Jan 27, 2016 Posted by M.M. Cox

Is it Kid’s Lit? A new discussion for WWAT…

My colleagues and I talk a lot about kid lit. I mean, yeah, it’s what we do. We talk about genre, what fits and what doesn’t, what breaks the rules and what doesn’t, and how many times a day we think to ourselves, what are the real ages of the respective readers for their respective genres? Well, one thing I love is classics. Okay, so most writers/readers have a classic that inspires them. My favorite classic authors of kid lit include C.S. Lewis, Laura Ingalls Wilder, and Jules Verne. Hmmm, Jules Verne. I recently read an eye-opening biography about the famous writer by William Butcher. In it, I discovered Jules Verne had worked for years to become a playwright, specializing in double-entendre and the scandalous. He eventually became a family man (although he most likely kept some other “interests” in Paris) and had a very difficult time connecting with and managing his (only) son. But it is after his marriage and journey into fatherhood that his science fiction writing came to the limelight. Actually, that’s not quite right. According to Butcher, it wasn’t so much science as travel that obsessed the middle-aged Jules Verne. Enter such works as Journey to the Center of the Earth, Around the World in Eighty Days, and 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea. My favorite is Phileas Fogg’s journey around the world (it’s the only one with a highly romantic finish), but many high school reading lists have the 130,000 word story of Captain Nemo’s underwater voyage. What I have come to learn, from reading Butcher’s biography, as well as a rereading of all the aforementioned Verne classics, are these things… Verne sometimes had to bow to the whims of his publisher. Jules Hetzel was a brutal businessman, and Verne suffered for not demanding better contracts. However, according to sources including Butcher, Verne made changes he disagreed with (including changing Nemo from a Polish man out to get revenge against the Russians to a man with an ambiguous ethnic identity, all so Hetzel wouldn’t lose the lucrative Russian market). Verne wrote an amazing letter to Hetzel that reminds me of things I’ve written defending my writing choices. At the end of the day though, a good writer remembers…publishers can only exist if they make money. That doesn’t mean you don’t write true to yourself, characters, and story, but you keep your mind open. Verne did, and even though Hetzel was much too interfering, it’s still... read more