April 6, 2022 • 30 mins
This week on the season finale of In Fact, Chelsea is sitting down with best-selling and award winning author Jacqueline Woodson. They discuss her early inspirations, the importance and recent politicization of children’s books, the progress we’ve made towards equality and what’s next - in the publishing industry and beyond.
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hi, I'm Chelsea Clinton, and this season on in fact,
we're celebrating Women's History Month, and since the month is
never enough, we're keeping going a little longer. I'm talking
with trailblazing women at the top of their fields about
their personal journeys, the progress women have made, and how
(00:22):
far we still have to go. Today, I am so
excited to be talking about books in the publishing industry
with one of my all time favorite authors, Jacqueline Woodson.
We know that the stories we share with our kids
influence how they see themselves in their place in this world,
and yet studies consistently show that the majority of main
characters in American children's stories are male and white. In fact,
(00:44):
in one study found that there were more animal and
non human characters than non white characters and books published
that year, and from the percentage of children's books written
about racially diverse characters or subjects grew by only one percent.
Jacqueline has written more than thirty books for children and
young adults, complex beautiful stories that usually center around girls, women,
(01:09):
and people of color. One of my personal favorites is
the middle grade novel Harbor Me, and it a group
of six kids get together after school each week and
what they call the Art Room. That's a r T
T for a room to talk with no adults present.
They share their feelings and open up about the very
serious challenges they in their family space. Jacqueline has written
(01:31):
two books for adults, another Brooklyn and Read at the Bone,
but she may be best known for her middle grade
memoir Inverse Brown Girl Dreaming won multiple awards, including the
National Book Award for Young People's Literature, and for years
it's been a staple in classrooms across the country, though
(01:51):
as you'll hear later, recently there have been districts trying
to ban it, and it's not the only one. It
would take a very, very long time to list all
the awards and honors Jacqueline has received, but some of
the highlights include serving as the Poetry Foundations young People's
Poet Laureate from seventeen, being named Ambassador for Young People's
(02:13):
Literature by the Library of Congress of receiving a MacArthur
Genius Fellowship, and the Hans Christian Anderson Award, which is
the highest international recognition given to authors and illustrators of
children's books. Jacqueline, thank you so much for being here today,
(02:37):
and as someone who first came to know you through
your books for young readers, I would love to know
first what you read growing up. What were your favorite
things to read when you were a kid. It's so
good to see you and talk to you, Chelsea. I
love these kind of connections. I love talking about literature.
I love talking about when so and when I think back,
(03:01):
it's so interesting because I see my reading is being
really limited. And I wonder if we talked to my
older sister, who read all the time, if she would
have the same narrative. She loved books like A Silver
Skate and Harry the Spy and All of a Kind
Family and all of these books that I was not
(03:24):
interested in, and I didn't know why I was not
interested in them, even though I love are you there, God,
It's me Margaret. That's one book I read over and
over again, and then anything else. Judy Bloom came along
with But I really found myself inside books like Eloise Greenfield.
She come bringing That Baby Girl, which is this great
book that's written in a dialect I understood and in
(03:48):
a way that I saw myself and my people inside
of it. And so I was constantly looking for those books.
I remember reading The Bluest Eye when I was like
in fifth grade, because I read The bluest Ian it's great, yeah,
and here's the crazy thing. So I read it in
fifth grade, and my memory of it was that in
the end of the book, Cola Bad Love was this
black girl who wants blue eyes so that she can
(04:10):
be accepted in the world, like Shirley Temple. I mean,
it's such a tragic story. My memory of it was
that she got blue eyes and lived happily ever after.
And then I read it again as an adult in
high school, and I was like, oh, Tony Morrison changed
the ending, and then I thought, no, there was a
children's version and the adult version, and this must have
(04:31):
been the children's version that I read in fifth grade.
And I think it was my sister who was like,
there are not two versions of that book, kids compartmentalized.
So those are the books I remember, and I just
remember reading the same books over and over. Hans Christian Andersen,
anything that he wrote, but especially The Little match Girl
was a book that I was fascinated by. Clearly, some
(04:55):
of the books she read made a huge impact on you,
not only when you were a kid, But even through
to today it sounds like definitely, I think the message
that got hammered in my head was that I wasn't
a quote great reader. And I get nervous because I
see it happening with young people today. You are supposed
to read fast, you're supposed to consume lots of literature.
(05:15):
You're supposed to read above quote unquote your grade level.
And there were all these rules to reading that were
inside a box I was not ascribing to. For me,
it was about being in the dream of the narrative,
just getting caught up in the story and being swept
away by it, and then wanting to have that experience
(05:35):
again and again. And so that's how I read. I
read the same books over and over. And when you
were little reading the same books over and over, did
you ever think, oh, Wow, I want to write a
book that maybe some other child in the future will
want to read over and over. Yeah, I've known I
wanted to be a writer since I was seven, since
you were seven. That's such a specific answer. What happened
(05:57):
at seven? Two things happened. I learned how to write
my name, I learned how to write Jacqueline, and I
learned that writing that name put it in the world.
There was such a power to the fact that you
put letters together and they make words, and that's all
there was to it. And so I made that connection
between the books I was reading and this new power
(06:18):
I had of writing my name. And then I was
always telling stories. I was always getting in trouble for lying.
But when I wrote my name in that way, Jacqueline
Amanda Woodson, I was like, I want to be a writer.
And every time I read a book, like when I
read Hans Christian Anderson, when I read The Little match Girl,
all I could think of was I want to do that.
I want to make someone else feel that way, or
(06:40):
I want to make myself feel that way again. So
how am I going to do that through story? And
did you know any writers when you were growing up?
Did you know people who were kind of taking things
out of their heads or even observing the world around
them and then putting that into words. I did not.
