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Zoë Dean is a senior at Southern Oregon University, majoring in business and minoring in English

What is Young Adult literature?

The general assumption between the book industry and readers is that young adult books are suited for ages twelve to eighteen years old. But the definition what is really “young adult” varies, The Educational Resources Information Clearinghouse (ERIC) defines young adults as those between the ages of eighteen and twenty-two, and the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) streches that definition up to 25. (Nilsen and Donelson). Alleen Pace Nilsen and Kenneth L. Donelson wrote that their concept of YA could “mean anything that readers between the approximate ages of twelve and eighteen choose to read either for leisure reading or to fill school assignments.” This is a pretty broad statement but it captures the somewhat vague boundaries of the genre. YA is a relatively new genre. In 1942 Maureen Daly wrote what is considered to be the first book written and published explicitly for teenagers Seventeenth Summer. But it was only in the 1960s that the Young Adult Library Services Association actually coined the term “young adult” with books like S. E. Hinton’s The Outsiders, paving the way for the first boom of young adult literature in the 1970s, including the works of Judy Blume, Lois Duncan and Robert Cormier. The 1980s saw the rise of R.L. Stine and series dramas like Sweet Valley High. A dip in the ‘90s due to low birthrates in the ‘70s meant less readers and the Young Adult Library Services Association to launch Teen Read Week in an effort to encourage teens to read in 1998. But it was in this time period that J.K. Rowling’s Harry Potter series took off, leading the way for Stephenie Meyer’s Twilight and Suzanne Collins’ The Hunger Games and into the modern genre of today’s YA literature.

A hallmark of the young adult genre is transformation, ranging from realistic portrayals of growing up to the paranormal transformation of a teen werewolf. It mirrors the teenage mindset of being “caught between two worlds, childhood and adulthood,” remarks Jennifer Lynn Barnes, a young adult author, Ph.D. and cognitive science scholar. “Teens wanted things that were real, that they connected with,” Levithan said. “It doesn’t have to reflect reality directly. They love ‘The Hunger Games’ not because it’s real in that it happens, but the emotions there are real, and it’s very relatable” (Strickland). Now the YA genre itself is transforming. Molly Wetta, a collection development librarian, acknowledges there has been a trend of mature content in YA books. “Many books are being labeled with a 14 (or even 15 or 16) and up target audience, instead of 12 and up.” It is Wetta’s conclusion that YA is expanding to include a more mature audience, adults. These “mature” young adult novels are being designated to a category called New Adult. Goodreads explains, “New Adult fiction bridges the gap between Young Adult and Adult genres. It typically features protagonists between the ages of 18 and 30… focusing on issues experienced by individuals between the area of childhood and adulthood, such as leaving home for university and getting a job.”

The argument for (diverse) Young Adult literature

In a 2011 article titled “Young People are Reading More than You” Withers and Ross found that “kids are buying books in quantities we’ve never seen before… We are right smack-dab in the new golden age of young adult literature.” In 2010 Kids & Family Reading Report found that 43 percent of the children ages 9-11 believe the most important outcome of reading books for fun is to open up the imagination, and 62 percent of the same demographic say they read books for fun “to be inspired by storylines and characters.” Half of the 9-11 year-olds surveyed by Scholastic said they read books to “help you figure out who you are and who you could become.” Michael Cart acknowledges this:

Teenagers urgently need books that speak with relevance and immediacy to their real lives and to their unique emotional, intellectual, and developmental needs and that provide a place of commonality of experience and mutual understanding…young readers need to see not only their own faces but also those of people who are different from them, for it’s in this way that books show them not only the differences but also the commonalities that comprise their humanity. By acquainting readers with the glorious varieties of the human experience, young adult literature invests young hearts and minds with tolerance, understanding, empathy, acceptance, compassion, kindness, and more.

Scientific American backs up these claims reporting that “Even reading short stories about friendship between in- and out-group characters is enough to improve attitudes toward stigmatized groups in children…[reading] results in keener social perception and increased empathy — empathy being defined more or less as the ability to alternate between different perspectives on a particular person or situation.” (Stetka). Alvina Ling, executive editor at Little, Brown, says that it is important for young readers to have access to books with diverse characters because “it helps foster acceptance and understanding of different people. These titles are for that child who is not seeing himself in the books he’s reading or a child from a different culture to have compassion towards people who are not like him” (Diaz).

