said, on 10/19/2015 12:05:00 PM
Thank you, Betsy. This was a beautifully, thoughtfully written post. I feel like a lot of the conversation occurring on Heavy Medal is “But what will the children think?!” – which is the *exact* argument challengers used when attempting to ban two books from my library in the last couple years (Yummy: The Last Days of a Southside Shorty and Monster).
Elizabeth Bird said, on 10/19/2015 12:10:00 PM
Thanks, Nina. Naturally I meant no offense to you. I should note that the term “it comes right out” is a screenwriting phrase I picked up from my husband about elements of a storyline that can be removed without detriment to the whole.
Amy Rae Weaver said, on 10/19/2015 12:32:00 PM
Thank you for your thoughtful and swift reply. My comment was a bit too much tangent for me to be comfortable with, in retrospect, and so in interest of not derailing the conversation further than I already have (and I apologize for that), I just want to acknowledge that I’ve read your answer and wish you a good day.
Emily Brown said, on 10/19/2015 10:19:00 PM
Thank you, Tanita! That’s exactly what I felt when I first read Debbie Reese’s post about this: “the discomfort of maybe not catching things which upset other people.” I had no memory of the passage, so I’m grateful to other people for pointing it out. It still surprises me that I can breeze by passages that might be hurtful to others, because, as a librarian, I think it’s part of my job to help kids read critically, and to show them it’s okay to be critical of things they like. I hope conversations like this will make me a better librarian, too.
Sarah said, on 10/20/2015 6:56:00 AM
This post focuses on how young people might read irony in a text– that is, whether they recognize the ironic distance between author and character (which I still don’t think is the issue those objecting to the passage are really raising.) But I just wanted to add that I think the dynamics of how young readers interact with books, and with the prejudices in them, is one of the central themes in The Hired Girl itself. Joan is first and foremost a reader. Her knowledge of the world comes partly through the books she reads, and she also, increasingly, uses her knowledge of the world to read against those beloved books. This back and forth of contextualization and re-contextualization includes her attitudes and conceptions about Jewish people, for example, and about prejudice. She uses the knowledge she’s gleaned from Ivanhoe to try to understand the Jewish people she meets, and then uses her experiences with the Jewish people she knows to contextualize attitudes presented in Ivanhoe.
But I think the picture of reading included within The Hired Girl also points to some of the problems people are addressing. As Debbie notes, this work of contextualization depends on the other experiences with which one reads against a text. Joan’s reading when she’s at the farm is different than her reading once she’s lived with the Rosenbachs. For most non-Native readers in the US, those other experiences include a litany of misrepresentations in books and media, little accurate knowledge, and few relationships with actual Native people. When it comes to the presentation of Jewish people in this book, I would also argue there are many images and associations Schlitz herself has absorbed from books like Ivanhoe, which maintain their hold on the imagination despite real knowledge of Jewish people. This includes the supposedly “good” stereotype of the idealized Rebecca. I think books can work on the imagination even when we have the means to put them in context.
As Angie says, all of this also continues to center the perspective of the reader who is encountering people and prejudices from the outside– not the reader whose context is their own very real, painful experiences as the target of those prejudices. Books like Roll of Thunder center the child *experiencing* prejudice, which is different from a book that focalizes a character with prejudiced views. In the later case, again, I don’t think the question is one of accuracy or even inclusion, but of how the author treats and understands both those views, and the reader who has experience with them that the author lacks.
Anon said, on 10/20/2015 2:10:00 PM
I don’t believe Betsy is suggesting you distrust child readers in toto, just that you distrust them about this.
In Eric Carle’s What’s Your Favorite Animal, he collaborates with fourteen renowned children’s book artists to create mini storybooks about a favorite animal.
On October 21, millions of children and adults will come together to read a single book for Jumpstart’sRead for the Record®. The annual campaign celebrates literacy and brings awareness to the fact that children in need start kindergarten 60% behind their more affluent peers.
Participants will also be trying to break the world record for largest shared reading experience. In order to do so, more than 2,462,860 people will need to read this year’s selected book, “Bunny Cakes” by bestselling author and illustrator Rosemary Wells.
We’re helping educators and program leaders serving kids in need celebrate! If at least 70% of the children in your program are from low income families or military families, you can order the custom edition of “Bunny Cakes” in both English and Spanish through the First Book Marketplace.
In the last 8 years, Read for the Record has engaged 11.5 million children and put 1.6 million books into the hands of kids in need. We’re excited to help even more kids participate in this year’s celebration. To receive books in time to celebrate on October 21, be sure to order by October 6. Here’s to breaking a new world record together!
Do you work with kids in need? Sign up to access “Bunny Cakes” along with other great books and resources through the First Book Marketplace?
Elephant and Piggie: I Broke My Trunk – Mo Willems
Gerald is careful. Piggie is not. Piggie cannot help smiling. Gerald can. Gerald worries so that Piggie does not have to. Gerald and Piggie are best friends. In I Broke My Trunk! Gerald tells Piggie the long, crazy story about breaking his trunk. Will Piggie end up with a long, crazy story of her own? Another hilarious escapade starring the Geisel Award-winning duo & vetted by an early-learning specialist
Yoko’s Paper Cranes – Rosemary Wells
Ever since Yoko moved with her Mama from Japan, she misses her Obaasan and Ojiisan (her grandma and grandpa) very much. She especially misses doing origami with them. Luckily, Yoko knows just what to do for Obaasan’s birthday. Yoko’s Paper Cranes is a story about making paper cranes and letting them fly with your heart to those you love, even if they are thousands of miles away.
