Beany and His New Recorder... and a literary agent scandal

Beany and His New Recorder by Carol Panter, illustrated by Imero Gobbato (1972, Four Winds Press).

I stumbled across this book online, I believe through another children's lit blog.  I decided I had to have it because I took recorder lessons from the ages of 8-18.  A lot of people don't realize recorder is a classical instrument, not just a kid's practice instrument in music class. Anyway, I ordered a used copy from Amazon and it's a really nice book.

However, what was intriguing to me was what I found in the book.  There was a note written on stationary from Russell and Volkening Literary Agents, signed by "Harriet."  Well, interestingly enough, the book is dedicated to a Harriet Wasserman.  I wondered if it was the same person and who she might be.

A Google search led me to find quite a lot of information about Harriet Wasserman. I found that she was an assistant at Russell and Volkening before going on to start her own literary agency. One of her most famous clients was Saul Bellow, whom she was in love with. She represented Bellow for 25 years, during which time he called her his "coach, manager, and trainer" and a close friend. So she felt betrayed when he switched agents. In 1997 she actually wrote a memoir about the experience called Handsome Is.

Now this is where things get even MORE interesting... she was involved in a huge scandal when she disappeared in 2007 after allegations of not paying clients their royalties.  You can read a whole article about it here.  Some of the clients who sued her were children's authors Walter Dean Myers and Emily Arnold McCully.  (Myers claimed she owed him $120,000, McCully "only" $60,000.) 

Apparently she had suffered several strokes and it was her declining mental state that led to her not paying back her clients.  She was 69 year old in 2007.  I couldn't find anymore information after that year, so it seems she is still missing.

I never thought I would find all this in a cheap used book from Amazon! 

Now, here is the book... I am assuming she was the agent for it.

12/3/2019 Update: I decided to search for Harriet Wasserman again now five years later, and found an obituary. She died on September 24, 2018 at the age of 81. 

Caribbean Carnival

I'm in an online class called The Heart of It: Creating Children's Books that Matter and one discussion that keeps coming up is if it's okay for writers/illustrators to create stories from the perspective of other cultures (for instance, a white person writing or illustrating the story of an African person).  It's an interesting and tricky question.  Honestly, although I had considered this with writing, I never thought that illustrators might have the same issue. 

In one of our webinars, we got to hear from the wonderful author Zetta Elliot.  She brought up how unfortunately in the publishing business, how it usually works is when you write about another culture, you are taking that opportunity and voice away from a writer/artist actually from that culture. Publishing companies will usually only publish one book from a certain culture in a year, maybe only one in a few years, because they feel there isn't enough room for more. It's unfortunate but the truth at this point in time. 

I still think it's a struggle because of course we want to include diversity and bring awareness to other cultures and experiences, but we need to mindful of writers/artists who need their voice heard.

To go with this theme, I've chosen Caribbean Carnival: Songs of the West Indies, illustrated by Frané Lessac.  I grew up with her books, and had always assumed she was Afro-Caribbean.  However, she is actually a white woman who grew up in New Jersey and currently lives in Australia.  She did live in Montserrat for a while, where many of her children's books are set.  But does the fact that she is not a Caribbean native take away from the authenticity of her books? What about how she illustrates in a Naive style? I personally still think her books are beautiful, but I am a white American myself so I don't really know how Afro-Caribbeans would feel about an outsider telling their stories.  Thoughts?

 

New Vision Award writing contest

Tu Books (an imprint of Lee & Low) is having a writing contest.  The New Vision Award is given for a MG/YA manuscript in the science fiction, fantasy, or mystery genre by an unpublished author of color. The winner receives a cash prize of $1000 and a publication contract. An Honor Award winner will receive a cash prize of $500.

The deadline is October 31.   This is a great opportunity, so submit and/or spread the word!

Kids respond to white washing on book covers

Lee & Low (a wonderful publisher of multicultural children's books) has a very interesting blog post about how kids perceive white washing of book covers. 

Some reactions from the kids:

• “It was sickening to look at all the stereotypes, the assumptions.”
• “I think I was on the girls’ side of the bookshelf, but even so, that just shows that Barnes & Noble separates their books by gender.”
• “I know that kids’ minds aren’t developed enough to understand these issues, but as they grow up, I hope they realize how serious this issue really is. People have the right to like any color they want and be anything they want to be.”
• “Society is almost afraid of putting a dark-skinned or Asian character on the cover of a book. I feel like these are minor forms of segregation.”
• “I didn’t see a book with a biracial main character . . . it is not fair in any way.”
• “In the chapter book section, I saw that most of the books that had non-Caucasian characters didn’t have that character on the cover.
• “On the covers, I saw thin, pretty girls. I didn’t see any overweight girls or anyone with acne. I think that these covers shape an idea of perfect in a girl’s mind, and make them want to be like that, even though everyone was born perfect.”

Read the full post here.