The influence of young adult books on their readers present perhaps the strongest case for diverse literature. Research backs up the claims that reading improves empathy and compassion, expands world views, and decreases negative bias. Reading diverse stories helps instill insight and compassion, not to mention bringing diversity into stories make things interesting. Junot Diaz reminds us that is was issues of race that created the X-men, the extermination of Indigenous people laid the foundation for science-fiction’s first contact stories, a history of colonialism and imperialism created Star Wars.

What is diversity?

The We Need Diverse Books movement says diversity is “All diverse experiences, including (but not limited to) LGBTQIA+, people of color, gender diversity, people with disabilities, and ethnic, cultural and religious minorities.” Malinda Lo, co-creator of DiversityInYa.com and YA author, expands on this by saying diverse books need to have a main character or one of the primary point-of-view characters fall under one or more of these categories. As Lo puts it, “Characters of color, LGBT and disabled characters deserve to be the heroes of their own stories.”

Rudine Sims Bishop at the Ohio State University wrote an article on the concept of “windows and mirrors” in children’s literature. “[Reading] becomes a means of self-affirmation, and readers often seek their mirrors in books… When children cannot find themselves reflected in the books they read, or when the images they see are distorted, negative, or laughable, they learn a powerful lesson about how they are devalued in the society of which they are a part of.” Bishop’s paper explains that children in dominate social groups often see themselves in the books they read, their own lives and experiences are mirrored back at them. Not only does this harm the children who do not see themselves in literature, but it denies the children who only see reflections of themselves the opportunity to see through a window to other’s lives. The books that portray the multicultural world that they live in help them realize their connections to all other humans.

In an interview, Junot Diaz laments the lack of representation he saw when he was growing up, “You know, vampires have no reflections in a mirror? There’s this idea that monsters don’t have reflections in a mirror. And what I’ve always thought is… if you want to make a human being into a monster, deny them, at the cultural level, any reflection of themselves” He reflects back on his childhood, thinking that there was something wrong with him because the society he was part of seemed to deny the existence of people who looked like he did. As a writer he became inspired to create mirrors that would reflect kids that were like him, so that they “might see themselves reflected back and might not feel so monstrous for it.”

Challenges diverse books face

In 2014 there were 65 YA fiction titles on the best seller list, among them only 10 featured a main character of color, which is only 15 percent. To put this number in perspective, 38 percent of the children living in the United States in 2014 were people of color. In the 65 bestselling YA titles, eight included LGBT main characters and only two featured characters with disabilities (Lo). And, just because this representation was technically there, it does not mean that it was truthful or positive. Many books lack quality representation, side lining the diverse characters to best friend roles off to the side, or worse creating culturally appropriate or negatively stereotypical characters that give a distorted view of a real people’s experience. The movement for diversity in YA books asks for cultures to be authentically represented, reflective of the many diverse lived experiences. The worlds in books provide one of the first opportunities children have to explore the world.

There is one category where diverse books have a strong presence, unfortunately, it’s on banned book lists. It seems diversity is slim— except when it comes to book challenges. “Among the Top 100 Banned/Challenged Books from 2000–2009, 52 books included some kind of diversity — that’s 52%… Over half of the Top 100 Banned/Challenged Books from 2000–2009 addressed issues about race, sexuality and/or disability; or were about non-white, LGBTQ and/or disabled characters” (Lo). Often books what fall outside the white, straight, abled mainstream status quo are challenged for reasons such as explicit language, but Lo argues that often explicit language is a discussion of minority perspectives. By banning these books result in “closing off dialogue and preventing readers from experiencing stories and lives outside the mainstream” (Lo). There’s a reason for this, Lo points out, and it’s not a pretty one: institutional racism and heteronormativity. “these are not simple issues, and there are no brief sound bytes that can explain the way that racism and heteronormativity are embedded in everyday life for everyone living in the world today” (Lo).