It was a different time. You know. My mom wrote
poetry for a long time as a young person, and
(07:03):
when she was in high school she wrote the poem
that opened their high school yearbook. And a very famous
man who we all know whose name I won't say
on air, actually put his name on the poem. This
person was the editor of the yearbook, and he just
signed his name to the poem. And it broke my
mother's heart, Like you know, I think for her for
(07:25):
so long she would see that poem where I still
have the yearbook, and she would say, you know, that
was mine. I wrote that poem. And so I wonder
what it would have meant for her to have that
poem in the world in a certain way, because at
one point she loved poetry. At one point she was
writing it and feeling brave enough to put it into
the world, and then that was erased by the theft
(07:46):
of it. So so I would say that I'm genetically
connected to writers, but it wasn't at a point where
we had author visits or anything. And so at seven,
you decide you want to be a writer. Did you
even know then that you would write for as many
different audiences and as many different age groups or did
(08:07):
that come later? I would say it came later. I
knew I wanted to write, and I didn't think that
there was just one group of people to write for.
And I still don't believe that. I think all books
were for everyone. I mean, when you look at my
experience with The Bluest Eye and reading it as a
fifth grader, it didn't destroy me. It made me have
(08:27):
a whole other narrative about that story. And there are
lots of people who would say, well, that book is
not for kids, and It's like, yeah, it's for kids
who want to read it and get something out of it.
So I always thought about writing that way. I didn't
think I'm going to write picture books for little kids,
are grown up books for adults. I didn't know that
those worlds were so heavily defined, but I knew that
(08:50):
I wanted to tell stories, and I wanted those stories
to land with people. And so as you now think
about the thirty plus books you've written for everyone knows
some more oriented towards kids or teenagers or adults. Are
there certain themes that have been important to you to
(09:12):
tackle or highlight in different books over time? Or has
each book had its own identity, its own story, its
own logic. Definitely both, you though, I think the journey
to the End, which has often been about acceptance, about freedom,
about letting people have their lives, about seeing people as
(09:36):
their whole selves has transitioned through every single book I've written.
I think there's a strong social justice element to the narratives,
and the characters are always very different and the situations
by which they get to that we all have a
right to walk through the world safely. Moment it's varied
from book to book, will be right back stay with us.
(10:10):
You mentioned your mom wrote poetry, and poetry also plays
an important role in your books, including your memoir Brown
Girl Dreaming, which is written entirely in verse. Was it
because of your mom that you were drawn to poetry
or do you find it's sometimes just inevitable for what
the story needs. Part of it is because when I
(10:30):
was a young person, I was very afraid of poetry.
I thought it was this secret language that only dead
white men understood, basically, And it wasn't until I was
made aware of the works of like Langsa Hughes and
Nikki Giovanni's poetry. I first heard her reciting on an album,
on a record album that my mom had. I didn't
make that connection that was poetry because I was like,
(10:52):
what is this? This is going straight to my heart?
And so when I started writing, I knew that the
way things sounded was important. The way things looked on
the page was important. The way a line ended was important.
And I learned that was poetry. I love that, and
everything I write I read out loud, so that makes
a difference too, and how it sounds. So I've thought
(11:13):
about your book harbor Me quite a lot in the
last couple of weeks, because just looking at the crisis
in Ukraine and that there are close to three million refugees,
and in harbor Me, it's a group of kids who
are aware of often issues that we think aren't appropriate
for kids to learn about or to think about, and
(11:34):
yet issues that affect so many kids in this country
or around the world, whether issues relating to incarceration or
the fear of having to leave your home. And so
I just wonder, Jacqueline, what stories do you hear from
people who have read that book or any of your books,
(11:55):
where readers say to you, this really hit me in
this or this really affected me so many you know.
I think the thing that happened with harbor Me is
I was talking to young people and then the pandemic came,
and then I started getting letters from young people who
(12:17):
would say, you know, this is my life I am Holly,
I am Haley, I am Amori. So Harbor Me was
like both heartbreaking and healing because I heard so many
stories of so many kids, across lines of race, across
lines of economic class, the stories of their fear and
their heartbreak and the places in which they felt trapped
(12:38):
inside their own skin. And one of those stories, and
Harbor Me, is about a white boy who moves into
a predominantly black neighborhood and what that means for him
to suddenly be other other by no fault of his own.
He's walking home and he's getting his next laughter. He's
keeping this a secret, right that there's this download bullying
going on, and then the way the kid rally around
(13:01):
him and say, we will not let this happen anymore.
And I think that's another story that kids talk about,
is like, that's unfair, that shouldn't happen. Why, you know,
why would they do that? And I remember going to
a school this was with visiting day, and visiting day
is the story of a girl whose dad is incarcerated,
and a teacher said, well, we don't need to read
(13:22):
this book because no one in this class has any
one in prison. And of course that made me mad,
and I'm like, I'm going to read that book. And
then when I read it, one kid raised his hand,
He's like, my dad's in prison. Another kid raised his hand,
he's like, my cousins in prison, my brother's in prison.
And there were about six kids who knew someone who
was incarcerated. And the teacher said, I never knew that,
(13:46):
and I said, because you never opened this door for them.
And we had this beautiful conversation where these kids have
been living with the shame of it. And I think
of that often, how we as adults, we too often
get to decide what the tone is in the room,
what that tone is going to be, and what kids
are going to feel safe talking about, and harbor me
(14:08):
became this huge conversation among all these kids talking about
which character fit their own particular narrative, and it was
so great to see that, and teachers talking about, Okay,
we're gonna have an art room. Now, you know, we're
going to have a space where adults give kids the
space to talk. And it doesn't even mean having to
leave the room, but being comfortable in our own silence.
