Of References and Readers

In the course of a recent child_lit discussion about food in children's literature, specifically in the Chronicles of Narnia, a listmember remarked "But [children] don’t easily tolerate something that’s assumed to be normal but isn’t normal to them. What do all our brilliant editors – Cheryl? – think on this point?" I wrote a response that I thought might interest some of you, so I'm cross-posting it here, with some amendments. (And yes, I admit I'm posting tonight partly to make another diagonal line in the calendar.)

I work on a lot of translations, so I usually deal with this problem not so much in terms of outdated references [the problem that Narnia presented us for discussion] as cultural unfamiliarity. . . . For instance, in the first-draft translation of our marvelous Japanese fantasy novel out this month, Moribito: Guardian of the Spirit, Chapter 2 described the main character as taking a bath indoors in a bathhouse, then going outdoors to another hot pool in the garden. This is of course entirely standard behavior in Japan, where bathhouses are an established part of the culture, but it would seem odd to an American child, who would be much more likely to view a bath as a place for hygiene than for relaxation or socialization (and two baths -- perish the thought!). Taken to the word level, this is also the debate over "Americanizing" British or Australian texts -- changing "jumpers" to "sweaters" -- and even in American books, we deal with it in "aging" a text: Will a third-grader understand the word "anticipation"?

The editorial options when faced with something that would likely be strange or difficult for the target audience are:

1. To let it stand as-is: The reader can pick it up from context, or it's not significant enough in the overall reading experience to change, or it can be looked up, or it's a mystery whose answer they can discover as they age. (I'm still learning some of the references in the Lord Peter Wimsey novels -- "Vagula, blandula," anyone?)
   
2. To emotionally contextualize the reference: The Narnian example we were dealing with on child_lit was that Father Christmas gives the Pevensies a tea tray for Christmas, which would be a wonderfully luxurious present amidst the privations of WWII but perhaps makes less sense to the well-fed children of the post-war years. But if the books were revised so it was established in the text that the Pevensies were usually very hungry, that they never saw sugar or hot tea or any of the other delicious things on a tea tray, then we readers might have the same reaction to the tea tray that they do, and the reference would make perfect sense. [Note that I am not advocating that such a change be made -- I'm just observing one way that the problem might be solved.] Or, in the third-grade book, if you see the kid simmering with excitement about getting to see his new baby brother, jumping up and down as his father escorts him down the halls of the hospital, then the meaning of "anticipation" should be clear.
3. To explain the reference outside the narrative text: For instance, in the lovely Australian novel The Slightly True Story of Cedar B. Hartley, which we published a few years ago, my boss Arthur Levine suggested to the author, Martine Murray, that we add a glossary at the back of the book to define fun Aussie terms like "footy" and "drongo" and "hoon around." This allowed us to keep those words but also to feel that the reader wouldn't be totally lost in the language. E. Lockhart also does this in her most excellent The Boyfriend List and The Boy Book -- the main character Ruby Oliver is a huge movie buff, and when she refers to an old film most contemporary teenagers might not have seen, she uses a footnote to explain the reference. (E. recently had a post on her blog asking teenage readers to fill out a survey about what references they recognized and what needed footnotes for the third Ruby book -- a pretty smart use of the Internet, I thought.)
   
4. To change it: "jumper" to "sweater," or "anticipation" to "excitement," or just by adding a little context. In our wonderful Spring 2009 novel Marcelo in the Real World, the religiously-interested narrator refers in passing to Ezekiel jumping on dry bones. The reference made sense to me, thanks to many hours spent in Baptist Sunday Schools, but I knew other readers may not have had such a religious education, so I suggested to Francisco that we add the phrase "in the Bible" to tell these readers where "Ezekiel" came from. The line now reads something like, "I think of Ezekiel in the Bible, jumping on dry bones" -- a change that barely slowed up the action and yet made the reference clear.
   
5. To delete the reference altogether if it's not fully necessary in the text.
   

When I come upon a reference or word that gives me pause, and which I think might cause the child reader pause in turn, I try to figure out which approach to the difficulty seems to be the right one -- including, of course, leaving it alone -- and then I suggest that to the author or translator. We discuss it as needed (sometimes extensively) and settle on a plan of attack. All of these decisions are made on a case-by-case basis, as what works for one book may not work in another, and a reference that doesn't work at one point in the book may be perfectly fine later. To return to the Moribito example, the translator (Cathy Hirano), author (Nahoko Uehashi), and I decided to cut the reference to the first of the two baths, because:

1. The baths took place early in the book, so the reader may not have fully committed to the story, and we didn't want to give that reader an excuse to put the book down because s/he found something difficult or weird. If the two-bath reference had come in chapter 12 or 13, say, instead of chapter 2, when the reader is fully invested in the characters and the (awesome, unlike-any-Western-fantasy-you'll-read, kick-ass) action, then we might have left it alone.
   
