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Batchelder Award Thoughts
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From: Ginny Moore Kruse <gmkruse>
Date: Fri, 26 Mar 2004 14:49:43 -0600
Susan Daugherty brought up a very real situation earlier today. She wrote about the challenge for teachers, librarians and parents with a global perspective who see the Batchelder books as opportunities to communicate that perspective to young readers. It's so daunting to encourage U.S. children to read the Batchelder books. Long texts. No "brand name." No media tie-in. Ver few familiar authors.
Norma Jean Sawicki's observations (3/23) also stirred my thinking. She commented from the vantage point of being an experienced editor who has attempted to promote the Batchelder Award. I think I'm correct in saying that Norma Jean's previous efforts to seek out and publish at least one if not more previously untranslated book won the Batchelder Award for the U.S. publisher with which she was associated. She pointed out the difficulty for a Batchelder-winning U.S. publisher to promote a Batchelder book. The book itself doesn't receive the Batchelder Award. The award goes to the U.S. publisher. Aha - so, like librarians and teachers, some winning publishers also have had a difficult time publicizing these award books. I wonder if Arthur Levine and other U.S. editors whose translated books have won previous Batchelder Awards agree on this point
The concept behind the Batchelder Award has always been to honor the publisher for taking the risk. Maybe it's time to review the nature of the Batchelder Award. Notice I wrote "maybe." Perhaps ALSC can be encouraged to consider altering this single aspect of the Batchelder Award, i.e., consider giving the Batchelder Award to the book, not to its U.S. publisher. By default the U.S. publisher and U.S. editor of that book will be honored. If that could make it easier for a U.S. publisher to promote a Batchelder "book," there's merit in considering such a change. It will help, too, if ALA or ALSC will always have the Batchelder seals available for sale, and also if someone will remember to encourage the U.S. publisher acquiring paperback rights to reproduce the Batchelder seal on the paperback jacket - and applaud when/if this happens.
Robin Smith and Sue McGowan's students enjoy many of the books for younger children translated into English. One of the reasons the Batchelder Award has been designated for the U.S. publishers of books with longer texts is that these previously untranslated books represent larger risks for these publishers. Another dimension of Batchelder eligibility is that it's comparatively easier for a U.S. publisher to assume the risk of publishing a highly visual book originally written in a language other than English, or a longer book already translated into English for publication somewhere in the U.K.
Robin's students enjoy "A Book of Coupons" written first in French by Susie Morgenstern. Terrific! Last year the U.S. Hans Christian Andersen Award Committee chose "A Book of Coupons" as one of three U.S. Honour Books to be exhibited internationally beginning in 2004 by the International Board on Books for Young People. This short humorous novel illustrated by Serge Bloch and translated by Gillian Rosner was published for the first time in English in this nation by Viking/Penguin Putnam in 2001. It's available now in a Puffin paperback edition. Curiously the IBBY guidelines call for a translator to be honored every other year by each of its member sections, not the author or any of the publishers of a translated book. It's certainly important to honor Gill Rosner and other translators because they're definitely the proverbial deserving, yet otherwise unsung heroes. However, Norma Jean's comments cause me to realize that this IBBY tribute presents yet another challenge to a publisher wanting to promote a book formally appreciated internationally because of its translator!
I'm convinced that each translated book deserves promotion like any other new book, i.e., in terms of its unique type or plot or genre - whatever you want to name it. Kids have rarely responded to "translated books" as descriptions of books they might want to read. An adventure? a mystery? a fantasy? humor? Holocaust fiction? a survivor story based on real life? Whatever. But not "translated books."
Perhaps we're all encouraged by Katy Horning's priceless account (3/23) of the discussion she led with children of the Batchelder winner "Buster's World." It wasn't featured as a book translated from the Danish language. Instead they focused upon the story. Oh yes, and where was "Buster's World" set? The children finally determined it had to be set in a foreign country. Why? Because the grown ups in it
"were nice to the kids." It couldn't be set in the U.S. because, as one child observed, an adult in the story treated Buster "like an equal. That would never happen in America. Kids and grown ups are never friends here."
The memorable Monsieur No?l in the French novel "A Book of Coupons" would feel right at home with those young American readers of a book first published in Denmark!