(14:32):
I find, even with my own kids, if I sit
very quietly, I hear things I won't hear if I'm
actually talking, or if they are aware of my presence
in the room and just being able to be in
that space where young people are talking about all of
these seemingly very quote unquote adult issues and it's like, no,
(14:52):
these are there every day. I do want to ask
about Brown Girl Dreaming, since it is autobiographical and so
much your work is wonderfully in the world of fiction,
but how and why did you decide to share your
own story. I was trying to figure out how I
got to this point of being Jacqueline Woodson. I had
(15:13):
grown up Jackie, the regular girl on the block, you know,
one of four children, and I wanted to go back
to the beginning. And I was falling apart through the
three years of writing that. And it's so funny because
I would just write pieces and I'm like, this is
not making sense. Why isn't it coming out as chapters?
Why does this even matter? It felt so deeply specific,
(15:35):
and um, you know, my beloved partner was like, just
keep writing. And then I say, like, what was your
partner and your family friends, what were they saying on
this journey? They were like, oh, Jackie's falling apart again.
She must be writing another book. Jackie's cranky again, she
must have had a bad writing day, like the same
thing they've been saying for twenty years. But I remember
going to my friend Toshi Reagan. She had read a
(15:57):
bunch of these little pieces, and I said, why am
not even trying to write this? Nothing was happening when
I was born, like this does not matter, and she's like,
what are you talking about? This country was on fire
when you were born, And it completely unlocked it to
that first poem, I am born on a Tuesday, February twelfth,
nineties sixty three, and it really began to make sense
(16:19):
why I was telling this story. And I really started thinking,
I'm going to tell this story in the context of
American history, because none of us are existing outside the
context of our country's history. And then I thought I
was going to talk about my life and my mom
and all this. And in the middle of writing it,
my mom died suddenly at sixty eight, and suddenly that
(16:40):
door closed, and I was like, wait a second. I
had questions, there were things I wanted to ask you.
And then the memoir changed and it became about myself
in the context of my mother right, because we're on
these journeys, because of the journeys our parents were on,
because of the journeys their parents were on, and all
the way back in time. And that when all of
(17:01):
it started making sense, and all of it started having
this other history to it. And when I finally got
the book finished, my beloved editor, Nancy Paulson, just had
her hand on my back. The whole time, I was
still saying, no one is going to read this, and
so I was stunned. I still am stunned by the
journey that book has had. I've talked to book clubs
(17:23):
where the brown girls are all Indian, you know, are
all Southeast Asian, are all Asian, and to realize that
so many people who see themselves as non white saw
themselves in this book. But what really surprised me where
all the white boys who came to me, who wrote
to me, it's like, I love this book. I loved
(17:43):
your grandfather, or I wonder what happened to your brother,
Like everybody seemed to find some part of themselves in
this book. And then I get these letters from white
men in their seventies who knew my grandfather, who knew hope,
and they're like, he taught me baseball. Your grandfather was
the nice man in Nelsonville, and that blows me away.
So just being able to get these pieces of my
(18:05):
history given back to me because of this memoirs is
such a gift. Oh my gosh. Well and also, Jacqueline,
that you wrote something that feels both specific and universal.
It sounds like to the people who are reading it.
And yet we are living in a time when there
are forces trying to limit what especially kids can read,
(18:27):
trying to take books out of school or public libraries,
out of curricula, especially for elementary and middle school aged kids.
And I know your work has shown up on some
of those lists, and wonder both kind of what that
feels like for you and also just what advice you
(18:49):
would have for anyone who might be getting discouraged by
the velocity of those efforts around the country. It's exhausting.
Most recently, Brown Girl Dreaming ended up on the list.
People are challenging it because they said, basically, there are
no white folks in it, and it's going to make
white children feel bad, as opposed to thinking about it
(19:11):
as an expansion of an experience for people like the
way that people are trying to use literature to make
the world smaller is heartbreaking, and for me as a writer,
it's exhausting more so than scary. It's like, really, we
have to have this fight again. And now this fight
is different though, because it's trying to be legislated, and
(19:34):
it is in some places. So I think the thing
that we have to be so aware of is that
we have power to create change in this situation. We
have power to go to our if we don't go
to our school boards, go to our school buildings and
talk to the principle and write letters in supportive librarians
because they are on the front lines of this. They're
(19:56):
the ones who are getting challenged just for what's in
their school libraries, and teachers are getting challenge for which
books they are sharing with their young people, and we
really need our voices now, um And I wish the
press would support those people who are challenging and winning
against these bands, because that's happening too, and that does
tend to give us a fire right. It's like, well,
(20:18):
if they could do this in Indiana, we can do
it in Brooklyn. But I think we really have to
be aware because it's going to change what our kids
have access to. And as parents, we want our kids
to be as broad minded as possible and to have
as many experiences as possible. And for many kids, those
experiences happened through literature, and so if the literature is
(20:39):
taken away, so much is at state with these bands,
and I just think we really have to be aware
and be willing to write those letters and go to
those spaces and make that change. I probably not surprisingly
emphatically agree. I also think, especially for those of us
who have young children for whom the pandemic has been
(21:00):
a huge portion of their lives, in which their lives
were rendered quite small, it's even more important that there
are pathways and portals into other people's experiences and to
other communities experiences. Oh man, it is so true. I
always think about Dr Rudin since Bishop hot talks about
the importance of kids having both mirrors and windows in
(21:23):
their literature, mirrors so they could see reflections of themselves,
and windows so that they can see into other worlds.
And You're so right, this is the opportunity for them
to see into those other world We're taking a quick
break to stay with us thinking about the need for
(21:52):
windows and mirrors. We know that most of children's literature
has been written by white people, and most of children's
literature has been written by men, and most of children's
literature has actually been told from a male or a
boy's point of view, including which I have never understood, Jacqueline.