2. Along similar lines, the main plot of the book has not yet started (that happens in the very next scene), so having two baths was slowing up our getting to that action.
3. While the book draws on elements of Japanese culture, it is a fantasy set in a fantasy world, so we were neither being untrue to Japanese culture nor losing the opportunity to teach children about it by changing the reference.
   

And that is the way it was published. We editors think about this a LOT, trying to imagine our ideal reader for each book, what that reader will tolerate, what adult gatekeepers think child readers will tolerate, whether the reference really detracts from the pleasure of the book (my first priority in editing as in reading -- pleasure), and so forth. But the final decision is always the author's.

In the followup discussion, another listmember posted a link to a fascinating article by the British author Anne Fine on updating her own books' references: Read it here.

Utter Silliness

I am posting today for the sole pleasure of making a little diagonal line in the calendar on the right. See it? Whee!

But in order to make up for wasting your time:

• The Reading Reptile, a most excellent independent children's bookstore in my dear hometown of Kansas City, MO, is holding a Debt Depletion Auction featuring many signed books and original picture-book art. There's some awesome stuff there, like the original Arlene Sardine cover art or paintings by Jon J Muth, and three days left to bid -- have at it!
• A fabulous mac-and-cheese recipe (via Jeremiah).
• Things I highly recommend to you: in movie theatres, Ironman; on Broadway, August: Osage County; in children's books reading, The Penderwicks on Gardam Street; on the Internet, Roger Ebert's new blog.
  
• And the Happiness of the Week: It carries me up to Prospect Heights and down to Kensington; it's usually on time, even though I'm often not on time for it. It is rarely overcrowded, and its staffpeople unfailingly polite. My thanks to you,

the B67 bus!!!

Three Links That Made Me Laugh Hard This Week

The World Beard and Mustache Championships

Actual text from the website: "With his superstyled partial beard which NPR's Robert Siegel once dubbed a 'hair pretzel,' Willi Chevalier practically owns the partial beard freestyle category. Indeed, Willi has won this category at all WBMCs in memory with the exception of the 2003 WBMC when he was on injured reserve following an unfortunate encounter with a power drill." Check out all the photos in the gallery.

Joe Posnanski's Account of His Best Sportswriting Day Ever

"The first question came, and it was something like: 'So, did you think you had it in you to beat the great and unbeatable Russian?'

"And Rulon Gardner said: 'Well, when I was growing, I used to wrestle cows on our dairy farm …'"

Sarah Jessica Parker's Hat in This Picture

Like Dr. Seuss and Patricia Field started an accessories line together. The Fug Girls are their usual brilliant selves in the dialogue.

Welcome to the Neighborhood

My thought process on seeing this yesterday:

1. Oh wow -- ninjas live in Park Slope!
   
2. But wait -- the true ninja would never advertise his or her whereabouts so crudely. Therefore, ninjas do not live in Park Slope.
3. But the true ninja would know that his or her enemies would think that the true ninja would never advertise his or her whereabouts so crudely. Thus the true ninja might go ahead and advertise his or her whereabouts in just that fashion to lull the enemies into a relaxed stupor and slay them. Therefore, ninjas live in Park Slope.
   
4. But the enemies would know that the true ninja would know that the enemies would think that the true ninja would never advertise his or her whereabouts so crudely. Therefore, the enemies would not fall for the ploy; therefore, the true ninja would not make such a ploy; therefore, the sign-writer is lying, and ninjas do not live in Park Slope.
5. But the true ninja would know that the enemies would know . . .
6. Ad infinitum.
   
7. Perhaps the ninja's enemies marked his or her house so that other enemies would know where the ninja lives and kill the ninja on behalf of the first enemies.
   
8. Or perhaps it's actually the first enemies' house and the ninja marked it so that the second enemies would kill the first enemies.
   
9. Or perhaps it's a decoy house to draw out all the enemies, and the ninja actually lives next door.
10. The Ninja Next Door: Now there's a title for a picture book.
    
11. Perhaps the Staten Island ninja has moved to Brooklyn!
12. Perhaps a ninja is behind me right now.
    
13. (And as you're reading this, one could be behind you.)
14. . . .
15. . . .
    
16. . . .
    