Un Alce, Veinte Ratones – Clare Beaton
Count the animals from one to twenty while searching for the cat in this lively hide-and-seek selection that introduces animals like frogs, whales, monkeys, ducks, hens and elephants. (Spanish language edition)
Healthy Kids – Maya Ajmera
Photographs showcase the many ways kids around the world can be healthy.
Officer Buckle and Gloria – Peggy Rathmann
Officer Buckle knows more about safety than anyone else in Napville, but his dull presentations put his audiences to sleep. Enter Gloria, Napville’s new police dog. Gloria knows just how to liven up the safety speeches – as long as Officer Buckle’s back is turned! Full color.
Daniel’s Mystery Egg (Bilingual) – Alma Flor Ada
Daniel encuentra en huevo. ¿Qué animal saldrá de aquí?
Daniel finds an egg. What kind of animal will it hatch?
Jack and Annie are on their second mission to find—and inspire—artists to bring happiness to millions. After traveling to New Orleans, Jack and Annie come head to head with some real ghosts, as well as discover the world of jazz when they meet a young Louis Armstrong!
The Duckling asks for a cookie – and gets one! Do you think the Pigeon is happy about that?
Very Hungry Caterpillar (Bilingual) – Eric Carle
Eric Carle’s classic story is now available as First Book’s newest BILINGUAL First Book Marketplace Special Edition.This bilingual edition is available exclusively through the First Book Marketplace!
Piggie Pie! – Margie Palatini and Howard Fine
Gritch the Witch wants piggies for dinner, but when she shows up at Old MacDonald’s farm, the pigs go undercover.
Drummer Hoff (Stories to Go!) – Barbara Emberley
DRUMMER HOFF is a lively folk verse all about the building of a cannon. Brightly dressed in full uniform, each soldier brings a part for the remarkable machine. Corporal Farrell brings the barrel, Sergeant Chowder brings the powder, General Border gives the order-but it’s Drummer Hoff who finally fires it off and explodes the whole rhyme.
It was very quiet in the studio when I finished the call. I had just agreed to illustrate Following Grandfather, a short novel by Rosemary Wells. The Rosemary Wells, whose work as an illustrator, and a writer, I hold in the highest regard. She had asked the publisher for me. Naturally, I said.....yes. But after the excitement, the reading, and the meeting, came the quiet--and with it, the self doubt...... Read the rest of this essay and posts by so many artists and writers that I admire at The Pippin Insider. http://www.pippinproperties.com/blog/entry/more-mice-clothes/
0 Comments on A very personal post. as of 12/4/2012 5:17:00 PM
So proud to see "Following Grandfather" (Rosemary Wells) and "Tugg and Teeny: That's What Friends Are For" ( J. Patrick Lewis ) on the list of nominees for the Easy Reader/Early Chapter Book category of the 2012 Cybils Award! There are so many great books nominated this year. See the complete list here: http://www.cybils.com/2012-nominations-easy-readersearly-chapter-books.html
Just two years ago I was admiring the work of my friend Kelly Murphy (http://www.kelmurphy.com/books.html) in this book category and wishing that I would have the opportunity to pursue some similar projects. The Universe responded with a wonderful Rosemary Wells manuscript and a three book series by Children's Poet Laureate, J. Patrick Lewis. Fantastic. Now, lets see...what would be nice for 2013?
We are extra lucky today as not one but two experts have concocted a gourmet feast of their Top 10 favourite multicultural stories about food. It seems fitting that authors Grace Lin and Jama Rattigan should each select food as their theme, since they have both written stories revolving around tasty recipes – as you will discover by looking at each of their menus. In fact, each has put a book by the other on her menu, while unaware that the other was cooking up their own recipe, so it seems fitting that we should bring you the whole spread for you to gorge on at a single sitting – and it’s also interesting to see which books come up as double portions…
Jama Rattigan is the author of Dumpling Soup illustrated by Lilian Hsu-Flanders (Little, Brown Books for Young Readers, 1998); The Woman in the Moon: A Story from Hawai’i illustrated by Carla Golembe (Little, Brown Books for Young Readers, 1996); and Truman’s Aunt Farm illustrated by G. Brian Karas (Sandpiper, 1996). As well as her website (check out the recipe for Dumpling Soup), Jama also hosts the truly delectable Jama’s Alphabet Soup, a must-visit blog for anyone interested in children’s books, food, or both at the same time.
Grace Lin‘s latest book is Starry River of the Sky (Little, Brown Books for Young Readers, 2012), the much-awaited companion novel to Newbery Honor Where the Mountain Meets the Moon (Little, Brown Books for Young Readers, 2009). She has written and illustrated many books for a wide age-range of children, including The Ugly Vegetables (Charlesbridge Publishing, 1999) and Dim Sum for Everyone (Knopf Books for Young Readers, 2001); and picture books she has illustrated include Where on Earth is my Bagel? by Frances and Ginger Park (Lee & Low Books, 2001). You can read our 2010 interview with Grace here, and view some of her beautiful artwork in our Gallery here and here. And do check out Grace’s website and blog, where she has a fantastic giveaway on offer in celebration of the launch of Starry River of the Sky.
Top 10 Favorite Multicultural Picture Books about Food by Jama Rattigan
Whether it’s a big platter of noodles, warm-from-the-oven flatbread, fried dumplings, or a steamy bowl of Ugly Vegetable Soup, there’s nothing tastier than a picture book about food. You eat with your eyes first, then step into the kitchens or sit at the tables of friends and family from faraway places, all of whom seem to agree that love is the best seasoning for any dish, and food tastes best when it is happily shared. These tasty tales always make me say, “More, please!”
