What I think of when I think of Judy Blume: a love letter
Last week my most recent copy of Bitch came in the mail (yay!) and they had this awesome article on Judy Blume, who was one of my all-time favorite YA authors. The article talked about her battle with censorship, and it mentioned that even a huge number of her books have faced censorship threats during her career her fans are always extremely surprised when they hear about it.
So here are my thoughts on this:
Judy Blume wrote about, among other things, menstruation, religion (including questioning the existence of God), teen sex & sexuality (especially involving teen girls), death, bullies, peer-pressure, cruelty, beauty standards, and (if memory serves) learning disabilities. She avoids cute euphemisms and uses swear words.
Given that just about all of these are subjects that lots of people would rather just be ignored, is it really so surprising that so many people have taken issue wit her work? Well, no. But we still end up being surprised.
Because of this: When I think of Judy Blume, what I think about is not how much she talks about subjects that other people don't talk about, it's how much I could always relate to her characters, even when they weren't anything like me. I think about how meaningful her stories were to me, and how much sense they made. I think of how real all of her characters where, how real they always were, no matter when I was reading or how old I was.
To wit: When I was freshman in college, there was one particular gathering in my dorm for an interfaith religious/spiritual discussion. At one point (I think we were talking about early influences) someone mentioned Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret and everyone, absolutely everyone, from the very traditional evangelical Christian to the radical feminist pagan, reacted the exact same way: "Oh my god, I loved that book so much."
And that's why I love Judy Blume.
So here are my thoughts on this:
Judy Blume wrote about, among other things, menstruation, religion (including questioning the existence of God), teen sex & sexuality (especially involving teen girls), death, bullies, peer-pressure, cruelty, beauty standards, and (if memory serves) learning disabilities. She avoids cute euphemisms and uses swear words.
Given that just about all of these are subjects that lots of people would rather just be ignored, is it really so surprising that so many people have taken issue wit her work? Well, no. But we still end up being surprised.
Because of this: When I think of Judy Blume, what I think about is not how much she talks about subjects that other people don't talk about, it's how much I could always relate to her characters, even when they weren't anything like me. I think about how meaningful her stories were to me, and how much sense they made. I think of how real all of her characters where, how real they always were, no matter when I was reading or how old I was.
To wit: When I was freshman in college, there was one particular gathering in my dorm for an interfaith religious/spiritual discussion. At one point (I think we were talking about early influences) someone mentioned Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret and everyone, absolutely everyone, from the very traditional evangelical Christian to the radical feminist pagan, reacted the exact same way: "Oh my god, I loved that book so much."
And that's why I love Judy Blume.