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Something Different Every Day

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March 29, 2007

Die, Ron, Die! and other annoying comments

Unless you've been confined to Azkaban lately, you probably have seen the cover for the new and final Harry Potter book. Once again, adults are posting their opinions about Harry, and once again, I am getting very irritated.

Fandom raises its ugly, divisive head all over other areas of pop culture as most computer-literate, Buffy/Star Trek/most-graphic-novel series followers are all too aware. The fans of these series argue vehemently over character development, speculate on plot twists to come, and express hatred and love with tremendous feeling. And that's fine. Whatever makes you happy.

But seeing the fandom that swirls around Harry Potter is weirdly distressing and unfamiliar. I can't think of another children's book series that has drawn adults into the same kinds of extreme opinions and to me, repellent, expressions of devotion and loathing. When I see adults writing things like "Die, Ron, die!" it makes me wish I believed in censorship. I just wouldn't allow those obnoxious grown-ups to read Harry if they can't behave nicely.

Okay, I don't really mind their expressing their (stupid) opinions. They annoy me, but lots of things annoy me. What I mind is the way fans try to bully an author into writing what they want them to write. The Harry/Hermione fans are going to be furious if at the end of Deathly Hallows Harry ends up with Ginny, and they aren't shy about saying so. Imagine writing to Beverly Cleary and telling her, "When Ramona is in junior high, I don't want her to date that moron Howie. I think Henry Huggins should be her boyfriend! Die, Howie, Die!"

Grown-ups. Yuck. I'm so glad I'm a children's librarian.

Posted by susan at 11:25 AM | Comments (0)

March 22, 2007

Age 12 going on 10 or 18, depending

The new NSLS Fast Facts survey on serving middle grade students brings up a subject I find pretty interesting. It was reassuring to see that many of the public libraries in this area treat the young adolescents as the dual-natured people that they are. You have your kids who are dying to reach the adult world and are 12 going on 18 (at least); you have your kids who are reluctant to leave the child world behind and are 12 going on 10, and then of course thanks to the wonders of hormone fluctuations you have the many kids who are anywhere from age 8 to age 40 all within one hour.

I strongly advocate libraries sharing service to this age group. Let them sort themselves out--let the Too Cool for the Children's Department kids head to Adult; let the I Still Love the Books I Loved Before kids keep coming to Youth Services, and let the staff work together on programming. Let's keep the Newbery medal going up to age 14 while the Printz goes down to 12. Let's not create firm boundaries for our own organizational convenience. Let's keep it nice and messy, just like the kids themselves!

Posted by susan at 10:08 AM | Comments (0)

March 16, 2007

What if you're the last one?

It seems to me that in the day and age of the computer, we ought to be doing a better job of making sure the children's books that were worth buying in the first place don't slip quietly away as libraries discard them. In the past, it was almost impossible to know if your library held the last copy of a book, whether it was #63 in a series of 64 books, or something by a local author who never won an award but was still really good or "the book I read when I was about 10 at summer camp about a girl who saves a horse. It had a green cover." Now, it's possible to know.

Whenever the subject comes up in youth services, as it recently did at a CCS meeting of the Public Access Services (PAS) group, the concern tends to be downplayed for some pretty good and some pretty bad reasons. A pretty good reason seems to be the library who is in the position of having to weed one book every time they purchase a book until their taxpayers vote them a new building. In that position, I would probably not be overly concerned about saving precious unique books. I would regret it....but I'd have other things on my mind.

The other reasons people give for not worrying about it don't seem as plausible to me. There's the:
~The Why should we care more about children's books than adult books? argument to which I answer Not My Problem. Adult librarians can be in charge of worrying about that one.

~~The Is it really worth worrying about? There are new books coming out every day! argument to which I answer look at how popular old TV shows are. People like to read the books they read in their childhood when their kids and grandkids get to be the right age.

~~~The Don't worry, the Library of Congress/Center for Children's Books/Unnamed Magical Other Place with Infinite Capacity argument to which I answer Don't count on it. The fact is, no one is making sure the last copies of things don't disappear. I contacted Dr. Betsy Hearne at the Center for Children's Books at the University of Illinois, who confirmed that they are in fact weeding their collection right now too.

So none of those are great arguments or solutions as far as I can see. I'd like to see the conversation continue, because with the resources we have these days, we actually do know if we're about to toss something out that might be the last of its kind. Is there some organized way we can try to hold onto those books?

Posted by susan at 3:20 PM | Comments (0)