The good news

It had been two years since Malinda Lo conducted her research of young adult literature, and things have started looking up. There is a positive trend towards more diverse books. More are being published, and gaining widespread acceptance. More and more people are connecting with these stories.

Benjamin Alire Sáenz wrote Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe, a book about the love story of two Mexican-American boys in the 1980s to reflect his own experiences. But, that didn’t stop a teen girl in 2015 from identifying with the novel, “even though she wasn’t a gay boy…the tight-knit Mexican-American families reminded her of her own” (Wetta). Alaina Leary, a writer who self identifies as a queer, disabled woman, was often disappointed to read stories where characters that she related to were killed off, magically cured, or otherwise forgotten in some way. That changed in Leigh Bardugo’s Six of Crows series, published in 2015: “In this series, we’re given scenes where disabled characters face their limitations, as well as scenes where the disability isn’t a major player, which is the lived experience of pretty much every disabled person I know. Our disabilities are important, but aren’t always a factor. … it does show that a character can be badass and disabled, that limitations aren’t inherently bad.”(Leary). Six of Crows has also been praised for its diverse characters who represent a range of experiences and deal with issues of disability, internalized ableism, and mental health. Issues like homophobia aren’t brought up in the fictional world that Bardugo creates, which is an important and purposeful choice. Normalizing diversity in fantasy worlds helps in normalize it in the real world. This falls under Malinda Lo’s advice to writers, to take responsibility for the worlds they create, and be conscious of the effects that they have on real people.

Michael Cart believes no other literary form or genre is as important as young adult literature. “Books show not only the differences but also the commonalities that comprise humanity… By acquainting readers with the glorious varieties of the human experience, young adult literature invests young hearts and minds with tolerance, understanding, empathy, acceptance, compassion, kindness, and more” (Cart).

The future is bright for diverse young adult literature. Looking into 2016 and beyond we are seeing more books tackling issues ranging from blindness and agoraphobia to the story of a transgender Italian-Pakistani painter. The world of YA is being filled with all new windows and mirrors for people of all ages to see not only themselves, but others in.

Works Cited

Booth, Heather. “Embracing Diversity in YA Lit.” School Library Journal. N.p., 12 Sept. 2013. Web. 08 Dec. 2016.
Donelson, Kenneth L., and Alleen Pace Nilsen. Literature for Today’s Young Adults. Glenview, IL: Scott, Foresman, 1980. Print.
Dwyer, Liz. “Closing the Diversity Gap in Young Adult Literature.” TakePart. N.p., 26 Sept. 2016. Web. 08 Dec. 2016.
“FanBrosShow Episode No. 30 – The Junot Diaz Episode.” SoundCloud. N.p., n.d. Web. 08 Dec. 2016.
Leary, Alaina. “Alive, Disabled, and Essential: How Leigh Bardugo’s ‘Six of Crows’ Series Made Me Feel Real.” Brooklyn Magazine. N.p., 30 Nov. 2016. Web. 08 Dec. 2016.
Lo, Malinda. “2014 LGBT YA by the Numbers.” Diversity in YA. N.p., 16 Dec. 2014. Web. 08 Dec. 2016.
Lo, Malinda. “Book Challenges Suppress Diversity.” Diversity in YA. N.p., 18 Sept. 2014. Web. 08 Dec. 2016.
Lo, Malinda. “Diversity in 2013 New York Times Young Adult Bestsellers.” Diversity in YA. N.p., 20 Apr. 2014. Web. 08 Dec. 2016.
Stetka, Bret. “Why Everyone Should Read Harry Potter.” Scientific American. N.p., 09 Sept. 2014. Web. 08 Dec. 2016.
Strickland, Ashley. “A Brief History of Young Adult Literature.” CNN. Cable News Network, 15 Apr. 2015. Web. 08 Dec. 2016.
Tauber, Daveena, and Meg Elison. “The State of Publishing: Young People Are Reading More Than You.” McSweeney’s Internet Tendency. N.p., 8 Feb. 2011. Web. 08 Dec. 2016.
We Need Diverse Books http://weneeddiversebooks.org/ Web. 08 Dec. 2016.
Wetta, Molly. “Who Is Young Adult Literature For? – The Hub.” The Hub. N.p., 18 Sept. 2015. Web. 08 Dec. 2016.

