Welcome to The Librarian Is In, The New York Public Library's podcast about books, culture, and what to read next.

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Bonjour! Rhonda and Frank are back to discuss what they've read this week. Have you checked out The Haunting of Bly Manor on Netflix yet? Rhonda is midway through and shares her thoughts and how it relates to our latest Book Club read: The Turn of the Screw.

Frank was encouraged by a member of his book club to pick up some translated works and he picked The Map and the Territory by Michel Houellebecq.

Rhonda was inspired to read a memoir after going through her grandmother's book collection, and she picked up All Boys Aren't Blue by George M. Johnson

In a series of personal essays, prominent journalist and LGBTQIA+ activist George M. Johnson explores his childhood, adolescence, and college years in New Jersey and Virginia. From the memories of getting his teeth kicked out by bullies at age five, to flea marketing with his loving grandmother, to his first sexual relationships, this young-adult memoir weaves together the trials and triumphs faced by Black queer boys. All Boys Aren't Blue covers topics such as gender identity, toxic masculinity, brotherhood, family, structural marginalization, consent, and Black joy. (Publisher summary).

Don't forget to join us next week for our next book club episode. Frank and Rhonda will be reading...

The Parable of the Sower by Octavia Butler

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Transcript

[Music]

[Frank] Bonjour, and welcome to "The Librarian Is In", the New York Public Library's podcast about books, culture and what to read next. I'm Francois.

[Rhonda] I'm Rhonda. Is there a French way to say, Rhonda? I don't think so.

[Frank] Rhonda.

[Rhonda] OK, that's good. That's good enough. That will do.

[Frank] I'm just giving you a hint as to what book I've read.

[Rhonda] Oh.

[Frank] I was originally going to do the whole thing in French. And I was like, "I don't know enough about French." And then I was going to do an accent. I was like, that could be weird. So I just said bonjour and Francois.

[Rhonda] I am intrigued now.

[Frank] Intrigued. Wow.

[Rhonda] Yes.

[Frank] Help me through it. That's all I'm telling you.

[Rhonda] You gave me a hint. OK. All right.

[Frank] I'll read through it.

[Rhonda] Yeah.

[Frank] So, what's up, Ms. Rhonda?

[Rhonda] You know, everything is everything. But one thing I did want to mention in terms of what's going on in popular culture --

[Frank] Right.

[Rhonda] -- as anyone, you know, watch a lot of the Netflix, but -- and the second installment of their "The Haunting" series, last year they did "The Haunting of Hill House", which was really good. It was very scary. I loved it.

[Frank] Was that based on Shirley Jackson?

[Rhonda] Yes. So I don't know if they're going to do every year, they're going to base it off of a book. But this -- the one that they just released is called "The Haunting of Bly Manor", and it's based on "The Turn of the Screw", which we just talked about.

[Frank] That's right.

[Rhonda] Yes. And it's interesting because as we discussed, you know, there's so many different ways to kind of interpret this book. And the few episodes that I've watched, they've already made some really interesting decisions. So, I wanted to put that out there.

[Frank] Did they make decisions that you could see that related back to the book, or they were off out of left field?

[Rhonda] No, they weren't. Well, one thing that they did, and I guess this might be part of the whole thing of the series is they put it in a more recent time frame. So this one they set in the '80s. So it's 1987.

[Frank] Wow.

[Rhonda] And not Victorian England. But they're giving us more backstory about these characters. So they're making kind of some decisions about, you know, what happened to the governess, like what was her motivation for this role. And they're giving us more information on the relationship between Ms. Jessel and Mr. Quint. So those types of things. But I mean, it still makes sense. But you can see that they've kind of taken some artistic license, but it's interesting so far.

[Frank] All right. See, I'm always reluctant to get into series because I feel like I have to make the commitment, like on the outset. But I should just calm down. And somebody just gave me their password for Netflix. Apparently, it's not that hard. I'm very juvenile when it comes to Netflix. But, you know, there was a movie with Marlon Brando in the '60s, early '70s that was the backstory of Jessel and Quint from "Turn of the Screw" and he played Quint. I forgot.

[Rhonda] What?

[Frank] Yeah, it gets very steamy, very early '70s kind of dealio.

