fossil

A few weeks ago on this blog I said I was planning to write an open letter to the We Need Diverse Books team. They’ve done an amazing job mobilizing dissatisfied readers and just surpassed their $100K fundraising goal, but every time I sat down to discuss the movement with my friends, they invariably asked, “Where are the Black folks?” I spoke to Christine Taylor-Butler about it, and she put me in touch with Dhonielle Clayton, YA author, librarian, and founder of Cake Literary. I wrote my letter and, following the advice of my fellow “rad women,” decided against posting it on the blog. Instead I sent it to Dhonielle, who sent it to Ellen Oh, and she and I had a really productive email exchange. Last week Dhonielle asked me to write a guest post for the WNDB Tumblr site; they’re reaching out to indie authors and I appreciate the chance to share my POV on the diversity/equity debate. Part of my guest post, “Invisibility Blues,” is taken from my un-open letter; it’s important to recognize that people have been fighting this fight for over a century—Black people:

I always imagined myself becoming an author but I didn’t set out to write for kids. I only took that path in 2000 after searching unsuccessfully for books that reflected my students’ varied realities. I didn’t set out to become a diversity advocate either, but my training as a scholar led me to investigate the dynamics of the publishing industry in order to understand how so many editors could rave about my writing and still reject my work. After 5 years of writing about racism in the publishing industry, I fear that I, too, have become a stereotype: the infamous “angry Black woman.”

Racism in children’s publishing has been a challenge faced by the Black community for over a century now, with individual artists and national organizations (like the NAACP) taking steps to correct the distorted image of Black children (see Kate Capshaw’s important essay here). So when the “invisibility blues” come knocking, I try to remember that this struggle isn’t new and that I am not alone.

Yesterday I started dusting the dresser and wound up going through all my jewelry boxes; I rarely wear jewelry these days, but back in the day I used to wear a lot of amber rings, earrings, and necklaces. Green amber was my favorite and I loved knowing that I had something ancient on my body—a fossil, the remains of a primeval tree. When people ask why I’m publishing so many books at once, I don’t really have an adequate answer. “Because I can” doesn’t explain why I’m acting with a sense of urgency. Our kids need these books, and if/when this kid lit crisis ever ends, I would like children to know that I tried to make a difference. It would sadden me if people looked back at the efforts to diversify children’s literature and wrongly believed it all started in 2014 with WNDB. A book, a blog post—they contribute narratives that make up the historical record. And if we don’t document our actions and ideas, no one will know about our contributions to the cause…