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Amalie Dieter is a senior at Southern Oregon University working towards a BA in English & Writing and a BS in Environmental Science & Policy.

The Grimm brothers are the most associated with the fairy tale genre compared to any other author or fairy tale collector and their work has been translated into 150 languages and is known throughout the world (Zipes xi). Despite this wide recognition and fame, how many people really know the original origins and purpose of the tales collected by the Grimm brothers? And how did these tales transform from their original state in 1812 to the many adaptations we see today? Numerous authors and scholars have written and researched the history of the Grimms and their tales and have found that their transformation is in large part due to the readers themselves.

The first edition published the Grimm brothers was fairly small compared to the eventual 210 tale edition: “Today the Grimms’ tales fill two fairly thick volumes, but in 1812, after five years of collecting, Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm had only found enough tales for one small book” (Bottigheimer 27). The Grimm brothers did not originally collect these tales for children to read: “When Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm first developed the plan to compile German folktales, they wanted to capture the “pure” voice of the German people and to preserve in print the oracular poetry of the common people” (Tatar 341). The original intent of the Grimm brothers was a scholarly project to preserve the oral traditions and cultural viewpoints of the German people, but after the first printing of the collection everything changed.

The readers’ response to the first edition of the collection was not what the Grimm brothers had been hoping for:

To a great extent the Grimms’ scholarly ambitions and patriotic zeal guided the production of the first edition of the Nursery and Household Tales. But once the collection was in print, reviewers weighed in with critiques that took the brothers back to the drawing board to revise, rescript, and redact. One critic denounced the collection as tainted by French and Italian influences. Another lamented the vast amounts of “pathetic” and “tasteless” material and urged parents to keep the volume out of the hands of children. (Tatar 343)

In the following editions of the Nursery and Household Tales the Grimm Brothers made many changes. They fleshed out the texts they had collected, often doubling their length and they polished the language used. The biggest change of all however, was the intended audience of their collection of tales, from scholars to children (Tatar 343). In order to make their collection suitable for children the Grimm Brothers made many additions and redactions to their collection: “The Grimms were intent on eliminating all residues of risqué humor in the tales they recorded, yet they had no reservations about preserving, and in some cases intensifying, the violence” (Tatar 344). Many of the tales the Grimm brothers had collected originally contained innuendo and sexual content that was considered to be inappropriate for children. The Grimm brothers also added religious references to the text and instructive motives to the tales in order to make them a sort of teaching device for children (Tatar 49). The violence of the tales only intensified over the editions, but during this time period violence was everywhere.

The Grimms would have been exposed to much of the political turmoil of the eighteenth-century: “The French Revolution of 1789, which was followed by grisly reports of the execution of Thermion, affected Wilhelm’s young imagination. His earliest watercolor drawing depicts a bloody scene from Louis XVI’s execution, as his head is held aloft before the gathered mob” (Bottigheimer 3). Other events and changes in Europe during this time were the Napoleonic Wars, the Romantic movement, Kantian philosophy, the age of Metternich, the July revolution in France, he struggles for constitutional government in the German states, the revolution of 1848, and the rise to power of Bismarck (Peppar xii). These events and changes in Europe influenced the additions and reactions to the Grimm brothers’ collection.