Best, Ginny
Ginny Moore Kruse gmkruse at education.wisc.edu
Received on Fri 26 Mar 2004 02:49:43 PM CST
Date: Fri, 26 Mar 2004 14:49:43 -0600
Susan Daugherty brought up a very real situation earlier today. She wrote about the challenge for teachers, librarians and parents with a global perspective who see the Batchelder books as opportunities to communicate that perspective to young readers. It's so daunting to encourage U.S. children to read the Batchelder books. Long texts. No "brand name." No media tie-in. Ver few familiar authors.
Norma Jean Sawicki's observations (3/23) also stirred my thinking. She commented from the vantage point of being an experienced editor who has attempted to promote the Batchelder Award. I think I'm correct in saying that Norma Jean's previous efforts to seek out and publish at least one if not more previously untranslated book won the Batchelder Award for the U.S. publisher with which she was associated. She pointed out the difficulty for a Batchelder-winning U.S. publisher to promote a Batchelder book. The book itself doesn't receive the Batchelder Award. The award goes to the U.S. publisher. Aha - so, like librarians and teachers, some winning publishers also have had a difficult time publicizing these award books. I wonder if Arthur Levine and other U.S. editors whose translated books have won previous Batchelder Awards agree on this point
The concept behind the Batchelder Award has always been to honor the publisher for taking the risk. Maybe it's time to review the nature of the Batchelder Award. Notice I wrote "maybe." Perhaps ALSC can be encouraged to consider altering this single aspect of the Batchelder Award, i.e., consider giving the Batchelder Award to the book, not to its U.S. publisher. By default the U.S. publisher and U.S. editor of that book will be honored. If that could make it easier for a U.S. publisher to promote a Batchelder "book," there's merit in considering such a change. It will help, too, if ALA or ALSC will always have the Batchelder seals available for sale, and also if someone will remember to encourage the U.S. publisher acquiring paperback rights to reproduce the Batchelder seal on the paperback jacket - and applaud when/if this happens.
Robin Smith and Sue McGowan's students enjoy many of the books for younger children translated into English. One of the reasons the Batchelder Award has been designated for the U.S. publishers of books with longer texts is that these previously untranslated books represent larger risks for these publishers. Another dimension of Batchelder eligibility is that it's comparatively easier for a U.S. publisher to assume the risk of publishing a highly visual book originally written in a language other than English, or a longer book already translated into English for publication somewhere in the U.K.
Robin's students enjoy "A Book of Coupons" written first in French by Susie Morgenstern. Terrific! Last year the U.S. Hans Christian Andersen Award Committee chose "A Book of Coupons" as one of three U.S. Honour Books to be exhibited internationally beginning in 2004 by the International Board on Books for Young People. This short humorous novel illustrated by Serge Bloch and translated by Gillian Rosner was published for the first time in English in this nation by Viking/Penguin Putnam in 2001. It's available now in a Puffin paperback edition. Curiously the IBBY guidelines call for a translator to be honored every other year by each of its member sections, not the author or any of the publishers of a translated book. It's certainly important to honor Gill Rosner and other translators because they're definitely the proverbial deserving, yet otherwise unsung heroes. However, Norma Jean's comments cause me to realize that this IBBY tribute presents yet another challenge to a publisher wanting to promote a book formally appreciated internationally because of its translator!
I'm convinced that each translated book deserves promotion like any other new book, i.e., in terms of its unique type or plot or genre - whatever you want to name it. Kids have rarely responded to "translated books" as descriptions of books they might want to read. An adventure? a mystery? a fantasy? humor? Holocaust fiction? a survivor story based on real life? Whatever. But not "translated books."
Perhaps we're all encouraged by Katy Horning's priceless account (3/23) of the discussion she led with children of the Batchelder winner "Buster's World." It wasn't featured as a book translated from the Danish language. Instead they focused upon the story. Oh yes, and where was "Buster's World" set? The children finally determined it had to be set in a foreign country. Why? Because the grown ups in it
"were nice to the kids." It couldn't be set in the U.S. because, as one child observed, an adult in the story treated Buster "like an equal. That would never happen in America. Kids and grown ups are never friends here."
The memorable Monsieur No?l in the French novel "A Book of Coupons" would feel right at home with those young American readers of a book first published in Denmark!
Best, Ginny
Ginny Moore Kruse gmkruse at education.wisc.edu
Received on Fri 26 Mar 2004 02:49:43 PM CST