So many of the classic books about animals, and you're like,
(22:15):
why do the frogs and the toads need to be
gendered male? Or the ducks or the cows. And while
certainly there are more women authors, there are more authors
of color, there are more women authors of color, were
still up against accumulative history that is overwhelmingly white and
(22:35):
overwhelmingly male. Do you think the publishing industry is doing
enough to help ensure that there are more voices given
a platform, given an opportunity, And if not, what more
do you think needs to happen? And what could anyone
listening do to try to help hasten the arrival of
(22:56):
real representation? Is so much to do, And one thing
about publishing is it's a business, and publishers look at
numbers and they make assumptions. Sometimes based on those numbers,
Organizations like we Need Diverse Books have been doing the
work to really change what's happening in publishing and get
(23:20):
more books by folks published, and then publishers get nervous
that those books aren't going to sell, even though I
remember looking at the bestseller list at one point and
there were like eight people of color on it. At
the same time, as parents, as teachers, it's really important
to get the books. And that doesn't mean to buy them.
(23:40):
It makes a difference if you go to your library
and take that book out. Publishers are gonna look at that.
Publishers need to get out of their own way and
understand that there's this community of young authors out there
who just need a chance to get their story told
and have platforms and will do their part to help
get the book into the world. But it's changing slowly.
(24:01):
I first published in the nineties and I was one
of very few as that with Walter B. Myers and
Virginia Hamilton's and them kissics, but you can name them,
I can name them. We were all friends. But that
that highlights, like, I'm so grateful you had that community, Jacqueline,
and also highlights the challenge that, like you knew everyone's
name it was and the rooms were very white, and
(24:22):
the awards ceremonies were very white. So I do think
the support of writers and their stories makes a huge
difference to publishers the demand for more books Like that,
I always say, what is your child's library look like?
When I was looking for schools for my children, the
first thing I looked at was the classroom library because
that told me a lot about the teacher's choices. That
(24:45):
told me a lot about what the tone of the
classroom was going to be and what the narrative of
the classroom was going to be. And I talked to
the teachers and librarians, and I talked about diversity. And
some people are comfortable with diversity being one or two people.
I'm not. I don't think that's diversity wanted two people
of color. So I think when we're talking about publishing
(25:05):
and creating change, we're not only also talking about the
number of books they're publishing, but who is in the
publishing health doing the work. How many editors of color,
how many publishers, how many publicity people of color. There's
so many levels of it, and there's still so much
work to do. But again, we have that power to
make that change by using our voices, by using our wallets,
(25:27):
by using our library cards to demand that change. I'm
so curious Jacquling, what questions do young writers, especially young
women writers, ask you, and what advice do you give
a lot of times they ask how do I get published?
And I say, don't worry about that now, because they're
like ten, and I don't. That's the age to be
(25:52):
worrying about the publishing industry. That's the time to be
telling your stories. And I say, write the stories that
really mad or to you, and show them to the
people you trust and who make you feel safe and
who make you want to keep writing. Do not show
them to the people who are going to destroy them.
There's constructive criticism and there's destructive criticism. And I tell
(26:14):
them what Dorothy Allison told me years and years decades ago,
that everybody has a story, and everybody has a right
to tell that story. So don't let anyone silence your
story because the world is waiting for it. And I
do believe that about young writers. I mean, I think,
can you imagine the stories these young people are gonna tell.
It's gonna be amazing, you know, I am so ready
(26:38):
for it. I think they have so much grit, so
many survival skills, They've learned so much, they're so smart,
it's going to be phenomenal. So I am just always
effusive when young people ask me about anything but publishing,
because I'm like, let's get these stories on the page.
And I always say, look up. You have to walk
through the world with your eyes open or else you're
(26:59):
not going to get the story. Worry. Yeah. Amen. One
last question, Jacqueline, is there one statistic or fact or
anecdote that you can share that either really inspires you
because it enrages you or it gives you hope about
where women are and where we could be. I would say,
thinking about it right in this moment, I think about
(27:22):
people like you. I think about Roxanne Gay and Dressing McMillan,
Cottam and Jamil Hill and all of these women who
have podcasts now who are speaking truth to power and
being heard. And I think about our young women and
older who actually have access to this kind of information
(27:44):
just by putting their earphones in. So this is huge
for me, the fact that we can have this conversation,
and this conversation can go out to lots and lots
and lots of people and they can continue the conversation.
It feels grassroots, and it feels empowering, and it feels
world changing. That's what I'm excited about today, that we're
(28:04):
talking to each other and we're telling the truth to
each other, and in doing so, we're protecting each other
and lifting each other up. So let's continue that. Well, yes, Jacqueline,
thank you. I listened to the radio a lot with
my mom when I was a little kid, like local
public radio and little at Arkansas, and I remember being
so excited when there would be like a girl's voice
on the air. And so when you said that, I
haven't thought about that and so long. And to know
(28:27):
that my children, your children, thankfully won't have that experience
because it won't be strange, dear women's voices is something
I'm really grateful for and proud to be a very
small part of. Thank you for being a part of it.
Thank you Jacqueline so much. You can find Jacqueline Woodson
on Twitter at Jackie Woodson, and I highly recommend all
(28:51):
of her books. They are important and beautiful and powerful
moving stories. Her latest is a picture book called The
Year We Learned to Fly. And thank you all so
much for joining me for this season of In Fact.
It's been truly inspiring to celebrate Women's History Month with
so many amazing women. And while we celebrate progress we've
(29:13):
made toward equality across the board, we know we still
have a long ways to go. I hope we will
share these incredible women's stories with your friends, families, and beyond.
