Some Links

[labellementeuse]

Here are some links that have been keeping me going lately.

1. This one I may actually have linked to before, because I find myself returning to it regularly. Orson Scott Card, meet Alan Turing. This is a post at Feminist SF about Alan Turing, the British mathmatician who worked on cryptanalysis during the second world war (and was awarded the OBE for his work there), and was later chemically castrated by the British gvt for admitting to having sex with other men; and Orson Scott Card, the famous homophobe (and author of Ender's Game, the tremendously well-known and influential science fiction novel.) Yonmei at feminist SF makes a terrific point, beautifully (and movingly) put, that Orson Scott Card owns a great deal of his literary career to Turing's work; yet people who share Card's views on queer people were probably responsible for his early death by suicide. I've read this post about 10 times now. I just can't recommend it enough, and I think it a challenge, as clear as a bell, to SF fandom: stop tolerating this behaviour. Stop buying Card's books: many of the themes in science fiction we love today are derived from the work of a man who Card despises. Stop tolerating homophobia in SF. Stop tolerating transphobia in SF. Stop tolerating, basically, this bullshit. Stop tolerating racism and sexism. Science fiction is about change. It is about the possibility of a different future. But we need to start enacting change here, now, today.

2. The Top 100 Children's Novels. This list was derived from an online poll asking people to list the ten books that had influenced them most as a child, and why. The top 100 are being posted in a careful, illuminating manner, including posting pictures of covers, quoting from what people wrote when nominating the books, history of the books, and, notably, addressing significant flaws of the books (for example, she linked to numerous criticisms of Lynne Reid Banks' The Indian in the Cupboard, which is notable for its racist and inaccurate portrayal of its titular 'Indian'.)

What would your ten be? I've been thinking about this for a few days now, and I think I have some of them straight, but in no particular order:

10. JRR Tolkien, The Hobbit. This is one of the earliest books I read independently as a child, and in fact reading it is one of my earliest memories. It introduced me to fantasy and all its tropes, and I re-read it several times in my childhood and young adulthood - although I haven't re-read it for about five years. Must get on that sometime. Although I wouldn't say that this book changed or influenced me particularly - if it did, it must have done so much too early for me to now distinguish - it certainly influenced my future tastes, which in turn have, literally, changed my life; changed my friendships; and introduced me to the wide, weird, wonderful world that is fandom (because I read LOTR... and then became involved with fandom through a friend who first fell into fandom through theonering.net.) ETA: I ought to have said earlier that I do not underestimate the influence Tolkien's works had on the fantasy genre generally, which has included pervasive racism, sexism, and Eurocentrism. All of these things should be held in mind when considering Tolkien's enormous influence on the field.

9. Witi Ihimaera, The Whale Rider. One of the earliest distinctively New Zealand books I had ever read, and possibly the earliest book I ever read explicitly about Maori culture and its place in my native country, but I also remember noting its remarkable attitude to transsexuals and gay people (this is actually a real side note in the book, but it struck me at the time), to family, and to expectations.

8. Tamora Pierce, In the Hand of the Goddess. This is a weird pick, the second book in a series, and not, IMO, Pierce's best series, either. (That would be Protector of the Small, for those playing the home game.) This quartet, Pierce's earlist, is in mnay ways the most flawed: it has problems with race, espcially in the first book (Alanna: The First Adventure), but also in the third and fourth. This one, by dint of being set mostly in Tortall - the typical mostly-Europe country of epic fantasy - retains only the usual problems that epic fantasy has with race (monocultural, monoracial). However, this is the book I was reading when I met one of my best friends. It was one of the first fantasy books I read with a female protagonist. It was one of the first books I read that tackled feminism and women explicitly. Still one of not-very-many novels I have ever read that deal with getting your period, contraception, and having sex when you're ready for it. These have all had an ongoing effect on me.

7. David Hill, See Ya, Simon. The first novel I read about grief; the first novel I read about disability and illness; the first novel that ever made me cry. This book has returned to me every time I have had to deal with grief and every time I attempt to become less ablist (although from that perspective it remains a flawed novel.)

