CMIS Evaluation Fiction Focus

It’s not often that the national newspaper editorialises about YA fiction. But following last Thursday’s Q & A program on the ABC and the discussion about the forthcoming film of Tomorrow When the War Began, The Australian has commented about political correctness and potential censorship. Here’s the Q & A program if you missed it. And here is a trailer:

Recommended yesterday by Meg Rosoff for mature readers, Margo Lanagan’s Tender Morsels is exciting predictable controversy in Britain and has revived the age-banding debate.

Philip Pullman is one of a number of authors to comment:

Designers at Random House have given Lanagan’s novel one cover illustration for younger readers, while another has been chosen for the adult edition being published by Jonathan Cape. Pullman feels the mysterious cover portrait picked for a young audience is likely to draw readers in without giving much information. He does not believe, though, that children’s writers should steer clear of tough material.

“I don’t think there should be areas that children’s books can’t deal with. Why should there be, given that children are likely to encounter much stronger subjects in real life, ranging from divorce – which once used to be something terrible and awful that you must not talk about – to drug trafficking and sex?”

Not in West Bend, Wisconsin, according to this disturbing report. This is a timely reminder about having a sound selection policy in place and it’s also worth revisiting The American Library Association’s Freedom to Read statement.

We’ll keep an eye on developments in West Bend.

It’s Banned Books Week in the US. This initiative of the American Library Association raises awareness that freedom to read is a fundamental right by publicising the most frequently challenged books of the previous year. The 2007 list includes Northern Lights/The Golden Compass. Here’s what its author thinks about censorship.

And what better time than Banned Books Week to remind ourselves of the Rights of the Reader. This lovely poster illustrated by Quentin Blake comes from Daniel Pennac’s book of the same name, courtesy of Walker Books.

Meanwhile, Doug Johnson suggests expanding the concept into cyberspace.

Rosemary Neill’s article in today’s Australian, Analysing their Dark Materials, revives an old argument: bleakness in YA (and children’s) literature. Suddenly it’s the ’90s again – many will remember the Marsden, Hartnett and Margaret Clark debate that raged hotly a decade ago.

A few online references take us back to that time. A bibliography from Flinders University (scroll down to ‘Bleak Fiction and the Need for Hope’) and an unsigned, but still worthwhile, three-parter here are both worth a look.

Neill’s piece is in the context of Requiem for a Beast. How amazing that people can be so disturbed by words and images on a page that they resort to hate mail!

Other titles referenced in The Australian article are Story of a Girl (Zarr), Boy Toy (Lyga), Marty’s Shadow (Heffernan), Then (Gleitzman), The Island (Greder) and the Gossip Girls series.

Agnes Nieuwenhuizen (Right Book, Right Time), Mark Macleod, publisher and a past president of CBCA and Bronwen Bennett, the current CBCA President have their say, with Bennett reminding us that Grimm’s fairytales are indeed grim.

The censorship referred to in this post and Carol Ann Duffy’s poetic response.