A reckoning is coming in the publishing world, and it has been on the horizon for a long time. How to deal with it is another story entirely.
And it breaks my heart. In so many ways and on so many levels. It is specifically difficult because of the way it intersects with libraries and their most vulnerable patrons.
By way of background. I grew up reading the traditional canon of dead white guys. It is just the way things were.
But I was very fortunate not to be trapped in that. I read everything Laura Ingalls Wilder wrote and loved her dearly (Yes, I had long braids and a sleeping cap like Laura. Yes, I lobbied my parents to change my middle name to "Elizabeth." They refused) Then, at some point, I stumbled across A Wrinkle in Time and saw that girls could write and break boundaries.
I also had a vast collection of Tasha Tudor books and even met her once. I would spend hours reading the poems and tales, staring at the detailed drawings, trying to drink in every last detail.
I was lucky. I could read stories by women. I could read stories about girls. I could read books where girls were traditional and ones where girls broke boundaries. I could see the wider world with myself as a part of it.
But this is because I was not only a girl but a middle-class white girl.
I honestly don't remember the first time I read a book with a character who was a person of color and was not a criminal, poor, a slave, or an object of pity.
So when I came to reading young adult books, especially ones with diverse characters, it was new and different. How would I have felt if I had never ever read a book about a character that looked like me?
But I did have that experience, in a sense. I am not just a middle-class white woman, but a middle-class fat white woman. (I was a fat kid too.) And that really does change everything.
When was the last time you read a book and there was a female character who was fat? Let's say there is one (which is rare). There is a very good chance that this character is one or more of the following: pathetic, stupid, lovelorn, lazy, abused, dirty, the butt of jokes, self-deprecatingly funny, ugly, unwanted. Oh, and she is always dieting. Her entire existence is defined by her desire to be less
Go ahead, give it a thought. Think of one who isn't.
Not just books, but TV. Everyone loses their mind about how amazing This is Us is, but what in the world goes on in the one fat lady's life other than dieting? Everything centers around it. Same with Mike & Molly. And Roseanne. Heck, Empire broke ground because its fat female character actually had a love life.
And just like that, we have run out of shows with fat female main characters. And TV is just a mirror of books. The lessons are the same.
When Eleanor & Park came out, it was hailed as a groundbreaking take on teen life, at least in part, because Eleanor is fat. She is strong and powerful in her own way, and she finds the most beautiful young love that is so raw and real. And her fatness doesn't prevent that. Yet while she is a wonderful character who is beautifully written, without getting into spoilers, she fits into several of the above categories. But she is pretty much the best option.
If I as a fat woman were to watch TV or read books, then use those to form ideas about myself, what would I believe? Nothing good, that's for sure.
So it is a powerful thing to see someone who could be you doing great things, being amazing and strong and smart and successful. For kids, it is hard to push back against an unending wave of negative messages to see the possibility of something better in the future, that you can be more than what the world tells you that you are doomed to be.
Several years ago, I read The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao. It is a work of art. It really is breathtaking in its scope. The story. The words. The characters. Everything about it. In it, the author Junot Diaz says, “[I]f you want to make a human being into a monster, deny them, at the cultural level, any reflection of themselves.”
Let that sink in.
It is dead on.
Junot Diaz won the Pulitzer for Oscar Wao and has been a celebrity writer ever since. His books are astonishing. They are fierce in their portrayal of the truth. They have strong, powerful, diverse characters and speak so much truth it is hard to comprehend at times.
He has a newly released children's book, Islandborn. What a beautiful book! And with a Dominican girl as the central character, talking about her heritage, showing the strength of immigrants, and filled with richly written and drawn diverse characters. What a treasure for a young child to open a book like this and see images of herself!
Full disclosure, if it were not clear already, I adore Dias. I love what he writes, what he says, the way he says it. His unapologetic support for those things that are important to him.
That's what makes this so difficult.
In mid-April, Diaz wrote a piece for the New Yorker detailing his childhood abuse at the hands of a trusted adult. The essay is excruciating. The trauma. The residual damage to Daiz. The ways his life has been warped and shaped. It is painful and powerful and horrible.
I grieved for Diaz. I still do. Even now, writing this, my heart hurts, and I have to struggle not to cry. Thinking of how many people have a story like Diaz's. How many kids have faced similar abuse and not survived? The horror is too great sometimes.
Then, just a few days ago, allegations surfaced of Diaz's abuse of women.
And there it is.
Now, in the last 24 hours, MIT has started an investigation into allegations against Daiz. He has resigned from the Pulitzer committee and faces investigation there.
Diaz, to his credit, acknowledges the voices and testimony of the accusers. He says that he accepts responsibility for his actions. What that means, in the long run, is anyone's guess.
The fall of Junot Diaz, really, is just one rock in an avalanche of those who stand accused. When these powerful men fall, with them go the written works they have created, many of which are, quite frankly irreplaceable. They fill a hole in the literary world. With writers of color being marginalized and overlooked for so long, each and every work by one who did make it onto the shelves is essential.
But when those writers have done despicable things, what happens to their works?
- Bill Cosby's Little Bill series is groundbreaking for young kids, especially young African American boys.
- Sherman Alexie's works are canon now. What library worth its salt doesn't have The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian?
- Jay Asher of 13 Reasons Why brought important attention to mental health issues
- James Dashner's The Maze Runner books are important texts for boys who often find reading inaccessible or uninteresting.
- Heck, the Nobel committee announced that in the face of sexual abuse allegations there would be no 2018 Nobel in Literature. For the first time since 1949.
And it is only May.
Yes, these allegations and crimes are horrific. Not just Diaz but many many men in the writing and publishing world. And for many of them, the situation has been whispered about and ignored. It is a good thing that these are being brought to light. It is the only way to bring healing. At a minimum, it is the first step.
But then what in the world do we do with the books?
When Sherman Alexie's books are the best, most accessible, beloved representation of Native American characters?
When Bill Cosby's Little Bill books are beloved, beautifully illustrated, wonderfully written, and representative of positively written young black boys?
What about Junot Diaz's books?
Far better people than me have thought about this and written about it.
Kara Yorio writing for School Library Journal
Aya de Leon's blog post Reconciling Rage and Compassion
is the best I have read regarding Diaz and what happens next. (full disclosure: it has some strong language).
Watching the media circus around the #MeToo movement is, in many ways an abstraction. But when it comes to the shelves of my library, what happens?
Junot Diaz's words still hover over the entire discussion: “[I]f you want to make a human being into a monster, deny them, at the cultural level, any reflection of themselves.” How much damage would it cause to remove all the books by all the authors who turn out to be despicable or those who have done despicable things?
And for that reason, I can't look at a book without considering those kids who would benefit from reading it. Or those who will get a glimpse into a life and world they don't know and grow from it.
I am not pulling a book simply because the author is despicable.
This is especially true when those are influential texts or ones that are representative of diverse characters.
I can't justify taking down a book that can play an important role in allowing a student to see themselves and their world in a broader, deeper way with a true depiction of themselves. I can't. And I won't.
I strongly believe in access and the power of self-censorship. If you don't like a book, don't read it. If an author is reprehensible to you, don't read it. I follow this in my own life (Woody Allen, I'm looking directly at you), so I am going to give my students that same courtesy.
These long and rambling thoughts, while a glimpse of the chaotic pathways my mind takes, are really the only way for me to tackle a mess like this. Nothing happens in isolation. No single issue is without connection to a dozen others.
It is hard to separate the art from the artist.
And it is impossible for me to separate the art from those who will benefit from it.
Books are essential as mirrors and windows and doorways. Who am I to close them?
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