6= William Taylor, The Blue Lawn. The first novel I read about being queer, and in many ways this book has dated extremely; on the other hand, it's pretty brilliant for its time and expressive of the struggle for, I am sure, many young New Zealand gay men. (The reasons it's dated: this is very much one of those novels going Oh, It's So Hard To Be Gay, and although neither of the boys die, it doesn't have a happy ending. Optimistic, though.) Incidentally, this is also one of the earliest books I read that talked about the Holocaust, although it's only in retrospect that I realise that's what's going on for the grandmother. That William Taylor, he sure did go for Issue novels.

6= Paula Boock, Dare, Truth, or Promise. Another of my earliest queer novels, and probably the second novel I read, after In the Hand of the Goddess, that really discussed female sexuality. it has a happier, more defiant ending than The Blue Lawn, if I remember it correctly, and I should mention while I'm on these two novels that the experience of reading these novels and having them be set in New Zealand are part of the reason why David Levithan and Nancy Garden aren't here: it's not that I don't love them, but they meant less to me than these novels did.

4. Lois Lowry, Taking Care of Terrific. There is a category of children's and young adult novels that I always describe as 'plain and tall' (of course, a joking reference to the US children's historical novel Sarah, Plain and Tall, which is by the way much better than the Little House books.) 'Plain and tall' books are books with direct, unadorned language. They are lucid, they are clear, they address themselves directly at children and young adults, and they stand up tall in their subject matter, their unpretentious beauty, and their dignity. Lois Lowry's stand-alone books, which include this, Summer to Die, and Number the Stars fit in this category for me (so, by the way, do Sharon Creech and Katherine Patterson's novels: Bloomability and Bridge to Terabithia are nearly on this list). Taking Care of Terrific is, I'm guessing, a weird pick for Lois Lowry, because it's not one of her best-known - oh, Anastasia Krupnik, you are a truly great heroine. But this book is just... beautiful, and that's all I can say about it.

3. Louise Fitzhugh, Nobody's Family is Going to Change. Another weird pick. Harriet the Spy just didn't mean as much to me as Emma did. Overweight, black, angry Emma who wanted to grow up to be a judge to impress her father who thinks women can't be lawyers; who wants to stick up for her little brother, Willie, who wants to grow up to be a tapdancer; who joins the Children's Army looking for change and is let down by their beauracracy; who helps organise her branch to look out for each other. This book made a huge impression on me when I was eleven, which is how old I was when I stole a copy from the bookshelf at school (this was a very weird bookshelf, not part of the library, that contained partial sets of what I am guessing were books that had been previously studied at my school but weren't any longer.) Along with Taking Care of Terrific, this is one of the earliest books I read when I understood how different the US was. (Another one: Maniac Magee, of course.)

2. Harper Lee, To Kill a Mockingbird. And here's an absolute classic. I'm sure I don't need to explain why this book is so high on my list.

1. Margaret Mahy, The Changeover. My first ever supernatural romance. 'Nuff said.

There's one person I wish I'd fit on here: Tessa Duder, whose courageous, bright, brilliant, influential, sporty, booky, drama-y, musical, overweight, underweight, Kiwi heroines are the women I'd most like to be when I grow up. Here's to Alex, Tiggie, Bingo, and Geraldine.

Comments

[katarik]

Most of your books I know the authors of, through either those books or another work. I... may have to have a trip to a used bookstore coming!

[labellementeuse]

That actually surprises me! Apart from Louise Fitzhugh and Lois Lowry, I would have said that most of these would have been a pretty standard book for those familiar with their work to read (the exceptions being Wm. Taylor and David Hill, but I really doubt you've read anything else by these people!) Care to illuminate me?

[katarik]

My first exposure to Tamora Pierce was actually half an hour with one of the Wild Magic books. I am *positive* I have read a Mahy work, but I cannot for the life of me place which one besides that it is *not* CHANGEOVER. Sharon Creech, though not technically one of your authors, pings my brain for something besides BLOOMABILITY.

