Do We Dare Disturb the Universe?

What is the role of children’s literature? Should it be uplifting: a shining example of how we wish life could be like? Or should it reflect reality? How much reality? Who’s reality?

For the past several months I have been reading The Invisible Child by Katherine Paterson (author of Bridge to Terabithia and Jacob Have I Loved). I have been savoring it slowly, one chapter at a time. She writes about the role of a writer, the role of children’s literature, and how adults think too much. Well, that last one is really just my summation.

The latest chapter I read was titled “Do I Dare Disturb the Universe?”. Paterson chronicles her process in writing Rebels of the Heavenly Kingdom, a book she describes as a “disturbing tale of war and betrayal” (174). She has also written about the death of a child, a sister who hates her twin, and children in general who are searching for love and acceptance because their reality is lacking.

Many times I have heard it said that children’s literature should be an escape, that it shouldn’t deal with the harsh reality of the world. Some would say that children should be protected from the world, kept safe from the burdens of adulthood. To some extent I agree. My five year old does not hear or see the news. When I do talk about world events, it is with a filter. I have that luxury. There is not war in my backyard.

But we do talk about war. We do talk about death. Hard topics do come up and I do not believe we should gloss them over. I do not believe children’s literature should either. There are many children who do not have the privilege of childhood innocence; who’s reality is far from the paradise we hope our children grow up in. They need books that gently handle the hard topics of family in prison, death, and war.

Maybe I don’t tell my 5 year old about the black father that was shot by police, but there is a school full of children who don’t have that luxury because they are classmates with his daughter. They are facing that reality. Do we leave them to process for themselves, isolated and alone? Please read what a teacher in that school posted on Facebook: Rebecca Lee's Post

Literature has the power to come in and speak to a child when they won’t listen to anyone else. Paterson writes, “It is my hope, of course, that children will find these characters to be real children like themselves - that they will be able to see themselves in them and then as they come to love and forgive these people on the page to be able to forgive and love their own deepest selves” (48).

While reading this chapter my mind kept returning to a book I read recently, The Seventh Wish by Kate Messner. It chronicles a 12 year old’s journey through middle school life and the realization that her sister is addicted to heroin. There is a point in the book when Charlie is coming to terms with her sister’s addiction and mentions that she doesn’t look like a drug addict. She was a soccer player, part of school clubs and got good grades. She wasn’t greasy or unwashed, like the D.A.R.E. videos showed.

The Seventh Wish has been removed from school and library shelves and Messner has been uninvited for school visits. There are those who think it is too much for a young child to read. That the subject is too heavy. That they should be protected from this reality. But my state of New Hampshire is fighting a heroin epidemic, as many states are, and there must be children who fit this character’s description. There are children who need to read this book to know they are not alone. That they are seen and heard and their stories have value.

These types of books bite through the perceived childhood ideal. There are so many children starved of characters to relate to; characters who do not live the ideal, who’s reality is so far from paradise. To feed them only children’s literature that is tied up neatly with a bow is to disregard these children’s life stories. Paterson also writes that “[her] task is to see through the disturbance to the unity so marvelously built into the Creation - to somehow find my way through the cacophony of reality to the harmony of truth” (176). Books that handle harsh reality don’t leave the children there, they bring them through - not to a neat little package, but hopefully to a place of peace despite reality.

So, thank you Katherine Paterson and Kate Messner. Thank you for writing the hard stuff in such beautiful ways.

'Empty-Calorie' Reading

    Every now and then as I am reading Young Adult Fiction, I come across a book I wish I had read when I was younger. When I finally read The Giver, I felt cheated that I hadn’t read it during my formative years. Yesterday I finished The Fog Diver by Joel Ross, and if it hadn’t been written in 2015, I would have felt the same way. 
 
