From: Lynn Rutan <lynnrutan_at_charter.net>
Date: Sat, 25 Sep 2010 14:48:14 -0400

I have been prodding Megan's original question like a sore tooth ever since she asked it and I'd like to respond to that. The question - would you feel you are doing your job and serving your community if you don't provide a book that challenges you personally. Ouch. My sore spot comes from an incident that happened five years ago.

I had felt confident that my professional philosophy and practice were matched. I had always tried to include books on lists and in my collections that were not appealing to me or my point of view. I sat in many a censorship hearing, championed the right to read books I wasn't crazy about and on more than one occasion I told people that the real test of freedom of speech is when you allow someone to say or write something you deeply disagree with.

And then during one of my years serving on Best Books for Young Adults I ran into The Boy in Striped Pajamas by John Boyne. I loathed this book. I cannot remember a time when I have had such a deep personal aversion to a book. It offended me to the deepest part of my soul. It was an instant and personal reaction and for once when I talk about throwing a book across the room I am not exaggerating.

I won't go into detail about why I felt that way except to say that I felt it made an event that was deeply horrifying to me into something somehow light and vaguely comedic even though the ending was designed to make the reader gasp and think. There was so much that seemed manipulative and inaccurate to me with incidents that could never have happened. I was greatly surprised when I discovered that many colleagues whom I respect tremendously did not feel the way I did. Many of the elements that bothered me the most they viewed as perfectly acceptable because the book was a parody. During the committee discussion period I spoke passionately against the book but I was already feeling uncomfortable with my position. Was my reaction personal or was it analytic and based on literary elements? I am sorry to say that I didn't pursue that internal discussion until later.

It was after I returned home from conference and was distributing the book donations to the various libraries in our district that I admitted to myself that I had allowed my emotions to rule my brain. I made the book part of our library collection and bought the book in paperback for the collection when it came out.

It was very humbling to discover my feet of clay - and here I am revealing those same appendages to the world! I have never forgotten this episode. As librarians and teachers, we are gatekeepers to ideas and there is nothing more important than making sure that gate is open to ideas we support as well as ideas we don't. Many of us have areas where emotion trumps reason and the key to managing to overcome that lies in understanding what our personal biases are. And - to always keep Megan's question firmly in our minds.

Lynn

Lynn Rutan Librarian Bookends: BooklistOnline Youth Blog Holland, MI lynnrutan_at_charter.net
Received on Sat 25 Sep 2010 02:48:14 PM CDT