My first Tolkien, like you, was HOBBIT. And of course my associations for Lowry are NUMBER THE STARS and GIVER, and my Fitzhugh is HARRIET.

[labellementeuse]

That's all the Tammy you've read? (Although I'm guessing that the Wild Magic quartet might be your fave anyway.) Yikes!

Re: Mahy: ummm... other than Changeover, people tend to have read The Lion in the Meadow, the Witch in the Cherry Tree, the Man Whose Mother Was a Pirate - but these are all much younger children's books. The Tricksters, maybe?

Sharon Creech will probably be Love That Dog or Walk Two Moons (my least favourite book by her.)

For some reason, I always forget that The Giver is Lowry, although I suppose it's her most famous novel. It's just so far estranged from Anastasia Krupnik (<333) that I can't get over it!

Randomly: Goddamnit, I forgot Cynthia Voigt, Diane Duane, and Diana Wynne Jones. *pouts*

[katarik]

No. Actually, at this point the Wild books are the *only* Tortall books I haven't read -- some Daine book was just my first exposure. And my adoration for the Circle books is Strong.

TRICKSTERS sounds vaguely familiar?

WALK TWO MOONS, yeah.

Consarn it, *why* do I know the name Anastasia Krupnik? I have not ever read her books!

And I have read at least *something* by every single one of those authors. Given me and culture, frankly I am proud.

[sister_luck]

Thanks for linking to the children's novels list and for inspiring me - I plan on posting my own ten favourites in the next days.

I've read only four of the books on your list (and loved all four) - though I probably wouldn't put them on the list of books that influenced me most.

[amarynth.livejournal.com]

Your formatting's kinda messed up at the end there.

And I find it amusing that you begin with a call on people to stop reading Card's books, and then endorse one of Tolkien's. I take it you find Tolkien's political views less troublesome than Card's?

[(Anonymous)]

The further back you go the more objectionable people's views become simply because of the changing nature of morals, I find Shakespeare's views on some things a thousand times more troubling than Orson Scott Card but since he's not benefitting materially from me buying his work and he hasn't had the chance to adapt his moral stances with the rest of society, I'm not going to boycott.

Someone who lives in the modern world, has been exposed to changing mores and still chooses to hold and express views that when put into action cause harm to other people is a completely different kettle of fish.

Perfectly logical.

[labellementeuse.livejournal.com]

Yeah, that! Thanks, anon. :)

[amarynth.livejournal.com]

Well, fair enough, but I think we need to draw the difference between Shakespeare, who lived centuries ago, and Tolkien, who lived about seventy years ago - and more to the point, was a contemporary of Turing. So in the context of a discussion of Card and Turing, I think Tolkien's relevant.

[labellementeuse.livejournal.com]

Except Card explicitly advocates for chemical castration ofr gay men. Now. Today. On his blog and as chairman of NOM (the storm is coming ads!) Tolkien - duh - isn't (and AFAIK never did). The point of bringing up Turing is that Card's work relies upon Turing's (Tolkien's didn't, although I suppose you could say that Tolkien, along with the rest of the UK, owed Turing a great debt after the second world war.)

[anna-en-route.livejournal.com]

That was me above, and it's really a matter of financial benefits (Tolkien being dead doesn't actually receive any from me buying his work) and honestly even in as little as 20 years you can see a radical shift in the views of society at large. If someone lives through those shifts but refuses to shift with them in ways that hurt other people then I won't give them my money.

One of my favourite parts of the God Delusion is where Richard Dawkins discusses how much he loved the Bulldog Drummond stories as a child and how appallingly racist they seem now in the face of changing moral truths.

[amarynth.livejournal.com]

To be honest I've never had much time for the "Oh it was like that back then" school of thought. For instance I constantly encounter people who quite flatly refuse to discuss the gender implications of Jane Austen's work by simply saying "Oh, it was different then".

Still, I suppose we're talking about a level of action beyond discussing - nobody here, I expect, would claim there's no point talking about the assumptions Shakespeare is carrying with him.

