I have a hunch that I read books differently from most people. Whether it’s fiction or nonfiction, I read the acknowledgments page first. I just love snooping into someone else’s creative process – where they did their research, whom their writing buddies are…. (I also love the directors’ commentaries on DVD movies.) Then I will look for an Author’s Note that reveals the man (or woman) behind the curtain: the author’s voice that breaks the “fourth wall.”
How I'm Doing It
Right now I’m working on author’s notes for two picture book biographies to be published in 2012. One book is a birth-to-death biography of a woman who dared to enter territory considered off-limits to women of her time. My author’s note is brief, describing how women followed her lead in the decades after her death, thanks to increased educational opportunities.
My second biography tells of a slave who challenged her owner in court, and ends with her gaining her freedom. And so my author’s note is more extensive. It sketches out the rest of her life, sets the record straight about a few erroneous ‘legends’ about her, and acknowledges some unanswered questions.
Most kids probably don’t read these ‘extras,’ but back matter is valuable for teachers and those few readers who want to learn more. These days, editors insist on bibliographies, websites, and source notes for all quotes in order to establish an author’s credibility and expertise.
How Others Do It
But many of us can’t resist going beyond the basics. We can’t bear to let go of information that doesn’t quite fit into the narrative arc of our story. M.T. Anderson’s author’s note in his quirky Strange Mr. Satie includes even more quirky details about Satie’s life and music. April Pulley Sayre’s note in Home at Last: A
Back in March, 2008, in one of my first I.N.K. blogs, Truth or Fiction??, I went on a rant about the publication of adult books purported to be memoirs that turned out to be fiction.
This is how I began: "This morning in the New York Times I read about another outed memoirist, Margaret B, Jones, whose account of life as a foster child growing up in the drug infested L.A. projects, Love and Consequences, turns out to be pure fiction. This follows on the footsteps of another recent fabrication, Misha Defonseca’s Misha:A Memoir of the Holocaust, which includes a story about being raised by wolves. Wolves? Did anybody who read it believe this? Meanwhile I’m slogging away with my writing partner Sandra Jordan, trying to copyedit for the twentieth time every detail, including a complicated List of Artworks, Bibliography, Quotes, text and more of a non-fiction project Christo and Jeanne-Claude:Through The Gates and Beyond."
Sue Macy responded to my blog the next day. Here is an excerpt from her thoughtful essay. “In recent years, the trend in kids’ nonfiction has been toward more attribution and accountability. When my editors first told me they would require footnotes for quotations and statistics, I balked, flashing back to those long ago days of writing college papers. But now I embrace the chance to hold the veracity of my work up to public scrutiny by including footnotes and inviting readers to e-mail me with questions about sources. And when those sources conflict with no clear consensus, as in the spelling of Annie Oakley’s real last name (Moses or Mozee), I do my best to report the disagreement and explain why I chose the option I did. In kids’ nonfiction, honesty is the best policy and accuracy always matters.”
Just a month ago the New York Times reported another case of fiction disguised as non-fiction. When this was revealed by historians, veterans, and scientists denouncing the book, “The Last Train from Hiroshima,” its’ author, Charles Pellegrino, said he was duped by a source. The man claimed to have substituted for the plane’s regular flight engineer on the bombing run to Hiroshima. He turned out to be an imposter. Experts pointed out other factual and technical errors. Henry Holt & Company stopped printing and selling the book. (Guess who wanted to make a movie out of it? Hint: Who produced Avatar?)
Does this happen in children’s book publishing? My research tells me there have been cases of plagiary accusations in fiction for children. (But very few.) If there have been scandals in non-fiction books for young readers, I cannot find any documentation. That doesn’t mean they don’t exist. But reading through the many commentaries on research by participating authors of I.N.K., I have been impressed, even awed, by their diligent, creative, and passionate research and fact-finding. You can read some of my past blogs on the subject, as well as one by Sandra Jordan, by highlighting my name in the sidebar. Here are some of my favorite nuggets of wisdom gleaned from this group of dedicated non-fiction writers.
David Schwartz: “To rewrite Kenneth Grahame’s delightful line (which, as it happens, was spoken by the character Mole in Wind in the Willows), “There is nothing—absolutely nothing—half so much worth doing as messing about in boats.” In this case, Grahame’s ode to blissful aimlessness might be rewritten for researchers as “There is nothing so delightful — or fruitful — as messing about in libraries.”
