From: Jean Casey <jcasey>
Date: Mon, 05 May 2003 10:39:40 -0500

As one who does remember that far back, I think that the YA novel as we know it now, really didn't hit its stride until the early 70's. I remember as an undergraduate('65i) that "kiddie lit" (I apologize for the term, but that's what it was THEN) covered all lit for children through their teens. There was no separate class offered for YA lit. Anyway. The books I remember as being controversial, in addition to "Catcher" were things like Judy Blume and 17th summer. Things that are a) now considered truly children's lit or b) Things that are now tame by comparison to what we're discussing here.

  It is interesting to me how many books that were cutting edge YA in the 70's have now found their way to middle school acceptability . The problem with this seems to be that placement all too often is determined by "readability" with no consideration for developmental readiness for the age group. A pet peeve for me is when wonderful books like Whirligig by Fleischman and others are out of the high school curriculum because of a "low" reading level, when they should be there because of content.
(I think every kid in driver's ed should read this book!)

Enough ranting. The point is that our society has become much more accepting of honest literature that deals with subjects our young adults are facing. I hope it's partly because we've been doing our job better in promoting quality realistic literature.

Jean
Received on Mon 05 May 2003 10:39:40 AM CDT