[anna-en-route.livejournal.com]

Discussing them is the way you figure out whether they're out of step with current social mores (and possibly why).

I don't subscribe to the "Oh it was like that back then" school of thought, more the "for his/her time he held views that were considered reasonable then but are appalling now".
Pointing out (as I think Terry Pratchett did in discworld science 2) that Shakespeare held some remarkable views for a man who was part of a society which still hung heads on spikes while on-lookers laughed should not make Shylock any more acceptable as a stereotype.


Another interesting question though is...what views that we hold now are going to be considered barbaric in 50 years time (and will we be complaining about the good old days when you could say x without someone complaining you were being xist).

[labellementeuse.livejournal.com]

Fixed, thank you.

No, actually it's the fact that Tolkien's been dead for nearly 40 years while Orson Scott Card is still actively campaigning against civil liberties for gay people, presumably on the back of the money he makes from selling his novels. Although the racism of Tolkien's novels has undoubtedly had a terrible, significant, and lasting effect on the epic fantasy genre - for example, a lot of the problems with race in the Tamora Pierce novels I mentioned above are derived from similar attitudes to races that are clearly faux-Mddle-Eastern - he, personally, is notaround.

Let me be clear: I actually don't have a problem with Card's fiction. It's clearly pushing his agenda (particularly the Alvin Maker ones, whose attitudes to women made me spit.) Card is a talented writer and Ender's Game is a book that has been very important to a very large number of people. However, people can write whatever the hell they like and that's basically fine. Card can continue selling his books to Mormons, that doesn't bother me (I mean, it does, but it doesn't.) After all, I buy a lot of Lois McMaster Bujold, who has a very apparent feminist, socially liberal agenda. What I have a problem with is twofold: 1. Card's status in the SF&F community, which is essentially 'Oh yeah he's a homophobe but who cares, his books are good' i.e. a wilful ignorance and refusal to connect the two facets of his personality and 2. People who do not agree with Card, paying him to do the destructive work he does because they are ignorant or because they kid themselves that it doesn't matter or because they think 'Oh, but I like it' or 'Oh, just be tolerant of him, don't dismiss him because you disagree with him.' I don't tolerate intolerance and that is really what people do with OSC.

[amarynth.livejournal.com]

So when Card dies you would be more OK with people buying his books? Unless, presumably, his heirs continue his 'good work' in campaigning against it?

I admit I'm a bit blase about this. I can count the number of authors who I agree with politically on the fingers of one hand. If I restricted myself to only reading those who don't actively campaign for things I stand against, I'd barely read anything.

[labellementeuse.livejournal.com]

Sure, why not? Ideally I'd like to see ongoing discussion of them tempered by a discussion of their political message, which I was just going to say I mentioned in my post about The Hobbit, but actually, I didn't. (Corrected now. I was definitely going to say something about that.) I always think it's important to be aware of what's going on in books and who you're supporting.

Also, to be honest, I think political differences rather less important, in the greater scheme of things, than social differences. Tolkien, as far as I am aware, didn't want to chemically castrate anyone. Card is just really, really problematic for me.

re: people who we disagree with. I buy stuff from people I disagree with all the time (for example, I enjoy the space opera and military SF genres, and these are often typified by the espousal of RW politics, violence, and sexism, often of the good-old-boy type (i.e.: oh women are great, but let's don't let them have the guns, eh boys?)) I buy Tegel chicken (battery, I believe) and 42 Below vodka (National Party supporters). but everyone has a line to draw, and I draw mine with Card and with the tolerance of Card.

[amarynth.livejournal.com]

It may just be a matter of semantics but I don't draw the political/social distinction, but even if I did, it'd be easy to find Tolkien problematic socially.

I agree that it's a personal matter, but I've got to say, while it's possible to reconcile your opener, which is full of imperatives 'don't tolerate this', with your closer here, 'everybody has a line to draw, this is where I draw mine'. I realise you weren't actually meaning to compel anybody (even if you had the means to do so) and I also realise that discussions of tone are generally less worthwhile than discussions of substance, but the language in the initial post at least implies that you feel there is at least a shared moral duty to not buy Card's books, now you seem to be stepping back from that a bit. Does it seem that way to you?