17. Perhaps I should stay away from that street.

The Quote File: Sentences

"I'm probably more interested in sentences than anything else in life." -- Tom Robbins

"My sentences are all I have. My life has always been an engagement with words. I do not have very much of a physical life. I write, I edit, I teach. And in all of these activities the focus of my attention is sentences. Sentences are continuous with my inmost being." -- Gordon Lish

"The sentence is my primary element, my tool, goal, bliss. Each new sentence is a heart-in-the mouth experiment." -- Cynthia Ozick

"My whole theory of writing I can sum up in one sentence: An author ought to write for the youth of his own generation, the critics of the next, and the schoolmasters of ever afterward." -- F. Scott Fitzgerald

"You must convince yourself that you are working in clay and not marble, on paper and not eternal bronze; let that first sentence be as stupid as it wishes. No one will rush out and print it as it stands. Just put it down; then another." -- Jacques Barzun

"All you have to do is write one true sentence. Write the truest sentence you know." -- Ernest Hemingway

"To get the right word in the right place is a rare achievement. To condense the diffused light of a page of thought into the luminous flash of a single sentence, is worthy to rank as a prize composition just by itself. . . . Anybody can have ideas--the difficulty is to express them without squandering a quire of paper on an idea that ought to be reduced to one glittering paragraph." -- Mark Twain

"It is my aim, and every effort bent, that the sum and history of my life, which in the same sentence is my obit and epitaph too, shall be them both: He made the books and he died." -- William Faulkner

Happinesses of the Week

Two Happinesses this weekend, for whichever week you care to count them. On Friday Jeremiah and his lovely wife 2.0 (long story) took me and another friend to his parents' house in central upstate New York. From there we all took a day trip to Cooperstown and the Baseball Hall of Fame, which is a beautiful and entertaining place, if sadly lacking in Royals information and memorabilia. (The Boys in Blue get one display about half the size of a batters' box, while the St. Louis Cardinals are everywhere . . . which may indeed be their respective contributions to baseball history, but I was indignant on behalf of my hometown.) Anyway, the best part of the weekend was the people I was with -- especially Jeremiah's parents, who were kind and generous and funny and wise and excellent cooks. So in gratitude to both couples, young and older:

The Conways!!!

Then after we returned to Brooklyn, I went for my Sunday run in Prospect Park, and this came up on the iPod:



"Jesus Walks" by Kanye West. I am not giving it the typical large-red-letter three-exclamation-mark treatment because while it's a Happiness aesthetically -- a terrific song with witty, meaningful lyrics (and, speaking personally, a beat that is just right for my running pace) -- it also has a great and important message that is worthy of a little more seriousness, and one that everyone should listen to. If you've never heard the song or seen the video before, please watch it. (It gives me goosebumps.) Kanye has also made two other videos for the song that serve as companions: Part 2, Part 3.

"Poetics" by Howard Nemerov

You know the old story Ann Landers tells
About the housewife in her basement doing the wash?
She's wearing her nightie, and she thinks, "Well hell,
I might's well put this in as well," and then
Being dripped on by a leaky pipe puts on
Her son's football helmet; whereupon
The meter reader happens to walk through
And "Lady," he gravely says, "I sure hope your team wins."

A story many times told in many ways,
The set of random accidents redeemed
By one more accident, as though chaos
Were the order that was before creation came.
That is the way things happen in the world,
A joke, a disappointment satisfied,
As we walk through doing our daily round,
Reading the meter, making things add up.

Squids 101: What I Like to See in an Artist's Portfolio

I went to an SCBWI portfolio viewing at the Society of Illustrators this afternoon. All of the portfolios there were very organized and professional, but for the benefit of illustrators who may not have had much guidance in putting a portfolio together, here are some things I like to see in them:

• Your best work. Don't put substandard pieces in your portfolio just to fill out the book.
  
• All the styles and/or media you feel proficient in. If you're comfortable doing black-and-white line art as well as watercolor and acrylic, feel free to put all three in, though I then suggest organizing the portfolio by medium so I can look at your style and skill in each one. Some illustrators create a separate portfolio for each style/medium, which is good to see if we're having a one-on-one critique, but less practical for general portfolio viewings like today's.
  
• Illustrations involving human beings, particularly children, but also covering a decent range of ages, races, genders, settings, and especially expressions. I don't mean that you have to have twenty portraits in your portfolio where the first is an old black woman rejoicing, the next a two-year-old Asian boy crying, the third George Clooney beaming: Just be sure that your illustrations include more than smiling white people.
  
• N.B.I.: It's the smiling there that can really annoy me -- when I look at a picture of 10 kids on a school bus, say, and all of them have the exact same vacant beaming expression, then you're not creating individual characters so much as a group stare, which might feel warm but will also feel flat. I'm looking for the individuality that comes out of your characters -- a sense of how real and alive those people are, no matter what medium or style you use.
  