Thank you for listening. In Fact is brought to you
by I Heart Radio. We are produced by a mighty
group of women and one amazing man, Erica Goodmanson, Mart Hart,
(29:34):
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on Apple Podcasts. The four appo
Hi, I'm Chelsea Clinton, and this season on in fact,
we're celebrating Women's History Month, and since the month is
never enough, we're keeping going a little longer. I'm talking
with trailblazing women at the top of their fields about
their personal journeys, the progress women have made, and how
(00:22):
far we still have to go. Today, I am so
excited to be talking about books in the publishing industry
with one of my all time favorite authors, Jacqueline Woodson.
We know that the stories we share with our kids
influence how they see themselves in their place in this world,
and yet studies consistently show that the majority of main
characters in American children's stories are male and white. In fact,
(00:44):
in one study found that there were more animal and
non human characters than non white characters and books published
that year, and from the percentage of children's books written
about racially diverse characters or subjects grew by only one percent.
Jacqueline has written more than thirty books for children and
young adults, complex beautiful stories that usually center around girls, women,
(01:09):
and people of color. One of my personal favorites is
the middle grade novel Harbor Me, and it a group
of six kids get together after school each week and
what they call the Art Room. That's a r T
T for a room to talk with no adults present.
They share their feelings and open up about the very
serious challenges they in their family space. Jacqueline has written
(01:31):
two books for adults, another Brooklyn and Read at the Bone,
but she may be best known for her middle grade
memoir Inverse Brown Girl Dreaming won multiple awards, including the
National Book Award for Young People's Literature, and for years
it's been a staple in classrooms across the country, though
(01:51):
as you'll hear later, recently there have been districts trying
to ban it, and it's not the only one. It
would take a very, very long time to list all
the awards and honors Jacqueline has received, but some of
the highlights include serving as the Poetry Foundations young People's
Poet Laureate from seventeen, being named Ambassador for Young People's
(02:13):
Literature by the Library of Congress of receiving a MacArthur
Genius Fellowship, and the Hans Christian Anderson Award, which is
the highest international recognition given to authors and illustrators of
children's books. Jacqueline, thank you so much for being here today,
(02:37):
and as someone who first came to know you through
your books for young readers, I would love to know
first what you read growing up. What were your favorite
things to read when you were a kid. It's so
good to see you and talk to you, Chelsea. I
love these kind of connections. I love talking about literature.
I love talking about when so and when I think back,
(03:01):
it's so interesting because I see my reading is being
really limited. And I wonder if we talked to my
older sister, who read all the time, if she would
have the same narrative. She loved books like A Silver
Skate and Harry the Spy and All of a Kind
Family and all of these books that I was not
(03:24):
interested in, and I didn't know why I was not
interested in them, even though I love are you there, God,
It's me Margaret. That's one book I read over and
over again, and then anything else. Judy Bloom came along
with But I really found myself inside books like Eloise Greenfield.
She come bringing That Baby Girl, which is this great
book that's written in a dialect I understood and in
(03:48):
a way that I saw myself and my people inside
of it. And so I was constantly looking for those books.
I remember reading The Bluest Eye when I was like
in fifth grade, because I read The bluest Ian it's great, yeah,
and here's the crazy thing. So I read it in
fifth grade, and my memory of it was that in
the end of the book, Cola Bad Love was this
black girl who wants blue eyes so that she can
(04:10):
be accepted in the world, like Shirley Temple. I mean,
it's such a tragic story. My memory of it was
that she got blue eyes and lived happily ever after.
And then I read it again as an adult in
high school, and I was like, oh, Tony Morrison changed
the ending, and then I thought, no, there was a
children's version and the adult version, and this must have
(04:31):
been the children's version that I read in fifth grade.
And I think it was my sister who was like,
there are not two versions of that book, kids compartmentalized.
So those are the books I remember, and I just
remember reading the same books over and over. Hans Christian Andersen,
anything that he wrote, but especially The Little match Girl
was a book that I was fascinated by. Clearly, some
(04:55):
of the books she read made a huge impact on you,
not only when you were a kid, But even through
to today it sounds like definitely, I think the message
that got hammered in my head was that I wasn't
a quote great reader. And I get nervous because I
see it happening with young people today. You are supposed
to read fast, you're supposed to consume lots of literature.
(05:15):
You're supposed to read above quote unquote your grade level.
And there were all these rules to reading that were
inside a box I was not ascribing to. For me,
it was about being in the dream of the narrative,
just getting caught up in the story and being swept
away by it, and then wanting to have that experience
(05:35):
again and again. And so that's how I read. I
read the same books over and over. And when you
were little reading the same books over and over, did
you ever think, oh, Wow, I want to write a
book that maybe some other child in the future will
want to read over and over. Yeah, I've known I
wanted to be a writer since I was seven, since
you were seven. That's such a specific answer. What happened
(05:57):
at seven? Two things happened. I learned how to write
my name, I learned how to write Jacqueline, and I
learned that writing that name put it in the world.
There was such a power to the fact that you
put letters together and they make words, and that's all
there was to it. And so I made that connection
between the books I was reading and this new power
(06:18):
I had of writing my name. And then I was
always telling stories. I was always getting in trouble for lying.
But when I wrote my name in that way, Jacqueline
Amanda Woodson, I was like, I want to be a writer.
And every time I read a book, like when I
read Hans Christian Anderson, when I read The Little match Girl,
all I could think of was I want to do that.
I want to make someone else feel that way, or
(06:40):
I want to make myself feel that way again. So
how am I going to do that through story? And
did you know any writers when you were growing up?
Did you know people who were kind of taking things
out of their heads or even observing the world around
them and then putting that into words. I did not.