~ Too Many Tamales by Gary Soto and Ed Martinez (Putnam, 1993)
My Top Ten Food-Themed Multicultual Books by Grace Lin
In my family instead of saying hello, we say, “Have you eaten yet?” Eating and food has always been a successful way to connect us to culture, familiar as well as exotic–perhaps because it’s so enjoyable! So these books about food can be an appetizer to another country, a comfort food of nostalgia or a delicious dessert of both. Hen hao chi!
~ Hiromi’s Hands by Lynne Barasch (Lee & Low, 2007)
~ Ganesha’s Sweet Tooth by Sanjay Patel and Emily Haynes, illustrated by Sanjay Patel (Chronicle Books, 2012)
~ Bee-Bim Bop! by Linda Sue Park,illustrated Ho Baek Lee (Clarion, 2005)
~ How My Parents Learned to Eat by Ina R. Friedman, illustrated by Allan Say (Sandpiper, 1987)
~ Apple Pie Fourth of July by Janet Wong, illustrated by Margaret Chodos-Irvine (Harcourt, 2002)
~ Everybody Cooks Rice by Norah Dooley, illustrated by Peter Thornton (Carolrhoda Books, 1992)
~ Yoko by Rosemary Wells (Hyperion, 1998)
~ Auntie Yang’s Great Soybean Picnic by Ginnie and Beth Lo (Lee & Low, 2012)
~ Peiling and the Chicken-Fried Christmas by Pauline Chen (Bloomsbury, 2007)
~ Dumpling Soup by Jama K. Rattigan, illustrated by Lillian Hsu Flanders (Little, Brown, 1998)
0 Comments on PaperTigers 10th Anniversary: Top 10 Multicultural Children’s Books about Food – Double Helpings from Grace Lin and Jama Rattigan as of 10/25/2012 7:17:00 PM
I will be signing this weekend in Connecticut. Don't miss this chance to meet Rosemary Wells and have your copy of Following Grandfather signed by both author and illustrator! Southwestern Connecticut Youth Book Expo Saturday, October 20 10:00 a.m. – 2:00 p.m. Huntington Branch Library 41 Church Street Shelton, CT The roster of authors and illustrators looks good! More info at: http://swctyouthbookexpo.org/
0 Comments on Book Expo! as of 10/16/2012 1:11:00 PM
Author: Rosemary Wells Illustrated by Christopher Denise Interest Level: Ages 8 and Up Chapter Book with illustrations
From the Book Jacket: When Jenny was little, Grandfather taught her how to button her buttons and how to write J for her name. When she was a little older, Grandfather took her to try on the expensive dresses at the stylish Mouse Boutique, hidden deep in the ductwork of the Jordan Marsh department store. And during long summer afternoons at Revere Beach, Grandfather taught Jenny the names of seashells.
But one day Grandfather was gone. Every mouse in Boston, including Jenny, went to his funeral high in the belfry of the cathedral. So how can it be that Jenny begins to spot Grandfather about town - turning a corner, sitting on a park bench? Could it really be that Grandfather is still out there somewhere, roaming the city he loved? Jenny can't help but run after the familiar silver whiskers, hoping...
Why It's On My Bookshelf: What a special find. So many children who have lost a grandparent will benefit from reading this book. Sometimes in my own life I will see something or even smell something that reminds me of my grandma. It makes me smile and is a reminder of how much I miss her. I have to admit this book even got me a little teary. Remembering a grandparent can make a child sad but also brings up all the wonderful happy times. Be prepared for lots of share outs and discussion. What an honor to read such a touching and healing story to children. I have a feeling this will be a heavily checked out book from my shelf.
0 Comments on Books That Heal Kids: Book Review: Following Grandfather as of 10/1/2012 4:18:00 PM
Many thanks to all the folks at Barrington Books, our friends, family and readers who came to book signing on Saturday. If you missed us, we will be signing together again on Saturday October 20th at the Southwestern Connecticut You Book Expo.
0 Comments on Following Grandfather Booksigning as of 9/27/2012 4:34:00 PM
I just received a stack of bookmarks from Candlewick Press announcing my new book due out this Fall. The piece was really nicely printed and designed (thank you Candlewick!) and features the cover.
I have had the incredible opportunity to work with one of my heros in the picture book and Y/A world, Rosemary Wells.
6 Comments on Sneak peak, my next book due out this Fall!, last added: 5/23/2012
Jan Brett‘s books are known and loved for their colourful and detailed illustrations often inspired by particular cultures from around the world. Her best-known titles include The Hat, The Mitten, and Gingerbread Baby. Here on Playing by the book I’ve reviewed two of her books: Christmas Trolls and Daisy Comes Home.
On Tom’s website you can download activity packs for each of his books (though many contain ideas that would work even if you don’t know the actual books in question). As it says on the page in question, “These activity guides were written by a real teacher, so they’re silly and educational.”
What a great find! Yoko Writes Her Name is one of our bilingual (Japanese/English) family’s favourite books! I’ve never heard of Max and Ruby (yes, I live under a rock) until now but that looks fab, thanks!
Zoe said, on 8/11/2011 5:40:00 AM
That’s great Jen – a whole new little world opening up then as there are loads of Max and Ruby books (and animations).
Janelle said, on 8/11/2011 5:15:00 PM
I’m enjoying your free activity sheets series. Amazing all the corresponding content that can be found online.