• N.B.II.: If you are at all inclined towards caricature or portraiture, it's nice and fun to include a portrait or illustration of some easily recognizable famous figure as rendered by you. (Andy Rash and Sean Qualls are experts at this.) This allows me to get a quick handle on your style by seeing how it compares to the real person. Moreover, the biographical picture book is alive and well, so it's good to know you can recreate real people with accuracy and verve.
  
• Illustrations involving animals, either anthropomorphized or real -- whatever your style is best suited for. I would suggest that you have at least two or three of the following common picture-book animals somewhere in your portfolio: a dog, a cat, a dinosaur, a cow, a pig, a chicken, a duck, a horse, a rabbit, a wolf, an elephant, a mouse, a tiger.
  
• While we're talking common subjects, it could be useful and fun to have pieces showing your unique take on any of the following: a ballet class; firefighters or fire trucks (or other cars and trucks); a farm; dinosaurs (again); a goodnight scene. These subjects may be familiar, but they never go away completely, and we'll always be looking for new takes on these old stories. (This is not a requirement by any means.)
  
• A few (3-4) pieces with the same subject, ideally a few consecutive spreads from the same story (extra points for having the text on the page). This could be an original story or a familiar text -- Mother Goose rhymes and fairy tales are good choices for their familiarity (though I must say that most first-time illustrators will probably not be able to get either a Mother Goose book or a fairy tale retelling published in an overcrowded market). This allows me to see how you handle the same characters in different perspectives, positions, and situations; what parts of the written narrative you choose to highlight in your picture; how you transition from one scene/emotional atmosphere to another; and how you choose to advance the story through your illustrations.
• Better still: A sketch dummy of your current project, with perhaps one piece of final art. It is probably not wise to make full final art of a book until it's sold, as the editor and art director will likely have some suggestions for you, but I love seeing sketch dummies, as they show how you sustain a story over 32 pages and how you handle your characters and their emotions.
  
• N.B.: It's fairly common to see a couple of consecutive letters from an ABC in a portfolio, and while it's always interesting, it ends up being more of a stylistic demonstration than a narrative one. If you're going to spend the pages in a portfolio, narrative progression is generally more compelling, revealing, and useful.
  
• If you have an interest in doing book jackets for novels, make some mockups of new jackets for already published books. I'll throw out three covers that could be fascinating to revisit: Eragon by Christopher Paolini, Twilight by Stephenie Meyer, and Saffy's Angel by Hilary McKay. (Not that there's anything wrong with those original covers -- just that they provide a wide range of subject matter and characters for you to reillustrate.)
  
• A few pieces showing the thing you're most passionate about or you most enjoy illustrating (if they weren't already incorporated in the above). That will likely be the thing you're best at illustrating as well, and it's great to know you're fantastic at and love to create sea scenes, for example, in case a manuscript set on the beach comes across my desk.
  
• Samples, postcard-size or larger, including your name, phone number, e-mail address, snail-mail address, and website, and at least one piece of your very best work, as chosen by a couple of honest friends. A good sample makes me think, in order, (1) "Ooh, I love this piece!" (2) "Ooh, I want to see more!" and (3) "Ooh, I'll check out her website right now!" Any sample smaller than a postcard means it's difficult to see the art properly and start the process at (1), which is why I request that specifically.
  
• N.B.: If you have not yet published a book and you do not have a website, please make one. I have heard illustrators say that it's difficult to maintain a website on top of everything else they have to do for their careers, and I sympathize; but there is no better way (besides this portfolio) to show me the whole range of what you're capable of, and sometimes a website is even better, as I can share it more quickly with colleagues and access it 24/7. Even a blogspot account (a la Dan Santat) is useful in showing the range of your work and the new stuff you're working on.
  

When I look at a portfolio, what I'm really trying to see is the illustrative equivalent of a writer's voice: the kinds of things you like to draw; your skill at rendering real life (even if said life involves dragons or fairies); the qualities of your unique style; how that style transforms real life; its emotional range; how that style might be applied to the manuscripts I have on my desk or future manuscripts that might come my way. So it is important to note that the bullet points above are all suggestions and not prescriptions: If you don't like drawing animals and you're not good at them, then by golly don't include them in your portfolio. Show me who you are illustratively, what you're good at and what you have a passion for, and the best projects will come out of those things.

For further advice on picture-book publishing, I recommend Marla Frazee's website (click on "Studio") and, always, the list of SCBWI Publications. And any editors, designers, or artists who happen to read this, please feel free to offer your own suggestions as well.