Cheryl Harness: “I grew up reading the encyclopedia just for fun. In all my books (40 or so) through the years, I always begin my research with a regular, old, paper World Book. It gives me more than enough information with which to make my outline.” (told to me by Cheryl at the Warrensburg Children Literature Festival on March 16.)
Gretchen Woelfle: “An old adage tells us to write about what we know. I disagree. I choose to write about what I don’t know, but want to learn. Full disclosure: I – and other writers I could n
It’s Good to Be Nosy
It’s good to be nosy. When I say this in schools, there’s always one teacher who looks uncomfortable. He’d rather I’d use the word curious. (Yes, it is, for some reason, usually a he.)
But I am nosy. Always have been. Always will be. I am a people watcher, an eavesdropper. If I could get away with it, I’d read other people’s mail, ask strangers in the airport probing questions (o.k. I have done that once in a while).
I wish I knew all about you, yes, you reading this post.
I don’t know if my nosiness is a result of nature or nurture, but I can tell you either way I got it from my mom. Nosiness was my mother’s milk, and I am glad for it. It made me a writer, made me someone who loves, loves, loves to do research. It was one of my mother’s greatest gifts to me. (Though I did suffer from her nosiness as a teenager when she read my journal--just because I had left it out. Who knew THAT was a rule? I sure didn’t--until that day. Oy, what she found out. Don’t ask.)
Here are some of my most significant childhood memories:
*Sitting in a hotel lobby with Mom, watching the people, and talking about them. What’s his story? Hers? Are those two a couple? Where do you think they live? What do they do? What is with that hat?
*Sitting in the kitchen during family gatherings while the women cooked, making myself as invisible as possible so they would keep gossiping. On different occasions I learned: my cousin M. had set the cat’s tail on fire and his mother, Crazy Aunt B., had just laughed; my father’s cousin Hymie, whom I adored, hadn’t died of a heart attack but had jumped out of the window at 80 because he was bereft at losing his long-time love—whom he lived with! But wasn’t married to! (It’s mine; you can’t have it.) Sitting in the kitchen also gave me practical information, of course: how to separate eggs, roast a chicken, what hormones can do…
*Sitting half-way down the steps during one of my parents’ parties. Is that how grown-ups act when kids aren’t around? Why?
Writing fiction is about looking at people and asking what makes them tick. Writing biography is exactly the same, only you can’t make anything up. Writing all non-fiction is about asking questions you don’t have the answers to. So you have to do research to find out. For that all it takes is being nosy.
When you do research you ask yourself, “What do I know and what do I need to know?” At the beginning of a project, the answer to the first part of the question is (in increasing level of panic) “not much, next to nothing, certainly not enough!” and the answer to the second part is, “a whole lot, so much, everything!” But if you just let your natural nosiness work for you, finding out more is often easy—and always fun. It’s like a treasure hunt, with clue leading to clue. Really it's like sitting at that kitchen table, only you don’t have to be invisible. You get to ask the questions. You get to be nosy.
Being nosy has helped me when I’ve needed to overcome shyness to interview someone (no, I don’t ask inappropriate questions). Being nosy has kept me going through rough patches in writing. For example, when I couldn’t find the hook of, say, a biography, I just needed to delve deeper into my subject’s private life. Why didn’t Barbara McClintock get along with her mother? Because Mrs. McClintock gave Barbara away for months when she was a toddler!
Why did Charles and Emma have one more child even though she was so old to have a baby…Oh! I found a letter Charles wrote complaining that Emma was “neglecting him.”
Reading primary sources—letters, journals, diaries—is heaven to a nosy person. Reading primary sources is a fantastic way for a writer to get great material, unique insights, and, we hope, give the world valuable new information.
And it’s completely legitimate! And legal! And moral!
Unlike reading a person’s journal just because she left it lying around….
So. Be honest. How nosy are you?
Great post. I have been at conferences where people are doing book talks for teachers and librarians and use the back matter is proof that the author did good work--those and the acknowledgments one makes to experts who provided time and info.
Back matter can be like dessert after a good meal, but yes, perhaps more so to nonfiction authors! It's always interesting to see the author's approach - what s/he puts in the story proper vs. afterword/author's note, and why (if explained). I recently blogged about "Ain't Nothing But a Man" by Scott Reynolds Nelson (about John Henry). In a sense, the whole book is back matter, though integrated into a narrative.