I know that, for some of you librarians, it feels like summer (and summer reading) will never end. But I was visiting my family in California recently and my sister-in-law mentioned that my niece is starting school on August 10th! August 10th! That seems so early, doesn’t it? Here in NYC, the public schools don’t start until after Labor Day. What about your part of the country? When does school start?
With school starting just around the corner, here are some new books to consider adding to your library to refresh and update your collections:
KINDERGATORS: HANDS OFF, HARRY! by Rosemary Wells This is an excellent picture book recommendation for kids with personal space issues.
Memories can move us forward or backward, depending on how we use them. My Havana: Memories of a Cuban Boyhood evokes the intensity of one child’s connection to his home in 1950s Havana. Prolific children’s book author Rosemary Wells once heard a radio interview with the Cuban-American architect Secundino Fernandez and years later located Fernandez and worked with him to produce this resonant little historical novel burnished with hope and light.
Secundino, or Dino, relishes his city avenues “lined with coral-stone archways, ancient doors, and window frames painted bright as birds-of-paradise.” As twilight arrives, neighbors begin their checker games, and the cafes fill with people. Dino loves to sketch the buildings, with their porticoes and marble columns. The first time Dino leaves the city of his heart, he crosses the Atlantic to spend time with his grandparents in Spain. When he finally returns home, he expects to stay. Dictators — first Batista, then Castro — take over, though, and the family abandons their restaurant to join relatives in New York City.
So homesick in this dark and dreary new environment, Dino relies on his memory to recreate his beloved Havana in the confines of his bedroom. With great care, he cuts out cardboard to represent its archways, balconies and cafes. Aluminum foil glued to plywood and glazed with blue nail varnish becomes a sparkling turquoise harbor. The double-spread illustration depicting the imaginative boy, scissors in hand, beautifully captures his resourceful nature. The novel closes with Dino adapting to his new world: “New York sunlight, shimmering with the promise of summer, settles round my shoulders like the arms of my mother. It is almost like my Havana.” This brief novel would brighten units on immigration, Cuba, or architecture.
Macaulay, David. Built to Last. Houghton Mifflin, 2010. Ages 9 and up.
In my decade as a school librarian, I often watched children poring over Macaulay’s remarkable architecture books. Rather than merely compiling his acclaimed books, Castle, Cathedral, and Mosque, Macaulay has created new colored illustrations, revised the text, and clarified some explanations.
While some might still long for the previously published cross-hatched illustrations, Macaulay’s changes enhance the reader’s experience of the architecture of the past. He ushers us into his Castle, for instance, with a double-spread illustration of a purple-robed king surveying a map, with pawns awaiting strategic placement. The castle Macaulay highlights is imagined but based on castles built for the conquest of Wales between 1277 and 1305, His interesting perspectives of the workers and how they go about building still capture the hearts of readers, young and old. In Cathedral, Macaulay was inspired by the 13th-century Gothic cathedrals of France. It’s hard to resist sharing Macaulay’s passion for the plans, methods and tools used by those builders “whose towering dreams still stand today.” Finally, the least changed a
0 Comments on Architects of Memories as of 2/27/2011 5:09:00 PM
There has been a lot of discussion recently about, to put it dramatically, the death of the poetry anthology and the difficulty of getting our themed and "random" collections of poetry published. As I read to my kids this week in school--more Ezra Jack Keats for 1st graders (full of poetic moments) and Rosemary Wells for the kindergarteners--it occurs to me that we may be neglecting another approach to getting our best work into the hands of young readers--the "picture poem book."
Wells's Noisy Nora is a grand example of a rhymed picture book text that could easily stand alone, even without her characteristic, finely detailed illustrations, as one poem in a collection like Sing a Song of Popcorn. If we begin to imagine all the picture book texts that could "cross over" into the realm of anthologized poems, it becomes easier to imagine the poems that might cross over in the other direction, into the realm of picture books.
There are plenty of out there--one of my favorites is e.e. cummings "little tree" rendered beautifully book-length by Deborah Kogan Ray (and adapted into an actual story, possibly unnecessarily, by Chris Raschka). Speaking of trees, a kind Booklist reviewer of my own Squeeze suggested that "The best poem, “How to Run Away,” could be a picture book in itself." What a compliment!
Of course, not all good or even excellent poems will stand up to a picture poem book treatment--and if we have exerted ourselves to percolate ideas and write poems from a "collection" point of view, it's likely that most of the poems written from that stance huddle too close to their flockmates to be comfortable out on their own.
While I don't have time this morning to reflect on what qualities make a poem picture-bookable, I'm going to enjoy trying to articulate them all weekend. I'm also going to be thinking which of my poems offer enough possibility for an illustrator, enough richness to warrant whole books to themselves. And then I'll start thinking again about the agent who might shop them for me!
Another nice one is "I Am Cherry Alive, the Little Girl Sang" (Delmore Schwartz). I think about this issue all the time, Heidi. Most of my picture books are kinda sorta poems, they resemble poems in parts, but they are not really poems. They have picture book elements that make them bookable. Sometimes people suggest that I submit poems I've written as picture book texts, but I haven't found one yet that measures up in bookability. They're just too slight.
I wrote one long poem years ago, "The Kitefisher," that contains a whole story, and I worked with my editor for months on it, trying to make it work as a picture book. After many revisions, I felt it had lost an essential part of the original, something mysterious and - yes - a little vague. Making it more concrete, closing the gaps in the action, clarifying motives, ended up spoiling the poem for me. I finally had to tell my editor that I couldn't do this, and I withdrew it.
I'd be interested in your views, and those of other commenters.