Baby Got Book

(Inspired by this shirt on ShelfTalker, I wrote new lyrics for this classic Sir Mix-A-Lot song of my youth.)

[Female voice]
Oh, my, god. Becky, look at her book. It is so big. *scoff* She looks like, one of those, librarians' girlfriends. But, you know, who understands those librarians? *scoff* They only talk to her, because, she looks like a total bibliovore, 'kay? I mean, her book, is just so big. *scoff* I can't believe it's just so thick. It's like, out there. I mean - gross. Look! She's just so ... smart!

[Sir Reads-a-Lot]
I like big books and I can not lie
You other brothers can't deny
That when a girl walks in with an big fat book
And glasses on her face
You're all thrilled, wanna talk to her quick
Cause you notice she's reading Dickens
Deep in the tote she's carrying
I'm hooked and I can't stop staring
Oh baby, I wanna get with you
And read you all night
My homeboys tried to warn me
But that book you got makes me so horny
Ooh, Tolkein - elves!
You say you wanna get in my shelves?
Well, use me, use me
'Cause you ain't that average bookie
I've seen them readin'
To hell with their speedin'
She's Zinn, Prynne,
Got it goin' like Jane Austen
I'm tired of magazines
Sayin' short books are the thing
Take the average intellectual and ask him that
She gotta cook much book
So, fellas! (Yeah!) Fellas! (Yeah!)
Has your girlfriend got big books? (Hell yeah!)
Tell 'em to read it! (Read it!) Read it! (Read it!)
Read that giant tome!
Baby got book!

(LA face with New York volume)
Baby got book!

I like pages galore
And when I'm in an indie bookstore
I just can't help myself, I'm actin' like an animal
Now here's my scandal
I wanna take 'em all home
And ugh, double-up, ugh, ugh
I ain't talking 'bout Dan Brown
'Cause his books are made for clowns
I want 'em real thick and juicy
So find that juicy novel
Reads-A-Lot will grovel
Beggin' for a piece of that cover
So I'm lookin' at bestsellers
Patterson and them fellers
Give me Joseph Heller
And I'll keep my women fine spellers
A word to the bookmarked sisters, I wanna get with ya
Good grammar's my bit, yeah
And I gotta be straight when I say I wanna *read*
Till the break of dawn
Tolstoy got it goin' on
A lot of simps won't like this song
'Cause them punks like to slim it and skim it
And I'd rather drink and think
'Cause I'm glossy, and I'm saucy
And I'm down to be your Mr. Darcy
So, ladies! (Yeah!) Ladies! (Yeah!)
You wanna roll in my barouche? (Hell yeah!)
Then open up! Ain't no doubt!
Even Pauly Shore got to shout
Baby got book!

Baby got book!
Yeah, baby ... when it comes to females, Cosmo ain't got nothin' to do with my selection. Two hundred pages? Ha ha, only if that's one chapter.

So your girlfriend reads like Ripa, with audiobooks on her speakers
But audio ain't the same thing, it's just cheatin'
My tall bookshelves they don't want none
Unless you've got spine, hun
You can do side bends or sit-ups
But please don't lose that brain
Some brothers full of folderol
Gonna tell you that your books ain't gold
So they don't beck you, reject you
And I pull up quick to recheck you
So Cosmo says it's bad to be smart
That ain't my library cart!
'Cause your mind is open and your curves are kickin'
And I'm thinkin' 'bout stickin'
To Paris and Lindsay in the magazines:
You ain't it, Miss Thing!
Give me a reader, I'll feed her,
Franzen and Pullman need her
Some knucklehead tried to dis
'Cause Harry Potter's on your list
Guy might read but he's still a fool
Eight hundred pages so cool
So ladies, if lit's your love
And you wanna make like Nabokov
Dial 1-800-READSALOT
And we'll read those banned novels.
Baby got book!

(Little in the middle but she got much book) [4x]

"Since There's No Help," by Michael Drayton

Since there's no help, come, let us kiss and part,
Nay, I have done, you get no more of me,
And I am glad, yea, glad with all my heart,
That thus so cleanly I myself can free.
Shake hands for ever, cancel all our vows,
And when we meet at any time again
Be it not seen in either of our brows
That we one jot of former love retain.
Now at the last gasp of Love's latest breath,
When, his pulse failing, Passion speechless lies,
When Faith is kneeling by his bed of death,
And Innocence is closing up his eyes,
Now, if thou wouldst, when all have giv'n him over,
From death to life thou might'st him yet recover.