Judy Blume’s books took on the role of companion in a lonely, liminal time
Simone Howell
A month after Judy Blume’s 88th birthday (she’s an Aquarius—humane, creative, aloof), I’m sitting on my bed, surrounded by her first books, Piccolo prints I’d never pass by in the store. I added the new bio to this constellation, Judy Blume – A Life, Mark Oppenheimer, journalist, literary historian, and long-time Judy stan.
“What did I miss?” Oppenheimer asks in his epilogue. Not much, I guess. A biography is the size of a house brick. I carry it from place to place, holding it with both hands, like a solar reflector, like a kettlebell. It traces Blume’s life from her middle-class Jewish “Holocaust-haunted” New Jersey girlhood, through her three marriages (the last of which was as a babysitter), her two children, sales of over 90 million books, early adoption of technology, unrealized ventures into deals, merchandise, and movies, to Blume’s full development as an activist, bookstore owner, and all-around good person.
In an interview with (himself) OldOppenheimer argues that the book effectively depicts a century of American life, from oppression in the 1950s to advances in women’s and LGBTQI rights to the current political explosion. Blume hasn’t published a book since her adult novel In an Unexpected Event in 2015, but remained a public figure revered by young tastemakers (Lena Dunham, Molly Ringwald) and was revived with a 2023 film adaptation. Are you there, Lord, it’s me, Margaret? and documentary Judy Blume Forever.
For me, a Generation Xer who cut his teeth on the realistic teen fiction of the 1970s, reading his biography was confronting the weight of years; It’s what the Dictionary of Uncertain Pains calls “zenosyn”: the silent compression of time, the feeling that it speeds up as you get older. “Life is short and life is long. But not in that order.” But once I got over that, I found it compelling, especially the first half, which follows Blume’s childhood as a great reader, dreamer and people-pleaser, anxiously affected by “gazeema” (eczema). Her transformation from suburban housewife doodling while the kids are at school to apprentice to Lee Wyndham, her near miss and subsequent joyous connection with editor Dick Jackson, carries all the fist-clenching momentum of a successful montage in a biopic. If the later chapters felt muddy or laundry list-like at times, I was already invested. Eventually, the reading experience became compelling and reflective of my child-self reader, which feels appropriate.
It was Blume who approached Oppenheimer about writing the book and communicating during COVID. (“The email was a surprise, a very pleasant surprise.” ) They had been in contact sporadically since 1997, after her article. Why Does Judy Blume Endure? published and invited him to lunch at his home on Martha’s Vineyard. Blume was not involved in the “hunting and gathering” phase of writing. Oppenheimer drew on interviews with Blume and those close to him, as well as the memoir he stopped working on in the 1980s and daunting correspondence between the author and fans, editors, peers, parents, movie people, gatekeepers and glommer-onners.
Biographies need to be comprehensive. Removing the negative and leaving only the gloss makes it insincere, a hagiography. And of course people are versatile. We’ve all seen what can happen when children’s writers are put on a pedestal. While there are no disgusting skeletons here, Katy Waldman’s New York Times It is called “vivid, disturbing details.” When Oppenheimer shared his first draft with Blume, Blume responded with a lengthy letter of suggestions, concerns, and edits. Some he accepted, some he rejected. The focus was on “the daily life of the subject: his childhood, his marriages, his children, as well as how he balanced his time as a writer with other commitments, such as his political work on censorship”.
Oppenheimer’s respect and admiration for Blume is evident throughout, but when I read that Blume distanced himself from the book and did not make any comments about it, I could understand why. I’m not sure if I should know when she had her tubes tied or other choices she made regarding her body. The reportage of discordant memories of early sexual experiences with his best friend feels prurient, like the narration of a salacious scene cut from the movie. my wife, (“Pure fiction,” Oppenheimer characterizes his first adult novel: “Judy never even had a dog.”) wife: In the trailer, Blume was seen posing in a dressing gown People magazine. (My friend, children’s book author Norma Klein, wrote in response: “When I saw that terrible photo of you, People, “When I put on the nightgown and with a shy, scared smile on her face, I almost wanted to cry.”)
I enjoyed reading that Blume blamed her first husband, Erica Jong Fear of Flying due to the end of their marriage. After all, I wondered what a female biographer might focus on and what she might leave out.
Oppenheimer’s attention to Blume’s commitment to the “business” of writing, that is, to “everything that goes with writing that is not writing itself,” is illuminating. At the height of his fame, Blume was receiving more than 2,000 letters a month (his goal was to answer 100 of them personally). Many were from young fans describing harm, suicidal ideation and sexual abuse. Blume’s duty of care extended far beyond the page. In 1981 he founded the Children’s Fund, which provides grants to organizations to improve communication between parents and children. Income Diary of Judy BlumeYou have been transferred to charity. Letters to JudyHer 1986 book of agony-aunt style nonfiction, ostensibly aimed at children, was a first step toward tackling book-related challenges. “I think a lot of censorship is based on fear…” he said. to mail. “…my child will ask me questions and I do not want to face these questions.”
I read here and there in my bed with my books, I get carried away with reading books. I’m looking Deenie. I’m looking Cry. The young characters on the covers are so finely drawn that you can see all the hope and doubt of their tears in their eyes; You can see their flowing hair, the biscuit crumbs on their sweaters and the wrinkles on their jeans. The books are slim, under two hundred pages, and the language is direct and simple.
When I read them as a child, I would put my own self on ice and live with these other selves, even if they were overbearing, arrogant, or naive. J. M. Sommers has argued that Judy Blume takes the classic 19th-century novel and recasts it as a “sororic dialogue”: “The reader finds herself sidetracked from her own reality, escaping an invitation into someone else’s troubles (with whom she can relate). The effect of this is that young women who read Blume’s works feel, in many ways, as if they were active participants in the heroine’s healing process, and vice versa.”
Oppenheimer says the only question he can’t answer is “Why Judy?” He admits that he is. “Other realists (or ‘issue novelists’, to use the unfortunate term) such as Paul Zindel or Norma Klein wrote the same but did not become famous.” Was it timing, luck, or personality? Was it craft – witchcraft! Was this thanks to Blume’s “total recall” as claimed in the title pages of his freefall novels (10 novels he wrote in five years between 1975 and 1980)?
Personally, I think this is because his books take on the role of companions for readers during a lonely and limiting time. “Let’s say by the time you turn twelve, you don’t have any more A+ days?” Karen offers to come in It’s Not the End of the World.
I think of Gaston Bachelard’s “Childhood is bigger than reality”; Blume’s books not only hint at things to come, they also gently show that a complicated life is also a life lived to the fullest. Oppenheimer’s biography in its entirety suggests the same thing.
Judy Blume, The Life of Mark Oppenheimer (Scribe) was published on March 31.