I just bought Little Tree -- love that! I mentioned to someone recently that her poem (which she'd written for adults) might work well as a picture book. It's good for us to broaden the way we think, add to the possibilities. Good luck finding an agent!
If you are looking for something fun to do this weekend (other than reading a book, of course), then look no further! This Saturday, September 25th, The Library of Congress and Honorary Chairs, President Barack Obama and Michelle Obama, will hold the 2010 National Book Festival in Washington D.C.’s National Mall. The Festival, for the 10th year running, will celebrate the joy and magic of reading by bringing together authors, their fans, and book-lovers of any kind.
This year, over 70 authors, including Rosemary Wells, author of Bunny Money (a First Book favorite), and Katherine Paterson, the current National Ambassador for Young People’s Literature, and author of the Newbery Medal- winning Jacob Have I Loved, will attend the event to discuss their work, talk with fans, and sign books.
So come join this tremendous celebration of literature this Saturday from 10:00 AM to 5:30 PM in the National Mall!
For more information about the 2010 National Book Festival, including a complete list of authors and events, visit http://www.loc.gov/bookfest/.
In 1996, Iona Opie edited a collection of Mother Goose rhymes. The title of the book is My Very First Mother Goose. Illustrations are by Rosemary Wells. For the most part, I really like her work. Some books by her are among our family favorites.
My Very First Mother Goose is one of those books that got starred reviews, won some awards, and ended up on a great many recommended-books lists. Here's the cover:
When I saw the book that year, I pointed colleagues to page 60 and 61, on which Opie placed "Up the wooden hill to blanket fair" because of the illustration that Wells came up with for that particular rhyme. This evening as I read through reviews, I see that only one reviewer noted the page... That person was Janice Del Negro. Her review, in The Bulletin of the Center for Children's Books (December 1996) said "the use of rabbits dressed up as Indians (complete with feathers and teepees) for "Up the wooden hill to Blanket Fair" may give some pause."
Here's the pages:
Let's look at those illustrations. On the right side, we see a bunny lying down, covered with a blanket. See the designs on the blanket? If you hadn't yet seen the facing page, you might not say the designs were meant to signify American Indians.
Now, look at the illustration beneath the rhyme. There's two bunnies in a cart. To me, they seem kind of affluent, perhaps like tourists out west, going to visit a store, or gallery, or museum, or some place where they will see Indians, and maybe purchase Native-made art.
Now look at that full-page illustration. No doubt about it... Those bunnies (should I be calling them rabbits?!) are definitely meant to be Indians... Maybe, they're even meant to be Navajos. Anyone 'in the know' about American Indian tapestries would know that the Navajo, or Dine, people are well known for the rugs or blankets they weave. But if we conclude that the bunnies are meant to signify Navajos, what is that thing that kind of looks like a tipi doing there?! Tipis are not used by Navajos...
I don't think any of the other pages in the book are about American Indians, and there don't seem to be any that are about, say, African Americans. So what gives? Why did Opie and Wells do that? What do you think?
2 Comments on Rosemary Wells illustration in MY VERY FIRST MOTHER GOOSE, last added: 8/26/2010
One more reviewer did pick up on the "Navajo" rabbits. Nancy Willard, in The New York Times Book Review (Nov. 10, 1996, p. 38) also remarked that: "The one regrettable lapse in taste is the illustration for a going-to-bed rhyme, 'Up the Wooden Hill to Blanket Fair,' which shows six very white rabbits in Native American dress and headbands, surrounded by geometrically patterned blankets and gathered around a tepee."
I probably would have used stronger language than "lapse in taste," but at least the reviewer mentioned it -- probably thanks to the awareness that you and others like you, Debbie, are raising through your work.
Looking Back on CWIM: The 1994 Edition An Interview with Rosemary Wells...
The is the year I fell in love with Children's Writer's & Illustrator's Market. I was splitting my time working as editorial assistant for Writer's Digest magazine and working as a production editor for market books. (I had two desks on two different floors and two phone extensions. This drove Bev in the mail room a little crazy--she just retired after a bajillion year at F+W. Bev was the eyes and ears of this institution, sort of like Carl the janitor in The Breakfast Club.)
By now CWIM was up to about 375 pages and the price was up a dollar from the last edition, now at $19.99. As production editor for the book, it was my job to field all the information coming in through the mail (the snail kind--no email yet), and make corrections on a hefty galley copy of the book. I also spent several months carefully proofreading every word of every listing in the book (a luxury we enjoyed due to our generous staff of about 15; now we have 6).
Today I'm excerpting from an "Insider Report" with Rosemary Wells, author of the beloved Max and Ruby books:
"A good children's book has to stand up to 500 reading aloud," says Rosemary Wells. "The only writer who can do it well are the once with a 'voice.' You also need a sure knowledge of what children are about. You don't necessarily need to have to have kids, but you have to be very close to your own childhood. There are a lot of people who try it, who love children and children's books, but it falls apart because they don't have these qualities."
Wells urges writers to avoid turning storied into vehicles for causes or moral lessons. "One mistake a writer can make is to try to teach a lesson or write a story for a cause or an idea," she says. "Write about character and the rest will follow. Otherwise, you run the risk of having the cause become your character. If my book have certain points to them, that's because they come along with the story, but what I try to do most of all is to give humor and character."
It’s another snowy day along the East Coast, perfect for staying indoors and curling up with a cup of cocoa and some great books. This month, the First Book Marketplace is highlighting some excellent books in honor of African-American history month as well as sweet seasonal titles to read with your valentine.
