Fantasies for all ages

The Smart Bitches recently waded into the fray of the “rape in romance” conversation. It was the same-old dead horse arguments trotted out again, i.e., 1) some people don’t differentiate between rape and forced seduction, 2) some people won’t read books about it at all, 3) it was the 70s!, 4) it makes the men more alpha, 5) it’s a fantasy, what does it matter? and a lot of permutations of the above.

I really don’t care to get into the discussion here. It’s done much better elsewhere. If you want to talk about that, go to the Smart Bitches or AAR or whatever. What REALLY interested me about the discussion was posted in the comments:

Dee said:

Well, women fantasise about this but if it were a reality it would disturbing and quite unpleasant. This is because the fantasy is striped of its unpleasantness and instead taps into our desires. Kids enjoy stories about children who have to go on grand adventures because they have no one who cares about them. In reality children without caring gaurdians live pretty unhappy lives. Yet children’s lit is filled with this fantasy – the fantasy of ridding oneself of adult supervision and control.

Wow. What a light bulb moment. I applaud you Dee, where ever you are (is this Dee Tonorio? Does anyone know?) The thing about most children’s adventure books is that they very skillfully divorce children from adults, or pit children against adults. When I read them as a child, I had no problem with them (much as I had no problem with Johanna Lindsay’s rape-romances as a teen). But when I read Harry Potter for the first time, I was already in college. And I remember very vividly thinking to myself: “Why in the world aren’t they telling the teachers what’s going on? Think about it. Harry and company (even the goody-two-shoes Hermione) spend much of the first book plotting against their teacher, Professor Snape. But of course, if they did approach the teachers with their problems (as Dumbledore asks Harry to do point blank in book 2), there would *be* no problem. By the time the children have grown enough to approach the adults, the problems have progressed to the point that even the adults can’t handle it (later books).

But aside from me questioning this point, I went along with it, because that “no authority to stop us, no authority to help us” fantasy in children’s literature was strongly ingrained in my psyche.

However, in real life, this would hardly be acceptable. Children are supposed to tell parents or other authority figures when something isn’t right, and adults are supposed to help them. I heard this is why, at long last, Sunffleupagus was made visible to the other denizens of Sesame Street, because the writers didn’t want children thinking that there was something there that Big Bird couldn’t make the grown-ups believe was real.

(I had a lot of imaginary friends as a kid. It never occurred to me to think that Snuffleupagus was not of the same ilk. There’s real and there’s *real*, you know? But hey, who am I to judge what hte learned child psychology people say?)

I’ve been on a YA kick recently, and in every book, you get this same divorce from authority. It makes sense. Without it, there’d be no book, because children/teens need to be autonomous to be protagonists.

In UGLIES, they live in a society mostly devoid of grownups. Later, certain grownups are depicted as the enemy.

In MIDNIGHTERS, they live in a time of day that only they can access. No grownups (which is interesting in and of itself, but I think we’ve got later books to answer why it’s just them).

In SO YESTERDAY, they actually do approach the grownups (cops), but there’s nothing they can do.

Okay, enough Scott Westerfeld (I’ve been glomming). Other books:

In AFTER, you have another situation where grownups are depicted as the enemy, as well as one in which the child protag is unwilling to approach his authority figure (father) for help. When he finally does, his father does save the day, and the book is over.

In THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO LARRY, Josh has a very loose relationship with his stepfather. This is a kid with his own stock portfolio, etc., and already has one foot out the door. His relationship with his stepfather does cause him some anguish, but mostly because he cares about him, not because of some parental-type issue. This kid is basically emancipated already. I think this books more than the others (perhaps because the character here is the most mature) is the one that treats adults less like “others” from which they must be emancipated.

Maybe that’s the difference between children’s literature and YA? Children’s lit is about a fantasy of autonomy, YA is about creating autonomy. The younger the YA audience skews, the more fantasy the story must be. Because children really “ought not” to be doing those sorts of things. Teens need to start thinking about it, because the time for independence is coming soon.

Like in college? 😉

I think where my own book bats up against YA the most is in a scene where my protagonist, Amy, actually considers the fact that she has never had the type of relationships with adults as she is having now. I think that’s a real turning point for kids in college, when they go from being “kids” to being “peers” in the eyes of adults, and in the eyes of themselves. I remember speaking to my childhood friend’s father and having him tell me that I don’t have to call him “Mr.” anymore, that I could just use his first name. I remember a friend instructing her children to call me “Miss Diana.” Both of those instances definitely took me aback and I wanted to explore similar moments with Amy. As I said in an earlier post, I think the characters in my story have been adults for a while. They’ve just been shut up in their ivory tower so they don’t all realize it yet. It’s a fun line to straddle.