    The Fog Diver describes a post-apocalyptic world where everyone travels by airships above the deadly Fog that covers the planet. Airships that are straight from a steam-punker’s dream; half blimp, half machine, with engines, valves and a pipe organ to steer it. All the markers of a perfect YA novel are there: danger, friends that stick closer than family, an evil villain and room for a sequel.
   I checked it out of the library, but forgot about it until got the reminder email that my books were due, today. I figured I’d be able to renew it, so didn’t take it with me. The librarian informed me someone has it on hold (good for them!). I bit my lip, trying to remember how long the book was, and said, ‘I think I can read it tonight’. She was sweet and reminded me I had a day of grace and that the library was closed on Sunday, so I could really have the weekend, as long as I returned it by Monday. Or, I could keep it till I’d finished and pay the .25 cents a day fine. “I’ll read it tonight,” I said with a smile. And I did. Well, almost. At 11pm I finally closed it, tantalizingly close to the finish. I was able to get the last few chapters read in the morning.
    It was fantastic, except...except that I’m not twelve anymore and I notice things. I notice what is there and what isn’t there. There was a lot of dialogue. The book is mostly dialogue, with no paragraphs of description. When there is non-dialogue description it is actually the thoughts of Chess, from whose point of view we see the world. When the author needs to give backstory he has a character ask a question and one or two other characters interrupt each other to give the story of why or where or how. It ends up feeling choppy, especially after the flowing, lyrical sentence I have been reading by E.B. White, L’engle, and Elizabeth George Speare. Do kids even know what good reading reads like anymore?
    I also ended up liking one of the supporting characters more than the main character. The book is written from Chess’ point of view, but Bea, the spunky ‘gearslinger’ who talks to the airship’s engines and treats her machines like people, ends up being the one my heart goes towards. The plot takes precedence over full-bodied characters. The characters are not fully fleshed out, but rather stereotypical (the mutineers who suddenly turn into our hero’s best friends).
    This novel has been nominated and shortlisted for a couple of awards including the Great Stone Face Award List, and I do feel that it is a good book. Perhaps it lands in the category of “empty-calorie” books. As Katherine Paterson writes in The Invisible Child,

            “We can’t snatch these empty-calorie books from our children’s hands, indeed, that would make them all the more desirable, but somehow we must make sure early on that they have books that will truly nourish them, that will enlarge their minds, that will prepare them to make wise and compassionate decisions when they are grown” (p. 94).


So don’t snatch this book away, snatch it for you child (or you!) and read it, in a sitting, in a day, in a week. It is good, like cake and ice-cream good. Just make sure you also read the 'meat and potatoes', something more substantial, something that will stretch your mind and fill you up with good writing.

Picture from www.amazon.com, cover art is copyrighted.

Making A Start

By chance I picked up Katherine Paterson’s book The Invisible Child: On Reading and Writing Books for Children at the library. Isn’t that how all great book recommendations start? The best books are the ones you aren’t looking for, that you don’t know you even need to read. This is definitely on of them. The Invisible Child is a collection of speeches and talks that Paterson has given ranging from 1974 into the 2000s. It contains her Newbury and National Book Award speeches as well as a number of other talks from conferences. 

This book has been stirring me to read the books I was inspired by as an adolescent. What books captured my attention, my mind, my heart when I was nine or ten years old? So I have returned to the books I have kept since childhood. Faithfully packing and unpacking through several moves. Books I can not get rid of, no matter how many yard sales I have. It’s not that I have good memories of these books, no, these books are my memories. So I have been gobbling up the Newbury Award winners of my youth: Katherine Paterson, Margeurite Henry, Elizabeth Enright, Elizabeth George Speare. I am trying to learn from them. Study their style, rhythm, what makes their characters so relatable and memorable. What is the rhythm of their sentences? How does the story unfold? I want to learn from these masters, mentors, but without copying. Of course, I’m also enjoying just reading them.
 
As I re-read these cherished books, Katherine Paterson’s words ring true, “There is something so comforting about the beloved books of childhood. When the uncertainties of life assail us, they stand as healing verities, and we can return to them again and again. But only, of course, if someone helped us to find those books when we were very young” (95).

That’s what I want to write. A book that captures that young imagination and tells that shy, introverted child there is adventure out there, or at least in here, between the pages. Life may be a bit boring and monotonous, but you can escape into a book filled with adventure and new worlds.
So I have made a start. First by filling my head with rich words from amazing authors, then by actually writing down the stories that are running through my head. We shall see what adventure awaits...