I don’t usually post anything aside from videos on Sunday but after attending the IBBY Conference in NYC this past weekend this topic came up and seemed well worth pursuing.
First, I’d like to address the question of whether or not children, or in this case middle school students, are capable of decoding an ignorant character’s prejudices if that prejudice is not specifically called out. Joan is wrong about a lot of things. You see this and you know this pretty early on. And while it is entirely possible that there will be young readers out there who have never encountered positive images and portrayals of American Indians in their children’s literature, the notion of white people “civilizing” other races and nations is not unique here. Do kids walk into historical novels with the understanding that people in the past thought things we cannot or should not think today? Is it the responsibility of the author instead to cut their all their sympathetic historical figures from a contemporary cloth and imbue them with our own attitudes towards race, gender, sexuality, etc.? I am reminded of a moment in Red Moon at Sharpsburg when author Rosemary Wells had her Southern Civil War era protagonist say of her corset that, “It constricts the mind.” A statement made by a young woman without outside influence or context, I might add. It felt wrong because it was wrong. A broad attempt to shoehorn contemporary attitudes into a historical tale.
I am reminded of the lesson of Patricia C. Wrede’s Thirteenth Child. Do you remember this controversy from 2009? It came up in the pre-Twitter era (it was around but not what it constitutes today) when outrage had a less constructive echo chamber in place, so you’d be forgiven for having forgotten it. The novel takes place in a historical America where magic is common and the Land Bridge never occurred. This America has woolly mammoths and slaves but no American Indians. In a conversation online in 2006, long before the book’s publication, the author said this about her title:
We are extra lucky today as not one but two experts have concocted a gourmet feast of their 
Whether it’s a big platter of noodles, warm-from-the-oven flatbread, fried dumplings, or a steamy bowl of Ugly Vegetable Soup, there’s nothing tastier than a picture book about food. You eat with your eyes first, then step into the kitchens or sit at the tables of friends and family from faraway places, all of whom seem to agree that love is the best seasoning for any dish, and food tastes best when it is happily shared. These tasty tales always make me say, “More, please!”
In my family instead of saying hello, we say, “Have you eaten yet?” Eating and food has always been a successful way to connect us to culture, familiar as well as exotic–perhaps because it’s so enjoyable! So these books about food can be an appetizer to another country, a comfort food of nostalgia or a delicious dessert of both. Hen hao chi!
.jpeg?picon=3306)
Today’s contribution to my series on 
.jpg?picon=696)
I agree 110%!
Your post makes me think of Mildred D. Taylor’s 1997 ALAN acceptance speech, in which she grapples with writing scenes and using language that is potentially painful for readers in her historical fiction about the Logan family:
“I am hurt that any child would ever be hurt by my words. As a parent I understand not wanting a child to hear painful words, but as a parent I do not understand not wanting a child to learn about a history that is part of America, a history about a family representing millions of families that are strong and loving and who remain united and strong, despite the obstacles they face.
In the writing of my most recent work, titled The Land, I have found myself hesitating about using words that would have been spoken in the late 1800s because of my concern about our “politically correct” society. But just as I have had to be honest with myself in the telling of all my stories, I realize I must be true to the feelings of the people about whom I write and true to the stories told. My stories might not be “politically correct,” so there will be those who will be offended, but as we all know, racism is offensive.
It is not polite, and it is full of pain.” http://scholar.lib.vt.edu/ejournals/ALAN/spring98/taylor.html
The crucial difference is that you’re writing about the hero of the story holding and expressing racist perspective about , while Taylor is depicting white antagonists in the African-American Logan family’s. I’m eager to hear what others have to say about this.
Thanks, Betsy Bird. Who on earth is reading The Hired Girl and thinking, “That Joan — she really *gets* people”?
I’ve seen variations of this conversation in many places recently, and at bottom I’m not sure the question of this post’s title is really the one being asked. (Or at least, not the one being asked by people raising concerns about the treatment of prejudiced viewpoints in various children’s books.) To me, the question is one that can be more difficult to articulate– not whether a text should include bigoted or otherwise objectionable views, but *how* those views are presented and contextualized within the story. And often, that reading of “how” depends a great deal on one’s own perspective and experiences.
For example, my reading of Joan’s attempt to convert her Jewish employers is informed by my own experiences as a Jewish woman, and also by my knowledge of many other such stories– and the way that conversion is often used as a motif in books written by non-Jews about Jewish experiences. (One could call it a trope.) If I, in sharing my reading, raise issues with Joan’s conversion attempt, then the counter-argument that this element is historically accurate and true to Joan’s character doesn’t really address the issue of context that I’m raising. The question isn’t just about an author’s decision to include prejudiced views and actions, but about *how* the author’s contextual decisions often reflect views the author may or may not be aware of. It seems worth noting that these discussions occur most often in cases where authors are writing about experiences outside of their own identities.
I think the related question– about whether writers should have faith in young readers’ ability to negotiate contextual clues and not take prejudiced views or actions at face value– also falls within this framework. Often, what I see is writers (and critics) discounting the perspectives of young readers who are able to contextualize the *author’s* viewpoint in ways that go against a dominant reading.
For anyone in these discussions who hasn’t read it, I highly recommend Toni Morrison’s book Playing in the Dark: Whiteness and the Literary Imagination. See, for example, her reading of Huck Finn. Many might argue that Twain offered an accurate portrayal of the racism of his time period, and that he trusted his readers to see that this is a commentary on racism and not an endorsement of such views. But Morrison’s reading gets at the deeper question I see being asked in these discussions– about how Twain’s decisions as a writer reflect on his own, biased, imagination.