It was a different time. You know. My mom wrote
poetry for a long time as a young person, and
(07:03):
when she was in high school she wrote the poem
that opened their high school yearbook. And a very famous
man who we all know whose name I won't say
on air, actually put his name on the poem. This
person was the editor of the yearbook, and he just
signed his name to the poem. And it broke my
mother's heart, Like you know, I think for her for
(07:25):
so long she would see that poem where I still
have the yearbook, and she would say, you know, that
was mine. I wrote that poem. And so I wonder
what it would have meant for her to have that
poem in the world in a certain way, because at
one point she loved poetry. At one point she was
writing it and feeling brave enough to put it into
the world, and then that was erased by the theft
(07:46):
of it. So so I would say that I'm genetically
connected to writers, but it wasn't at a point where
we had author visits or anything. And so at seven,
you decide you want to be a writer. Did you
even know then that you would write for as many
different audiences and as many different age groups or did
(08:07):
that come later? I would say it came later. I
knew I wanted to write, and I didn't think that
there was just one group of people to write for.
And I still don't believe that. I think all books
were for everyone. I mean, when you look at my
experience with The Bluest Eye and reading it as a
fifth grader, it didn't destroy me. It made me have
(08:27):
a whole other narrative about that story. And there are
lots of people who would say, well, that book is
not for kids, and It's like, yeah, it's for kids
who want to read it and get something out of it.
So I always thought about writing that way. I didn't
think I'm going to write picture books for little kids,
are grown up books for adults. I didn't know that
those worlds were so heavily defined, but I knew that
(08:50):
I wanted to tell stories, and I wanted those stories
to land with people. And so as you now think
about the thirty plus books you've written for everyone knows
some more oriented towards kids or teenagers or adults. Are
there certain themes that have been important to you to
(09:12):
tackle or highlight in different books over time? Or has
each book had its own identity, its own story, its
own logic. Definitely both, you though, I think the journey
to the End, which has often been about acceptance, about freedom,
about letting people have their lives, about seeing people as
(09:36):
their whole selves has transitioned through every single book I've written.
I think there's a strong social justice element to the narratives,
and the characters are always very different and the situations
by which they get to that we all have a
right to walk through the world safely. Moment it's varied
from book to book, will be right back stay with us.
(10:10):
You mentioned your mom wrote poetry, and poetry also plays
an important role in your books, including your memoir Brown
Girl Dreaming, which is written entirely in verse. Was it
because of your mom that you were drawn to poetry
or do you find it's sometimes just inevitable for what
the story needs. Part of it is because when I
(10:30):
was a young person, I was very afraid of poetry.
I thought it was this secret language that only dead
white men understood, basically, And it wasn't until I was
made aware of the works of like Langsa Hughes and
Nikki Giovanni's poetry. I first heard her reciting on an album,
on a record album that my mom had. I didn't
make that connection that was poetry because I was like,
(10:52):
what is this? This is going straight to my heart?
And so when I started writing, I knew that the
way things sounded was important. The way things looked on
the page was important. The way a line ended was important.
And I learned that was poetry. I love that, and
everything I write I read out loud, so that makes
a difference too, and how it sounds. So I've thought
(11:13):
about your book harbor Me quite a lot in the
last couple of weeks, because just looking at the crisis
in Ukraine and that there are close to three million refugees,
and in harbor Me, it's a group of kids who
are aware of often issues that we think aren't appropriate
for kids to learn about or to think about, and
(11:34):
yet issues that affect so many kids in this country
or around the world, whether issues relating to incarceration or
the fear of having to leave your home. And so
I just wonder, Jacqueline, what stories do you hear from
people who have read that book or any of your books,
(11:55):
where readers say to you, this really hit me in
this or this really affected me so many you know.
I think the thing that happened with harbor Me is
I was talking to young people and then the pandemic came,
and then I started getting letters from young people who
(12:17):
would say, you know, this is my life I am Holly,
I am Haley, I am Amori. So Harbor Me was
like both heartbreaking and healing because I heard so many
stories of so many kids, across lines of race, across
lines of economic class, the stories of their fear and
their heartbreak and the places in which they felt trapped
(12:38):
inside their own skin. And one of those stories, and
Harbor Me, is about a white boy who moves into
a predominantly black neighborhood and what that means for him
to suddenly be other other by no fault of his own.
He's walking home and he's getting his next laughter. He's
keeping this a secret, right that there's this download bullying
going on, and then the way the kid rally around
(13:01):
him and say, we will not let this happen anymore.
And I think that's another story that kids talk about,
is like, that's unfair, that shouldn't happen. Why, you know,
why would they do that? And I remember going to
a school this was with visiting day, and visiting day
is the story of a girl whose dad is incarcerated,
and a teacher said, well, we don't need to read
(13:22):
this book because no one in this class has any
one in prison. And of course that made me mad,
and I'm like, I'm going to read that book. And
then when I read it, one kid raised his hand,
He's like, my dad's in prison. Another kid raised his hand,
he's like, my cousins in prison, my brother's in prison.
And there were about six kids who knew someone who
was incarcerated. And the teacher said, I never knew that,
(13:46):
and I said, because you never opened this door for them.
And we had this beautiful conversation where these kids have
been living with the shame of it. And I think
of that often, how we as adults, we too often
get to decide what the tone is in the room,
what that tone is going to be, and what kids
are going to feel safe talking about, and harbor me
(14:08):
became this huge conversation among all these kids talking about
which character fit their own particular narrative, and it was
so great to see that, and teachers talking about, Okay,
we're gonna have an art room. Now, you know, we're
going to have a space where adults give kids the
space to talk. And it doesn't even mean having to
leave the room, but being comfortable in our own silence.
(14:32):
I find, even with my own kids, if I sit
very quietly, I hear things I won't hear if I'm
actually talking, or if they are aware of my presence
in the room and just being able to be in
that space where young people are talking about all of
these seemingly very quote unquote adult issues and it's like, no,
(14:52):
these are there every day. I do want to ask
about Brown Girl Dreaming, since it is autobiographical and so
much your work is wonderfully in the world of fiction,
but how and why did you decide to share your
own story. I was trying to figure out how I
got to this point of being Jacqueline Woodson. I had
(15:13):
grown up Jackie, the regular girl on the block, you know,
one of four children, and I wanted to go back
to the beginning. And I was falling apart through the
three years of writing that. And it's so funny because
I would just write pieces and I'm like, this is
not making sense. Why isn't it coming out as chapters?