Some examples of changes the Grimm brothers made to their collection are found in the tales of Cinderella, Red Riding Hood, and Rapunzel. The Grimm Brothers made the tale of Cinderella more violent than the one written by Charles Perrault: “The Grimms delighted in describing the blood in the shoes of the step sisters who try to slice off their heels and toes in order to get a perfect fit. The German version also gives us a far less compassionate Cinderella, one who does not forgive her stepsisters but invites them to her wedding where doves peck out their eyes” (Tatar 30). Some of the transformations the Grimms made were to serve as harsh lessons for children (Zipes 14). The Grimms revised the Red Riding Hood tale so that the Huntsman rescues Red Riding Hood and her grandmother, while in the original the young girl rescues herself by distracting the wolf with a strip tease (Tatar 18). The Grimms erased all of the inappropriate erotic content and added in behavioral imperatives such as: “When you’re out in the woods, look straight ahead of you like a good little girl and don’t stray from the path” (Tatar 19). Many scholars have pointed out that some of the rewriting and edits the Grimms did made the women in the stories less independent, giving us the role of damsel in distress. The Grimm brothers also took out any “scandal” of their version of Rapunzel: “In the first version of the Grimms’ Nursery and Household Tales, Rapunzel asks the enchantress why her clothes are getting so tight and don’t fit any longer” (Tatar 113). This was taken out and replaced with a less harmful line. The Grimm brothers also made Rapunzel a “wife” to the prince so as to not suggest that Rapunzel’s twins were born out of wedlock (Tatar 113). Other edits were made in general to many of the tales, for example many of the original evil women in the tales were mothers, but the Grimms changed them to step mothers.

A lot has been written about where the Grimm brothers got their tales: “Few readers know that more than half of the 210 fairy tales included in the Grimm anthologies had a woman’s hand in them, whether they were recorded from her storytelling or recorded by her as she listened to another storyteller” (Paradiz xi). Many of the people who provided the Grimm brothers with tales were girls and young women who were in the brother’s social circle:

Wilhelm’s informants were as young as 14-year-old Dortchen Wild, one of six daughters of the town apothecary Rudolf Wild who lived across the street from the Grimm family. Dortchen’s older sister Gretchen, another tale contributor, was 20. The two girls and their mother told Wilhelm several folk tales and many fairy tales, some of which – like “The Frog Prince,” “Frau Holle,” The Six Swans,” and “Many Furs” – later became well known in the English-speaking world. (Bottigheimer 28)

The three Hassenpflug girls (Marie, Jeannette, and Amalie) were also principal sources for the Grimm brothers. The three girls provided the brothers with many tales including, The Seven Ravens, Red Riding Hood, The Girl Without Hands, The Robber Bridegroom, Sleeping Beauty, King Thrush beard, Snow White, and The Carnation (Bottigheimer 29).

The changes that the Grimm brothers made to their collection of tales has influenced two centuries worth of generations and continues to shape our world today: “In this century, Walt Disney’s film versions of fairy tales, beginning with Snow White in 1937, helped add to familiarity with the stories. In recent years, widespread enthusiasm for every sort of fantasy, from science fiction to horror movies, has included a strong up swing of interest in fairy tale” (McGlat vii). There are many Disney adaptations of fairy tales and the tales collected by the Grimm brothers: Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, Cinderella, Sleeping Beauty, The Princess and the Frog, and Tangled are just a few examples. These adaptations of course do not resemble even the edited editions of the Nursery and Household Tales, not to even mention the originals. Most women and girls in these adaptations are either damsels in distress or villains, gone are the women who save themselves with their imagination, bravery, and quick thinking (Zipes 74). There is also very few traces of violence and sexual content left in any of the tales we see today, however many still cling to the idea of role models of behavior, instruction, and morality (Zipes 152).

It is unclear whether or not children stories will return to their original form, seen in the eighteenth century, but recently there has been an increase of films and television series based on fairy tales that are of a much darker nature than the Disney film adaptations. One popular television series is Once Upon a Time, which contains material from many tales and myths including: Snow White, Red Riding Hood, Sleeping Beauty, Rumplestiltskin, Rapunzel, and Cinderella. In this show many women are damsels in distress or villains, but there are also many more who are strong women who save the day. Red Riding Hood in this enchanted world is actually the wolf herself and her grandmother is one tough old lady who comes to the rescue of many of the characters (Once Upon A Time). Another current TV series is Grimm, which is a spin on the Grimm brothers themselves. This show is set in current society and is a cop drama with a fantastical twist. In this show a Grimm is someone who collects tales and information about magical creatures and then uses that information to hunt them down (Grimm). The Grimm TV series includes many of the details of the tales collected by the Grimm brothers and reflects more of the original versions, especially the violence the Grimm brothers were known for describing in their tales.