Betsy, while I appreciate you taking this on, you take an argument in which I question one line I one book, in the context of a Newbery Award discussion, to suggest that such a questioning means I distrust child readers In toto, and any controversial passages at all.
We have to be able to talk about issues of race in children’s books, as passionately as we do about the rest of it, without making this a “Black or white” discussion.
The one question I think we can start with is: why did you put the question about what a Native kid reading the book might think as your last concern? Why aren’t we all making that our first concern? Well, because we’re centering our whiteness, is why. Because our entire society centers whiteness, is why. Because we want to get derailed in BUT ARE WE ALLOWED TO EVEN WRITE THIS (clutches pearls clutches pearls). You’re allowed to write any darn thing you want. But that means we, the critical adult audience, are also allowed to then ask hard, uncomfortable questions about that thing you wrote. That’s just part of the deal.
I find that, often, one part of this argument is – you must be the kind of person who only wants NICE things to happen in fiction. You must not care about THE TRUTH. To which, of course, the only response is: depends on who you’re asking to tell you the truth. Let’s take a look at Tim Tingle’s HOW I BECAME A GHOST. There’s a book that is raw and unblinking in its portrayal of what happened to the Choctaw people as they were forced onto the Trail of Tears. Would anyone who has read it say that it is “sanitized” or “nice” version of history? Certainly not. And yet examples like this rarely come up in these conversations about “REAL history isn’t gentle!” Yes, marginalized people know this more than anyone.
I’d also come back to your final line: kid readers, like all of us, can reject something as untrue and still be impacted by it. Sarah raises a good point – “historically accurate, tho!!” doesn’t address the larger issues of what happens when a reader in the here and now interacts with this text. To say that they will simply say, “Well, that’s how it was back then!” and go about their merry way doesn’t address that, in many cases, that’s how it still is today.
I would love to trust readers, too, but trust itself rests on respect, and that respect has not been there for so many people/peoples who have been othered by the media, whether we’re talking about children’s books or films, or whether we’re talking about the past or the present day.
Did anyone click on the link that Jonathan provided? Not the one to my site but the one to his Google search? I think it actually makes my point. Go look. The first three images in the first line (Men/Women/Male Native) are stereotypical–but more important–they are costumes that people can get for Halloween. Because THAT is what comes up first, I think it tells us a lot about what people know about respect for Native people–or rather that they do NOT respect Native people. Maybe they dress up that way out of ignorance, or out of a misguided sense of what it means to honor a people, but I do think it speaks volumes about why we cannot trust the reader.
Once you’re at the point where we’re looking at a particularly book (that someone has already made the decision to publish and promote) and a character and a time period, it certainly makes sense for that particular character to have particular misconceptions and bigotries built into her way of seeing the world.
But when it starts to feel like the primary role of American Indians or people of color in the body of juvenile historical fiction is to provoke white people’s prejudices (or demonstrate what a hero they are for NOT holding those prejudices), or to spur white people to action… that’s a problem for me. When I find myself getting frustrated and exhausted by the way male authors write about women, I can retreat to a big pile of books by women, about women, to reset my internal expectations. (And I hope that men are reading them, too.) Native kids (and non-Native kids who walk around in our current, still-racist world, as Debbie points out) have a MUCH smaller pile of books to resort to–far too few for a kid who’s a prolific reader.
So I guess my question would be “how much more historical fiction about white people do we really need?”
So I guess my question would be “how much more historical fiction about white people do we really need?”
I would argue that stories about lower-class white characters that do more than play on poor-but-good stereotypes, especially in certain historical time periods, are still necessary. The rampant fetishization of the Victorian and Edwardian upper class among adults interested in the time period (just look at vast swaths of steampunk or some of the uglier ends of Downton Abbey fandom), to the detriment of discussions of poverty and the working classes that made that kind of living possible, suggests to me that books like The Hired Girl still absolutely have a place. And as a Catholic child who was often frustrated by depictions of nominal Protestant Christianity in books (The Baby-Sitters Club and Little Women both come to mind as examples that confused and surprised me), the presence of an explicitly Catholic main character like Joan, however imperfect she is, would have meant a great deal to me.
Are those needs as pressing as the need for books that reflect greater racial diversity and respect for audiences of colour? No, I don’t think so. Do those books need to include lines like the one in question here? No, I don’t think so, either. But I question the notion that we’ve exhausted historical fiction about white characters entirely, when there are intersectional issues that remain underwritten and underpublished.
Particularly because my next book tells the story of a prejudiced white character being temporarily fostered by a black family, this discussion has been close to home for me. I felt like it was appropriate to put the character’s assumptions about black people right out front and to make it clear from whence they came (her grandmother) – but I felt like it was equally important to correct those assumptions within the text. Maybe that’s me not trusting my readers to get it right, but it’s like that comedian who quit because he wasn’t sure people were laughing at the right part of his jokes — you don’t want to hold up something to ridicule (or, at least *I* don’t) and let a reader walk away with the idea that the idea is correct. To my mind, there are indeed subtleties in this – racism is insidious in its pervasiveness, as is sexism, etc.. I know it’s gauche for writers to “send messages” in our work, and we have all recently heard and rehashed the big argument against having an “diversity agenda” in writing, but I believe we all write with purpose, if we are wise. There are choices to be made in subtly asserting our beliefs and gently righting misconceptions, as it were… And all writers make a choice to acknowledge this or not, I guess, based on what we feel is important.
