Newsletter #41 — Censorship
August 15, 2022
Newsletter #41 — Censorship
Censorship — I didn't go to Canada thinking of The F Words. I didn't even bring any copies of The F Words with me, because the whole trip was to celebrate Jack Graney's Ford Frick Award. However, several of the people we met apparently looked me up and read about my most recent book and asked questions about it. In each case, the parent, grandparent, teacher, or librarian (I leave teens out because they react positively to The F Words) was very interested in the book's content and not at all afraid of its title. That is, sadly, so different from here in the States, where many parents, librarians, and teachers (not so much grandparents) react with hesitation. Even fear. I can see in their faces that they think the book is going to be censored or banned and they will get in trouble somehow. They close up. They don't even comprehend the title, which is plural. They don't even see all those little f words running across the top of the cover: foe, friend, father, fight, fear. They tense up. This is what censorship does to a country — makes its citizens afraid.
Ballad Book — I've been having an intensely busy, non-writing-related summer, but now that we've returned from Canada I can resume rewriting a middle grades story which I'm trying to tell in ballad form. I've never written in ballad form, so this is especially difficult for me. Expect to hear wails of anguish from now through December. Maybe beyond. (I will try to wail in iambic tetrameter in which the second and fourth lines of each stanza rhyme.)
Libraries — My September 15 blog talks about The F Words and libraries.