The writer Chiki Fabregat, during her speech at the congress.Ángel L. Matos
The
New York Times
recently published an extensive article on the proliferation of
dirty
titles in children's and youth literature published in the United States.
And he did it like someone who discovers gunpowder, as if the market had suddenly been flooded by a torrent of books with thug, rude and indecent content, or any other manifestation of what is wrong, for an audience, the child, who enjoys eschatology.
Subversive titles —it's the adjective used by the newspaper— such as
I need a new ass, Everybody poops, What color is a unicorn's poop
or
Almost everyone farts.
The reading of the first, via Zoom, caused the dismissal of an assistant teacher at an elementary school in Mississippi for choosing it.
The titled Anti-
Racist Baby
, on the other hand, has broken sales records on the Internet after being criticized by Republicans during the confirmation process of the new Supreme Court Justice, Ketanji Brown Jackson.
What do you think about Chiki Fabregat, renowned author of children's and youth literature (LIJ) in Spanish?
Well, tearing your hair out at this point, with hooligan titles in the Hispanic market for decades, is at least anecdotal.
“Children love eschatology”, he stresses, “this topic is nothing new, years ago a very popular book was published in Spain,
El topo que que queried que quedo que que quedo que lo que se chado que se chado que se ha que se ha se cha en el topo, el mole que que que qué que está que who had done that to him in the head
, about a rodent that a one day he discovers a piece of shit on the top of his head”.
No one was crossed about it when it was published, in 2007;
the book, edited by Alfaguara Infantil and intended for
non-readers
from zero to two years old, is counted among the LIJ classics.
Fabregat, who last week participated in the I International Congress of Writers held in Puerto Rico, is more concerned about other issues, such as works that consecrate toxic relationships, disguised as romantic novels, between adolescents (the case of
After
, a best-selling “vomitive” written by Anna Todd);
and, above all, the dismissal to which published opinion subjects children's and youth literature, "which is not a genre, like crime or romance, because it encompasses them all."
Fabregat, professor at the School of Writers and winner of the SM Gran Angular 2021 award for her novel
De Ella El cofre de nada
, insists, however, that there is no need to defend the LIJ "because it defends itself."
“Children and adolescents read, saying the opposite is not true;
They are the most loyal readers out there.
In fact, the LIJ supports the publishing market -half of the Madrid Book Fair is dedicated to the LIJ-, but despite this we do not have any space in the media or dissemination".
Fabregat, who starred in an anecdote at the congress - he received twenty books by local authors after apologizing to the public for his ignorance of the Caribbean LIJ - recalls the lines of children and adolescents at book signings at fairs.
“Children are captivated by the story and its characters;
to teenagers, the author,” he explains.
“LIJ authors are more accessible” than those of adult literature, a definition he abhors, while readers are particularly more active.
“They do reading clubs;
they have blogs, they recommend titles on Twitter, they have co-reading groups on Telegram and some
booktubers,
a true phenomenon, they have many followers”, insists the writer, to break the cliché that presents the youngest as creatures glued to a screen and oblivious to books.
While he was participating in the Congress of Puerto Rico, the first copies of his latest novel,
Remind me why I died
, arrived at his home in Madrid , which took six years to publish because it deals with youth suicide.
“Young people understand everything.
Although there is certainly an ethic or responsibility on the part of the author;
I, for example, would never include explicit sex, or rape, in the plot.
They are minds that are being formed and I feel very responsible about it, I believe that readers must be treated with great care.
Beyond the classics —one of them, the story of Little Red Riding Hood, was
deconstructed
by the writer at the conference— and fashions —impossible to avoid the pull of titles like Harry Potter or Twilight, and their emulators—, Fabregat confesses his admiration for the creators of English and Nordic LIJ, "always the most groundbreaking, like the great Roald Rahl", at whose side the Latinos and the Americans, "more influenced by religion", are more timid.
"But you can talk about everything, as long as it's done responsibly."
If, as in a
matryoshka
game , children's and youth literature is usually the most hidden doll in Literature with capital letters, the Caribbean LIJ and, by extension, Latin American, would occupy the last place, due to lack of editorial diffusion beyond the respective countries. .
“There is very little transfer;
I know some [Latin American] authors, but because they publish in Spain…”.
An ignorance that the I International Congress of Writers of Puerto Rico has tried to remedy, giving the LIJ panel the same category as the rest, and that the generosity of those attending the fair held in Caguas enthusiastically and generously tried to mitigate.
Fabregat's literary backpack returned from Puerto Rico more loaded, fuller.
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