As an aside the only Card book I ever read actually had a fairly positive depiction of a gay man and some pretty clear (if reasonably formulaic and liberal) criticisms of anti-gay sentiment. I don't know if he changed his mind or what, but it's weird to reconcile this with his stated public views.

[eavanmoore.livejournal.com]

I don't much like Orson Scott Card's books, largely because they reflect his personal politics too clearly to enjoy them. But would you advocate boycotting any good book if its author was a creep? I can kind of see that, if you think he's betraying his own movement.

[labellementeuse.livejournal.com]

C&Ping what I said to amarynth above:

I actually don't have a problem with Card's fiction. It's clearly pushing his agenda (particularly the Alvin Maker ones, whose attitudes to women made me spit.) Card is a talented writer and Ender's Game is a book that has been very important to a very large number of people. However, people can write whatever the hell they like and that's basically fine. Card can continue selling his books to Mormons, that doesn't bother me (I mean, it does, but it doesn't.) After all, I buy a lot of Lois McMaster Bujold, who has a very apparent feminist, socially liberal agenda. What I have a problem with is twofold: 1. Card's status in the SF&F community, which is essentially 'Oh yeah he's a homophobe but who cares, his books are good' i.e. a wilful ignorance and refusal to connect the two facets of his personality and 2. People who do not agree with Card, paying him to do the destructive work he does because they are ignorant or because they kid themselves that it doesn't matter or because they think 'Oh, but I like it' or 'Oh, just be tolerant of him, don't dismiss him because you disagree with him.' I don't tolerate intolerance and that is really what people do with OSC.

So you know, people can keep buying Card... but only if they're aware of, and comfortable with, what that makes them complicit in (and I reserve the right to have a problem with that.) The problem is not that OSC is a creep, although I could stand to see SF&F fandom less tolerant of creeps. The problem is that he uses money - my money, because I bought Ender's Game once and I borrowed the Alvin Maker books from the library and I pay my taxes and they support that library - to campaign for his creepitude.

[kitsuchi.livejournal.com]

The problem is that he uses money ... to campaign for his creepitude.

This is my problem with Card. If it were just that he were homophobic, and he kept that as a private opinion, it would be easier to separate his opinions from his work, but he isn't keeping his bigotry to himself, he is actively campaigning in hate. And I'm not willing to support that. I don't want to be complicit in that.

And I'm someone who bought not only Ender's Game, but every damn one of the Ender books, up until I found out about him. Those are books I love. (Well, except for the last three Bean ones, where we learn that women all want to have babies and also if you're doing IVF you have to keep all of the fertilised eggs, because they are babies dammit.

I love them, but I don't reread them anymore, and I'm not sure I could bring myself too ...obviously, I'm still feeling betrayed.

[labellementeuse.livejournal.com]

I love them, but I don't reread them anymore, and I'm not sure I could bring myself too ...obviously, I'm still feeling betrayed.

ITA. I distinctly remember being shocked when I found out how virulently anti-gay Card was (although, per Alvin Maker, I had already figured out some of his other political opinions.) And I completely agree with your sense of betrayal. Ender's Game was a favourite of mine, too.

[amarynth.livejournal.com]

Of course if he did keep his homophobia private, we wouldn't know anything about it, so it'd kind of be a moot point.

[labellementeuse.livejournal.com]

Oh, IDK. I can think of people whose opinions I object to who don't actively campaign on such (ex: Amanda Palmer; John Ringo; S M Stirling). But generally I think this is kind of beside the point: of course we only know what people choose to show us, but that's all we ever really have to go on. It's what we do & show that really counts, IMO, because it's the only think we can possibly work from.

[kitsuchi.livejournal.com]

I was thinking more along the lines of it came up in an interview once so people were aware of it, rather than being something he was out propounding on. Private probably wasn't the right word.