Walt Disney Pictures is even embracing the return to the darker versions of fairy tales with the musical fantasy film, Into The Woods, which was produced in 2014. In the introduction of The Annotated Classic Fairy Tales you find this description of fairy tales:

Fairy tales are up close and personal, telling us about the quest for romance and riches, for power and privilege, and, most important, for a way out of the woods back to the safety and security of home. Bringing myths down to earth and inflecting them in human rather than heroic terms, fairy tales put a familiar spin on the stories in the archive of our collective imagination. (Tatar xii)

The film Into The Woods embraces this description of the classic fairy tales literally and figuratively. Much of the material used in this film comes from the original versions of the Grimm tales. Red Riding Hood in this film is a clever girl who tricks the baker and his wife out of many of their goods, however she does end up needing rescuing. The wolf is represented by a deviant man like the original version and includes instructions like “do not wander from the path and beware of strangers” (Into The Woods). After the encounter with the wolf Red Riding Hood becomes more independent, a girl who wears a cape made of wolf skin and carries a knife to protect herself with (Into the Woods).

The tale of Rapunzel in this film is a mixture of the old and new versions, it does contain the sexual content that the original version did, but it contains many of the other details. Some of these include: the enchantress getting Rapunzel because her parents stole from the enchantress’ garden, the enchantress locking Rapunzel in a tower, thorns blinding the prince, Rapunzel being banished to a swamp, Rapunzel’s tears healing the prince (Into The Woods). The tale of Cinderella in this film adaptation contains the violence of the original Grimm version, where the stepsisters have their toes and heels sliced off to fit into the slipper and Cinderella’s birds blind the stepsister for their cruelty (Into The Woods). Also, from the original Grimm tales the theme of wish fulfillment, of wanting riches, children, and a different life are included in this film.

What would literature, culture, and society be like today if the readers of the 18th century had not called for the Grimm brothers to edit their collection or if the Grimm brothers refused to do so? The Grimm collection of tales have changed many times over for the past two centuries, but that is the nature of fairy tales: “Fairy tales are never fixed and always changing from one region to another, from one teller to another, they still preserve a stable core” (Haase 31). Even though the fairy tales we know today may not reflect the original Grimm collection, their legacy lives on through the adaptations and the inspiration they passed on to other authors, scholars, and collectors.

Works Cited

Bottigheimer, Ruth B. Fairy Tales: A New History. Albany: Excelsior Editions, 2009. Print.

Bottigheimer, Ruth B. Grimms’ Bad Girls & Bold Boys: The Moral & Social Vision of the Tales. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1987. Print.

Ellis, John M. One Fairy Story Too Many: The Brothers Grimm and Their Tales. Chicago, University of Chicago, 1983. Print.

Grimm. By Stephen Carpenter, David Greenwalt, and Jim Kouf. NBC Universal Television, 2011. DVD.

Haase, Donald. The Reception of Grimms’ Fairy Tales: Responses, Reactions, Revisions. Detroit, Wayne State University Press, 1993. Print.

Into The Woods. Dir. Rob Marshall. By James Lapine. Walt Disney Pictures, 2014. DVD.

McGlat, James M. The Brothers Grimm and Folktale. Urbana: Univ. of Illinois Press, 1991. Print.

Once Upon A Time. By Edward Kitsis and Adam Horowitz. ABC Studios, 2011. Digital. Netflix. Web.

Paradiz, Valerie. Clever Maids: The Secret History of the Grimm Fairy Tales. New York: Basic, 2005. Print.

Peppar, Murr B. Paths Through the Forest: A Biography of the Brothers Grimm. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1971. Print.

Tatar, Maria. The Annotated Classic Fairy Tales. New York: Norton, 2002. Print.

Zipes, Jack. Grimm Legacies: The Magic Spell of the Grimms’ Folk and Fairy Tales. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2015. Print.

Zipes, Jack. The Brothers Grimm: From Enchanted Forests to Modern World. New York: Palrave, 2002.