Stop Calling Diversity an Agenda: Meg Rosoff and Large Fears

Librarian Edith Campbell recently praised Myles E Johnson and Kendrick Daye’s Large Fears on Facebook, praising its role in creating more representations for marginalized young people, especially queer black boys. American writer Meg Rosoff then commented on the post, sparking what the Guardian calls a “diversity row.” The How I Live Now author commented:

There are not too few books for marginalised young people. There are hundreds of them, thousands of them. You don’t have to read about a queer black boy to read a book about a marginalised child. The children’s book world is getting far too literal about what “needs” to be represented. You don’t read Crime and Punishment to find out about Russian criminals. Or Alice in Wonderland to know about rabbits. Good literature expands your mind. It doesn’t have the “job” of being a mirror.

Rosoff’s comment caught the attention of more than one Facebook user, and when one pointed out that she strongly felt that seeing one’s own experience mirrored is significant and means a lot to kids, Rosoff responded:

Read a newspaper. Read a magazine. Go see a movie. There are zillions of places kids can see mirrors. Books do not have a “job”. Books are to teach kids about the world, about being different or being brave. I really hate this idea that we need agendas in books. A great book has a philosophical, spiritual, intellectual agenda that speaks to many many people — not just gay black boys. I’m sorry, but write a pamphlet about it. That’s not what books are for.

Many pointed out that publishing can be incredibly discriminatory, one of the reasons that Johnson, the author of Large Fears, crowdfunded and self-published rather than waiting “to get the green light from anyone else.” They also pointed out biased representation in news, magazines, TV, film, and more.

I don’t want to single Rosoff out, because this is a common sentiment. In any article about diversity, you’ll see tons of comments (less so at TMS cause y’all are amazing) saying that artists shouldn’t force diversity , merit is all that matters, that they’re pandering, and that readers/viewers don’t like feminist/LGBTQ+/racial agendas. They’re comments that emerge every time a character is race-bent, not–straight, or anything that strays from the norm. It’s exhausting and probably merits a drinking game.

You can head over to the Facebook post to read the entire exchange, which is, as a whole, civil and level-headed. I’d rather not quote every dialogue since Facebook isn’t the most constructive medium, but Rosoff does stand by her statements, telling the Guardian she was misunderstood:

Books don’t have jobs, any more than symphonies or paintings have jobs. It seems a simple point to me but I believe I ended up in cross-purposes with the original poster, who wasn’t talking about an agenda for authors as much as an agenda for society. Which no sane person would argue with.”

I feel like Rosoff’s sentiments are rooted in an artistic view that is too distanced from art’s very real influence on the world. While books don’t have “jobs” of acting as mirrors, the fact is they do. The stories we choose to tell and the stories we don’t are a reflection of the world and shape how we view it. Campbell wrote a powerful blog post about the importance of Large Fears and responds to Rosoff’s comments, quoting one user’s words of “all books have agendas.”

I do need to read about a queer black boy to read about marginalized people. I do need the children’s book world to be much more literal about what, about who needs to be represented and I need that more than I need to read about self absorbed middle class white kids in apocalyptic England.

I need mirrors like Jeremiah Nebula to remind me that I can face my fears. I need him to remind me how fearfully white the world is and if I need this book as my mirror, then my queer little black boys need books to prop themselves on it like a crutch.

As Debbie Reese responded to Rosoff, “all books have agendas.”

The only agenda queer black boys have is to breathe.

(via The Guardian, Image via Largefears.com)

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