Why does this even matter? It felt so deeply specific,
(15:35):
and um, you know, my beloved partner was like, just
keep writing. And then I say, like, what was your
partner and your family friends, what were they saying on
this journey? They were like, oh, Jackie's falling apart again.
She must be writing another book. Jackie's cranky again, she
must have had a bad writing day, like the same
thing they've been saying for twenty years. But I remember
going to my friend Toshi Reagan. She had read a
(15:57):
bunch of these little pieces, and I said, why am
not even trying to write this? Nothing was happening when
I was born, like this does not matter, and she's like,
what are you talking about? This country was on fire
when you were born, And it completely unlocked it to
that first poem, I am born on a Tuesday, February twelfth,
nineties sixty three, and it really began to make sense
(16:19):
why I was telling this story. And I really started thinking,
I'm going to tell this story in the context of
American history, because none of us are existing outside the
context of our country's history. And then I thought I
was going to talk about my life and my mom
and all this. And in the middle of writing it,
my mom died suddenly at sixty eight, and suddenly that
(16:40):
door closed, and I was like, wait a second. I
had questions, there were things I wanted to ask you.
And then the memoir changed and it became about myself
in the context of my mother right, because we're on
these journeys, because of the journeys our parents were on,
because of the journeys their parents were on, and all
the way back in time. And that when all of
(17:01):
it started making sense, and all of it started having
this other history to it. And when I finally got
the book finished, my beloved editor, Nancy Paulson, just had
her hand on my back. The whole time, I was
still saying, no one is going to read this, and
so I was stunned. I still am stunned by the
journey that book has had. I've talked to book clubs
(17:23):
where the brown girls are all Indian, you know, are
all Southeast Asian, are all Asian, and to realize that
so many people who see themselves as non white saw
themselves in this book. But what really surprised me where
all the white boys who came to me, who wrote
to me, it's like, I love this book. I loved
(17:43):
your grandfather, or I wonder what happened to your brother,
Like everybody seemed to find some part of themselves in
this book. And then I get these letters from white
men in their seventies who knew my grandfather, who knew hope,
and they're like, he taught me baseball. Your grandfather was
the nice man in Nelsonville, and that blows me away.
So just being able to get these pieces of my
(18:05):
history given back to me because of this memoirs is
such a gift. Oh my gosh. Well and also, Jacqueline,
that you wrote something that feels both specific and universal.
It sounds like to the people who are reading it.
And yet we are living in a time when there
are forces trying to limit what especially kids can read,
(18:27):
trying to take books out of school or public libraries,
out of curricula, especially for elementary and middle school aged kids.
And I know your work has shown up on some
of those lists, and wonder both kind of what that
feels like for you and also just what advice you
(18:49):
would have for anyone who might be getting discouraged by
the velocity of those efforts around the country. It's exhausting.
Most recently, Brown Girl Dreaming ended up on the list.
People are challenging it because they said, basically, there are
no white folks in it, and it's going to make
white children feel bad, as opposed to thinking about it
(19:11):
as an expansion of an experience for people like the
way that people are trying to use literature to make
the world smaller is heartbreaking, and for me as a writer,
it's exhausting more so than scary. It's like, really, we
have to have this fight again. And now this fight
is different though, because it's trying to be legislated, and
(19:34):
it is in some places. So I think the thing
that we have to be so aware of is that
we have power to create change in this situation. We
have power to go to our if we don't go
to our school boards, go to our school buildings and
talk to the principle and write letters in supportive librarians
because they are on the front lines of this. They're
(19:56):
the ones who are getting challenged just for what's in
their school libraries, and teachers are getting challenge for which
books they are sharing with their young people, and we
really need our voices now, um And I wish the
press would support those people who are challenging and winning
against these bands, because that's happening too, and that does
tend to give us a fire right. It's like, well,
(20:18):
if they could do this in Indiana, we can do
it in Brooklyn. But I think we really have to
be aware because it's going to change what our kids
have access to. And as parents, we want our kids
to be as broad minded as possible and to have
as many experiences as possible. And for many kids, those
experiences happened through literature, and so if the literature is
(20:39):
taken away, so much is at state with these bands,
and I just think we really have to be aware
and be willing to write those letters and go to
those spaces and make that change. I probably not surprisingly
emphatically agree. I also think, especially for those of us
who have young children for whom the pandemic has been
(21:00):
a huge portion of their lives, in which their lives
were rendered quite small, it's even more important that there
are pathways and portals into other people's experiences and to
other communities experiences. Oh man, it is so true. I
always think about Dr Rudin since Bishop hot talks about
the importance of kids having both mirrors and windows in
(21:23):
their literature, mirrors so they could see reflections of themselves,
and windows so that they can see into other worlds.
And You're so right, this is the opportunity for them
to see into those other world We're taking a quick
break to stay with us thinking about the need for
(21:52):
windows and mirrors. We know that most of children's literature
has been written by white people, and most of children's
literature has been written by men, and most of children's
literature has actually been told from a male or a
boy's point of view, including which I have never understood, Jacqueline.
