the more things change...

It is easy, as a white person, to forget about racism - especially in this Obama-centric time. We elected a black President, didn't we? Look at how far we've come! It is easy, as a white bookseller in a predominantly white community, to look at the shop shelves and not see much of a problem when there are very few faces darker than your own staring back at you. It is easy to look around at your own diverse bookshelves and know that you yourself are openminded, and believe with your optimistic liberal heart that the tides are turning, the winds are changing. But they're not, really. Not enough. Not fast enough and not deeply enough. And we're all complicit. Every single one of us. There is huge outrage over the issue of Bloomsbury's cover for Justine Larbalestier's LIAR.  And there should be.  It was a stupid decision to take a book about a biracial girl and slap a picture of a white girl on it.  It was a shameful decision. It was a wrong decision. And the publisher's response to the outcry is, frankly, a pile of shit: “The entire premise of this book is about a compulsive liar,” said Melanie Cecka, publishing director of Bloomsbury Children’s Books USA and Walker Books for Young Readers, who worked on Liar. “Of all the things you’re going to choose to believe of her, you’re going to choose to believe she was telling the truth about race?” (from PW, here) Since the author herself has specifically stated that Micah (the main character in LIAR) is black, and if readers believe otherwise, it undermines her entire book, then YES I BELIEVE SHE IS TELLING THE TRUTH ABOUT RACE. And I think it's pretty lucky for the publisher that this book is about a liar, because it allows them to craft this supposed truth about why they chose this cover (against the strong objections of the author), when it looks like nothing more than more of the same crap I have been hearing for years: books featuring black faces on the cover don't sell. Bull. But what, exactly, have we done to change that? I'm not talking about the people at The Brown Bookshelf or Color Online. I'm talking about us - the great whitewashed book community. The publishers, the booksellers, the librarians, the bloggers, the reviewers. What have we done? Sure, there are pack leaders among us, people fighting against this stuff every day - but the greater majority of us have been pretty complacent. And many of us have admitted in our blogs this week (as I am doing, right now) that we haven't been reviewing many books about people of color. I just looked back at my review posts, and since I started this blog there have been exactly three books reviewed featuring POC on the cover. Three. And of those, two of them (CHAINS and FLYGIRL) are historical fiction. The third was SUGAR PLUM BALLERINAS, about which I wrote the following: This book is so, so charming, AND the little girl is African-American as are some of her new friends but it is not remotely about that. It is just what we keep wishing for - a lovely little book about a black child where race isn’t an issue at all. Every child likes to read books about kids who look like them and guess what, publishers? Every child isn’t white. I hope this becomes a series. I wrote that over a year ago, and wow, just LOOK at all I did to try to get this point across to publishers! Oh wait. No, I really didn't. I haven't, really, and not enough of us have. Not loudly enough, not often enough, and not together enough. If we HAD been, if we has a book community had truly been focused on this, it wouldn't have taken until now for a major author in a major publication to ask why the Caldecott Medal has never been won by a single African-American illustrator. (Leo and Diane Dillon, an interracial married couple, have won twice.) And the author? Nikki Grimes. A black author herself. She shouldn't have had to point this out, and it shouldn't have been a shock to any of us. It certainly was one to me, though. Because just stop and think about this for a few minutes. Stop and think about the people who you probably assume have won a Caldecott, but in truth have not: Jerry Pinkney Brian Collier Kadir Nelson E.B. Lewis Ashley Bryan Donald Crews And if they've never won, how are Don Tate and Floyd Cooper and Sean Qualls and Brian Pinkney and Nina Crews and Leonard Jenkins and Shadra Strickland (and, and, and, and) ever supposed to do it? I look at these names and I cannot believe that FREIGHT TRAIN wasn't a Caldecott winner. Or LET IT SHINE. Or THE OTHER SIDE. Or ROSA. Or WE ARE THE SHIP. My daughter and I both love THE HOUSE IN THE NIGHT, but just open WE ARE THE SHIP and look at the way Nelson plays with light and tell me that it didn't deserve to be recognized. Or open MOSES and explain to me why FLOTSAM won instead. Do not misunderstand me: I think FLOTSAM is an incredible piece of work, and David Wiesner is a fixture at my old shop and a lovely and extremely talented man, but the art in MOSES is also extraordinary. And how many Caldecott committees can possibly look at Jerry Pinkney's work and put him on the Honor list...again? I do not care how many Coretta Scott King awards these artists have won. I DO NOT CARE. Jerry Pinkney's won five. It doesn't equal a Caldecott. After I'm done thinking about this, I move on to thinking about related things that have bothered me that I never addressed with a publisher or a sales rep. The book BASS ACKWARDS AND BELLY UP and its sequel, FOOTFREE AND FANCYLOOSE, feature four girls - 3 white, 1 biracial. The covers? Three girls, all white.This particular slap is one I see over and over and over again: a book features characters of more than one race, but the cover only pictures white kids. So not only do white people only buy books with white people on them, they only buy books with ONLY white people on them? The picture book TEN LITTLE FINGERS AND TEN LITTLE TOES is one I love and have sold many copies of, but why, in a book celebrating the sameness of all of us despite our skin color/nationality/place of residence, does the final baby and mother - the true subjects of the book - have to be white? Don't we already have enough new baby books that feature little white babies? (There are some good ones featuring black babies, but not enough, and in those books all of the other people pictured are black too.) Do all of the books about Asian babies have to be about adoption or food or Chinese New Year?  (Are there even any books about Hispanic babies?) Why aren't there more books like CORDUROY, where the little girl just happens to be black and that's just that? She just IS. It's not part of the story. It's not a slave narrative or a book about surviving a crack house or a book where every other character is also black. It's a sweet book about a little bear and the girl who takes him home, and she isn't white, and you know what? White people have been just fine with that since 1968. White people have also been purchasing the work of Mr. Ezra Jack Keats for decades, and oh look - what's that on THE SNOWY DAY? A little black boy! When GRACE FOR PRESIDENT came out a couple of years ago, I was so happy to see that Grace was black and her classmates were a motley assortment of races. And guess what? We sold a whole lot of copies of that book because it was a good book and good books sell. Crap doesn't sell no matter who's on the cover. And if there aren't covers with black faces on them, then of course they don't sell. But there aren't any on covers because those covers don't sell (supposedly). And around and around and around we go. I don't know what to do about this, except to start speaking up. Loudly. Persistently. Often. Speak up until I'm heard. Until we're heard. I've been sleeping for too long, and I'm ready to help change this. I don't know if I can, but I know I can't look past it for another minute. And I'm taking the August Color Me Brown Book Challenge. I've got a whole lot of books that are going to have to wait awhile longer. The brown books have been waiting long enough.