Books like THE HIRED GIRL, which have a lot to like in them despite the issues, provide the means for us to learn how to be fans of problematic things, to learn how to listen and sit with the discomfort of maybe not catching things which upset other people, and for me, at least, to be a better writer. I know thinking about this won’t help me produce a perfect book – good luck with that, huh? – but a more thoughtful book in this world of reflexive, unrepentant and systemic prejudice can only be a good thing.
[…] are some lively debates going on at Heavy Medal and Fuse #8 about Laura Amy Schlitz’s The Hired Girl, a presumed favorite for 2016 Newbery consideration. […]
I’m with the writer of this article all the way. Ms. Bird is correct that falsification of history (and our ancestors’ sensibilities) for the sake of contemporary political correctness not only shortchanges the readers, it robs them of the opportunity to know where mankind has been and how far we’ve come. It’s one of my peeves with so much “historical” fiction. It isn’t historical at all. It’s contemporary with decorations of older superficial details.
Writing for young readers is a responsibility, and writing about other times and places for any age is a greater responsibility still. Tell the characters’ truth.
Sure! To be clear, I don’t think the answer to my question is “none.” But as people who are outside the Newbery committee, we have the luxury of looking at this particular text as a part of a larger field of literature. My first, lizard-brain, instinctive pushback to “but it’s historically accurate!” is often “but this might be the only line a student reads about American Indians all year!”, and that’s a problem that this book alone can’t solve, and that I don’t expect it to.
I do consider plucky lower-class historical white girls to be overrepresented (without having actually done a count), but you’re right that many of them appear in poor-but-good morality tales, and I’d believe that few of them are explicitly and accurately Catholic.
Betsy, I responded above in defense against your two paragraphs starting “Does it come right out…” as I felt that was putting words in my mouth, but perhaps I was only choosing to take personal offense. I do think that’s skewing the argument I was trying to make at Heavy Medal. If we can put that aside, I agree with nearly everything you say, except for your final assessment of how well this all works in HIRED GIRL. I’ve tried to explain why here: http://blogs.slj.com/heavymedal/2015/10/15/the-hired-girl/#comment-218683
Into this discussion, and by no means to turn it into a discussion about something else, I just want to interject that we need more Roman Catholic characters in children’s lit. When I first read The Hired Girl I cringed for Joan’s behavior regularly (who didn’t?), but one of my first thoughts was that I couldn’t believe she *was* Roman Catholic. It blew my socks off! She’s the main character too, not a secondary character! All through reading the book I felt grateful for that.
Thank you, Betsy. This was a beautifully, thoughtfully written post. I feel like a lot of the conversation occurring on Heavy Medal is “But what will the children think?!” – which is the *exact* argument challengers used when attempting to ban two books from my library in the last couple years (Yummy: The Last Days of a Southside Shorty and Monster).
Thanks, Nina. Naturally I meant no offense to you. I should note that the term “it comes right out” is a screenwriting phrase I picked up from my husband about elements of a storyline that can be removed without detriment to the whole.
Thank you for your thoughtful and swift reply. My comment was a bit too much tangent for me to be comfortable with, in retrospect, and so in interest of not derailing the conversation further than I already have (and I apologize for that), I just want to acknowledge that I’ve read your answer and wish you a good day.
Thank you, Tanita! That’s exactly what I felt when I first read Debbie Reese’s post about this: “the discomfort of maybe not catching things which upset other people.” I had no memory of the passage, so I’m grateful to other people for pointing it out. It still surprises me that I can breeze by passages that might be hurtful to others, because, as a librarian, I think it’s part of my job to help kids read critically, and to show them it’s okay to be critical of things they like. I hope conversations like this will make me a better librarian, too.
This post focuses on how young people might read irony in a text– that is, whether they recognize the ironic distance between author and character (which I still don’t think is the issue those objecting to the passage are really raising.) But I just wanted to add that I think the dynamics of how young readers interact with books, and with the prejudices in them, is one of the central themes in The Hired Girl itself. Joan is first and foremost a reader. Her knowledge of the world comes partly through the books she reads, and she also, increasingly, uses her knowledge of the world to read against those beloved books. This back and forth of contextualization and re-contextualization includes her attitudes and conceptions about Jewish people, for example, and about prejudice. She uses the knowledge she’s gleaned from Ivanhoe to try to understand the Jewish people she meets, and then uses her experiences with the Jewish people she knows to contextualize attitudes presented in Ivanhoe.
But I think the picture of reading included within The Hired Girl also points to some of the problems people are addressing. As Debbie notes, this work of contextualization depends on the other experiences with which one reads against a text. Joan’s reading when she’s at the farm is different than her reading once she’s lived with the Rosenbachs. For most non-Native readers in the US, those other experiences include a litany of misrepresentations in books and media, little accurate knowledge, and few relationships with actual Native people. When it comes to the presentation of Jewish people in this book, I would also argue there are many images and associations Schlitz herself has absorbed from books like Ivanhoe, which maintain their hold on the imagination despite real knowledge of Jewish people. This includes the supposedly “good” stereotype of the idealized Rebecca. I think books can work on the imagination even when we have the means to put them in context.
As Angie says, all of this also continues to center the perspective of the reader who is encountering people and prejudices from the outside– not the reader whose context is their own very real, painful experiences as the target of those prejudices. Books like Roll of Thunder center the child *experiencing* prejudice, which is different from a book that focalizes a character with prejudiced views. In the later case, again, I don’t think the question is one of accuracy or even inclusion, but of how the author treats and understands both those views, and the reader who has experience with them that the author lacks.
I don’t believe Betsy is suggesting you distrust child readers in toto, just that you distrust them about this.