So many of the classic books about animals, and you're like,
(22:15):
why do the frogs and the toads need to be
gendered male? Or the ducks or the cows. And while
certainly there are more women authors, there are more authors
of color, there are more women authors of color, were
still up against accumulative history that is overwhelmingly white and
(22:35):
overwhelmingly male. Do you think the publishing industry is doing
enough to help ensure that there are more voices given
a platform, given an opportunity, And if not, what more
do you think needs to happen? And what could anyone
listening do to try to help hasten the arrival of
(22:56):
real representation? Is so much to do, And one thing
about publishing is it's a business, and publishers look at
numbers and they make assumptions. Sometimes based on those numbers,
Organizations like we Need Diverse Books have been doing the
work to really change what's happening in publishing and get
(23:20):
more books by folks published, and then publishers get nervous
that those books aren't going to sell, even though I
remember looking at the bestseller list at one point and
there were like eight people of color on it. At
the same time, as parents, as teachers, it's really important
to get the books. And that doesn't mean to buy them.
(23:40):
It makes a difference if you go to your library
and take that book out. Publishers are gonna look at that.
Publishers need to get out of their own way and
understand that there's this community of young authors out there
who just need a chance to get their story told
and have platforms and will do their part to help
get the book into the world. But it's changing slowly.
(24:01):
I first published in the nineties and I was one
of very few as that with Walter B. Myers and
Virginia Hamilton's and them kissics, but you can name them,
I can name them. We were all friends. But that
that highlights, like, I'm so grateful you had that community, Jacqueline,
and also highlights the challenge that, like you knew everyone's
name it was and the rooms were very white, and
(24:22):
the awards ceremonies were very white. So I do think
the support of writers and their stories makes a huge
difference to publishers the demand for more books Like that,
I always say, what is your child's library look like?
When I was looking for schools for my children, the
first thing I looked at was the classroom library because
that told me a lot about the teacher's choices. That
(24:45):
told me a lot about what the tone of the
classroom was going to be and what the narrative of
the classroom was going to be. And I talked to
the teachers and librarians, and I talked about diversity. And
some people are comfortable with diversity being one or two people.
I'm not. I don't think that's diversity wanted two people
of color. So I think when we're talking about publishing
(25:05):
and creating change, we're not only also talking about the
number of books they're publishing, but who is in the
publishing health doing the work. How many editors of color,
how many publishers, how many publicity people of color. There's
so many levels of it, and there's still so much
work to do. But again, we have that power to
make that change by using our voices, by using our wallets,
(25:27):
by using our library cards to demand that change. I'm
so curious Jacquling, what questions do young writers, especially young
women writers, ask you, and what advice do you give
a lot of times they ask how do I get published?
And I say, don't worry about that now, because they're
like ten, and I don't. That's the age to be
(25:52):
worrying about the publishing industry. That's the time to be
telling your stories. And I say, write the stories that
really mad or to you, and show them to the
people you trust and who make you feel safe and
who make you want to keep writing. Do not show
them to the people who are going to destroy them.
There's constructive criticism and there's destructive criticism. And I tell
(26:14):
them what Dorothy Allison told me years and years decades ago,
that everybody has a story, and everybody has a right
to tell that story. So don't let anyone silence your
story because the world is waiting for it. And I
do believe that about young writers. I mean, I think,
can you imagine the stories these young people are gonna tell.
It's gonna be amazing, you know, I am so ready
(26:38):
for it. I think they have so much grit, so
many survival skills, They've learned so much, they're so smart,
it's going to be phenomenal. So I am just always
effusive when young people ask me about anything but publishing,
because I'm like, let's get these stories on the page.
And I always say, look up. You have to walk
through the world with your eyes open or else you're
(26:59):
not going to get the story. Worry. Yeah. Amen. One
last question, Jacqueline, is there one statistic or fact or
anecdote that you can share that either really inspires you
because it enrages you or it gives you hope about
where women are and where we could be. I would say,
thinking about it right in this moment, I think about
(27:22):
people like you. I think about Roxanne Gay and Dressing McMillan,
Cottam and Jamil Hill and all of these women who
have podcasts now who are speaking truth to power and
being heard. And I think about our young women and
older who actually have access to this kind of information
(27:44):
just by putting their earphones in. So this is huge
for me, the fact that we can have this conversation,
and this conversation can go out to lots and lots
and lots of people and they can continue the conversation.
It feels grassroots, and it feels empowering, and it feels
world changing. That's what I'm excited about today, that we're
(28:04):
talking to each other and we're telling the truth to
each other, and in doing so, we're protecting each other
and lifting each other up. So let's continue that. Well, yes, Jacqueline,
thank you. I listened to the radio a lot with
my mom when I was a little kid, like local
public radio and little at Arkansas, and I remember being
so excited when there would be like a girl's voice
on the air. And so when you said that, I
haven't thought about that and so long. And to know
(28:27):
that my children, your children, thankfully won't have that experience
because it won't be strange, dear women's voices is something
I'm really grateful for and proud to be a very
small part of. Thank you for being a part of it.
Thank you Jacqueline so much. You can find Jacqueline Woodson
on Twitter at Jackie Woodson, and I highly recommend all
(28:51):
of her books. They are important and beautiful and powerful
moving stories. Her latest is a picture book called The
Year We Learned to Fly. And thank you all so
much for joining me for this season of In Fact.
It's been truly inspiring to celebrate Women's History Month with
so many amazing women. And while we celebrate progress we've
(29:13):
made toward equality across the board, we know we still
have a long ways to go. I hope we will
share these incredible women's stories with your friends, families, and beyond.
Thank you for listening. In Fact is brought to you
by I Heart Radio. We are produced by a mighty
group of women and one amazing man, Erica Goodmanson, Mart Hart,
(29:34):
Sarah Horowitz, Jessmin Molly, and Justin Wright, with help from
Lindsay Hoffman, Barry Lurie, Joey Sukuban, Julie Supran, Mike Taylor,
and Emily Young. Original music is by Justin Wright. If
you like this episode of In Fact, please make sure
to subscribe so you never miss an episode, and tell
your family and friends to do the same. If you
really want to help us out, please leave a review
(29:56):
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