Comments

[Colleen]

There are so many good things about this post I don't know where to begin. But honestly it was the bit about Corduroy that really gave me pause. How long has that book been a classic? We think of the bear and how the bear deserves to be loved and the little girl and how much we love the two of them and never - never ever ever - have I ever thought but that girl was black and not like me so the story doesn't work. (I had trouble with Snowy Day because I grew up in FL - I didn't know what snow was.... :)

You're fabulous, you know? I'll see ya at the Book Challenge - I feel the exact way you do.

[Doret]

Its 7:26 in the morning, and my day is already made. Thank you for not ignoring this issue. Thank you for making time not excuses to do Susan's Reading. Challenge.

Two picture books where the characters just happen to be Black. Both illus. by Noah Z Jones
Dance with Me by Charles R Smith
http://www.powells.com/s?header=Search+Formkw=Dance+with+me+By+Smith+
Not Norman by Kelly Bennett
http://www.powells.com/s?header=Search+Formkw=Not+Norman+

[Zetta Elliott]

Thanks for this thoughtful post--and for bothering to include black FEMALE illustrators, who have been left out of this whole debate (never mind the Caldecott itself). We (people of color) desperately need allies b/c the truth is, whites are most likely to listen to other whites--when POC express outrage, we're often dismissed as hostile or hysterical ("She's just so angry!"). There's reason behind the rage, and it means a lot to have an ally with the courage to speak out.

[Eileen]

Here, here. It's a constant struggle to remind students that the world is big and diverse. It isn't just the little kids, either.

[Tarie]

I love your reminder that good books sell no matter who is on the cover - and crap doesn't sell no matter who is on the cover. Woot woot!!

[susan]

Melissa,

Thank you! Ask me how long I have been feeling alone and swimming against the freakin' tide in the book blogosphere? Finally, it dawned on white people there is a problem, because people of color have always known.

Would you say it again? Not all books with poc characters are about race. Not all poc books are about the ghetto or are 'urban' (AA kids will reject the label and rightly so). We aren't monolithic. You don't have to drag yourself through historical or street lit if you opt to read a poc book. We fall in love. Do silly things. We have whole families or families with problems and we get them. We're LBGTQ and superheros. And at Color Online poc is not code for black exclusively. I live in a racially and ethnically diverse world. I teach my girls to celebrate their world and to venture beyond it.

Thank you for encouraging readers to participate in the challenge. I am by no means an authority on poc literature. But I read a lot of it. Join us at Color Online. We'd love to chat with you and talk books. I love all good books and yes, sometimes it feels very good to read a book where the characters look like me and their experiences culturally mirror my own.

You're always welcome. Don't let the challenge be the only time.

[Nicole Tadgell]

THANK YOU for posting this! I was really beginning to feel that I may not be getting more assignments because I've been promoting myself as a black female children's book illustrator who LOVES to illustrate books where the character just HAPPENS to be black - instead of going for books with weighty issues like race, slavery, poverty.

-Nicole

No Mush Today by Sally Derby - Lee and Low Books
Josias, Hold the Book by Jennifer Elvgren - Boyds Mills Press
Lights Out by Angela Shelf Medearis - Scholastic
A Day with Daddy by Nikki Grimes - Scholastic

[Janet Carter]

Have you read Princess Bubble? Love that book!

[Jessie]

Thank you for mentioning Ten Little Fingers! I went to the bookstore so fast for that book, I love Oxenbury so much and I'd read multiple reviews talking about the racial diversity. When I turned to the last page I literally felt it like a punch in my gut.

[Antona]

I found your website late although I've shopped at Pudd N' Head Books since Nikki opened and finally, yes, someone other than a black person said this! Thanks for posting about the black out of books. I was just at the library today hunting for high school books for my son and there were so many with white characters on the front it made my heart sink. We have a variety of books in our home but it is always since for my children, especially the girls, to see characters like them featured in the stories. And absolutely, not just historical fiction, slavery, poverty, or "urban" stories. Some of us lead really boring, middle class, suburban lives! Where are we in the literary pages? Thanks again and I'll see you soon when I stop by for Kiden's next set of books!

[Eliza]

I'm reading this right now (as you know, since you sent it to me), and I looked at the cover after starting it and went "HUH?!" and forgot that this was the book all the hubbub was about! (P.S. So far, this book is FANTASTIC...not done yet, but thank you so much for sending it to me!)