I'm Still Interested In One Of These Subjects
This fall I mentioned here that I can still recall a book I read when I was young about a woman who disguised herself as a man so she could fight in the Civil War. Well, I'll Pass for Your Comrade by Anita Silvey is a nonfiction book on the subject. With pictures! Check out an interview with the author at cynsations.
By the way, The Washington Post recently carried an article about Silvey's article in School Library Journal about the Newbery medal has lost its luster. I hope no one does an article on the Washington Post article about the School Library Journal article because, really, I think this topic has been wrung pretty dry.
Labels: nonfiction
3 Comments:
apparently the Guardian disagrees with you--here's an article about the article about the article: http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/booksblog/2008/dec/19/newbery-medal-children-elitism
(no, there's nothing particularly new in it,though it's a little more nuanced than the piece in the Post)
I understand why School Library Journal was interested in Silvey's article, and I certainly understand why the kidlit world is interested. It surprises me, though, that general interest publications think their general readership is interested. In the carbon-based world I live in, people barely know what the Newbery is. Sure, the publication of these pieces always gets a rise out of some people within children's literature but, again, who wants to read about that? Except for us? And I'm getting bored.
One could conclude that the general interest periodicals are discussing the issue simply because it is iconoclastic and anti-establishment and vaguely anti-intellectual and they presume that will sell, but that would be too depressing.
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