Last night, my enormously gracious hostesses at St. Joseph's University—Ann Green and April Lindner—shared their students with me. Some had read
Dangerous Neighbors. Some had read
You Are My Only. All of them, many in the graduate program, spend their days thinking about words and writing.
I talked about the future of young adult literature. I also continued to talk about sentences. Why they matter. How they are crafted. What we put at risk if we, as a nation, a culture, foist only plots upon one another, and not song.
Yesterday on this blog,
I shared some of my own sentences in the making—a beginning place, a mid place—as well as a reminder of a NaNo
contest I am conducting. Last night, at St. Joe's, I read from that same
James Wood essay in
The New Yorker that I celebrated here not long ago—that lesson in beautiful writing.
Today I mean only to share these few words from a Pablo Neruda poem. These are simple lines, simple words. No pyrotechnics, no self-conscious gloss, no unnecessary intricacies. Good sentences, I am saying, don't have to be complex. But they must always be true.
From Neruda:
Only the shadows
know
the secrets
of closed houses,
only the forbidden wind
and the moon that shines
on the roof
Yesterday, my gorgeous niece Claire called, as she will, from time to time. She had a school project on the docket, questions for my husband about his life in architecture, but I got to talk to her, too (it was part of the deal). Claire is the niece who shares her love of books with me. The sixth grader with a huge vocabulary and a very empathetic heart. She'd just acquired a handful of new titles from Borders. I sat on my deck, phone pressed to my ear, as she read the jacket flaps to me. Together, and quite craftily, we speculated.
Not long ago, at a cocktail hour, someone said, indicating me, "Oh, don't talk to her. She just writes kids' books for a living." It was half a joke, but I suspected it wasn't really. It was a prejudice I thought we'd snuffed, this ghetto-ization of YA writers. I think of dear Claire whenever I think of those who want to make YA books a lesser category. I think of the giants of the craft.
I'm going to be thinking out loud about the YA genre—the rise of fantasy, paranormal romance, dystopia, and steampunk, the ever-continuing importance of contemporary realism when handled by those who care about kids and about craft—during a few upcoming appearances. I'm going to be talking about what I think is next. In the meantime, I'd love to know what you think is next. What you think is necessary, what is called for. What trends are over and done for you? What stories do you miss? What books would you give my bright, loving, beautiful niece Claire, if you had the privilege of being her aunt?
Please let me know here. And please come, too, to one of the following events, where I'll be talking about all this and more, while also reading pages from
You Are My Only. I want to see you. Live, and in person. It's about time for that.
Wednesday, October 26, 4 PM - 6 PM
Rutgers-Camden Visiting Writers Series
Young Adult Lit: It's Not Just Kids' Stuff Anymore
(details
here)
Thursday, October 27, 7:30 PM
You Are My Only/Book Launch Party
Radnor Memorial Library, Radnor, PA
(details to come)
Monday, November 7, 6:30 PMYou Are My Only/Lecture and Reading
Haub Executive Center, St. Joseph's University
(details
here)
Wednesday, November 9, 7:00 PMYou Are My Only/Reading and Signing
Chester County Book & Music Company
975 Paoli Pike
West Goshen Center, West Chester, PA
Ah, Neruda! Wonderful words and love him. Thanks for sharing these moments in writing...I hope to stay motivated.
True. Yes. I like these words you share.