[Rhonda] Interesting.

[Frank] I know.

[Rhonda] On a --

[Frank] I mean, "Turn of the Screw" has been turned into an opera. I mean, it's been a story that has been discussed for years as we did last episode, right, was last time.

[Rhonda] Yeah, it was.

[Frank] Definitely. If you out there haven't heard it, you should go back and listen to it. And one of the things I was going to say is when you said it took place in the '80s, "The Haunting of Bly Manor", I don't know if I'm just sensitive to it, but I feel like I've noticed the '80s are featured in a lot of shows and presentations. And I think for a couple of reasons. First of all, the '80s is now like sort of an interesting cool time to look back to with style, and clothes, and things like that. But I wonder if more for -- I didn't ask you about this with "The Haunting of Bly Manor", but if more and more shows are just doing that to elide the whole internet cellphone thing, like for plot point. Like when you have a plotting of a story, you don't have to say, well, they would just call them on their cellphone because they don't have one, because that could alleviate a lot of so-called the old school like moments of distress, like, well, just use your cellphone. And then you have to contrive ways that they lose it or something like that. I don't know. I was just throwing it out there.

[Rhonda] That's an interesting observation. I do see the '80s popping up more. But, yeah, I wonder if that is one of the reasons why. That's a good -- Something to think about.

[Frank] I do know and there's a book, and I can't remember now the title. I think it was -- It's a YA white book called "Carnival at Bray" where the author had particularly said, she set it in the early '90s because it was about teenagers and she wanted to -- she didn't want them -- she didn't want to deal with the whole cellphone thing, that they'd have to be on it, and referring to it, and otherwise it wouldn't be believable. So she literally set it in 1990 to elide that issue. Anywho.

[Rhonda] Wow. Cellphones have --

[Frank]A lot of [inaudible].

[Rhonda] -- the world.

[Frank] What did you say?

[Rhonda] I said cellphones have just revolutionized our world.

[Frank] I know. Yeah, you know, I could go on and on. How we do go on or how I do? Anyway, this is like -- So our discussion today is basically books that we both read on our own that we wanted to read and neither one of us know what the other read. As I alluded to, I was -- I went down the French path, shall we say? Excuse me.

[Rhonda] Yeah, I'm intrigued. I think I want to hear this.

[Frank] Well, you know, I said it in my book discussion group too, because I sort of have a whole new group now that we're doing it online than I had before. Some people have continued over, but, you know, some people have lost touch and some people I haven't, and for various reasons. But I have this group now online, which is so great. And I was talking about my reluctance to read translated author, I'm sure I've mentioned this before, because I feel like I'm -- there's so much in my native language, English, that I can read that to read a translated work is almost reading the work of two authors in some ways. And I just felt like reluctant to go there. And one of the participants said, no, you must, you must, you must read authors from other countries, because you just have to. You have to get that perspective, you have to delve in. So for some reason, I just needed permission. And then we read Thomas Mann. We've read a couple of translated work that are -- And I'm sort of loving it. So that led me to -- Because you know I'm always trying to read something I haven't read before that I might have heard about, or a classic, or something contemporary that's controversial or hailed. And it just -- And I like it very organically, and it just surfaced for me, actually, through the book discussion group I do. The author, Michel Houellebecq.

[Rhonda] OK.

[Frank] And it's H-O-U-E-L-L E-B-E-C-Q, Houellebecq, Michel. And he's a pretty famous author, probably, I mean, you know, as these things go for what it's worth, like the most famous author in France today, like at this point, legendary. And controversial. I mean, those listening might, when I said the name, might immediately been like, "Oh, boy, not him." Or, "Oh, yeah, he's interesting." Because he said some controversial, you know? I mean, he's very much -- I mean, I hate doing it, but like to, you know, diminutize a -- to a caricature, you know, like Gauloises, smoking, existential, full of angst, you know, the classic French trope that we would see from outside. But that's just not a fair designation. I mean, maybe sometimes it is, but it's productive. And I don't really want to do it, even though I just did. But so anyway, I picked up -- I decided to read a book of his to see what all the hoo-ha was about. And I picked up a book called the "Map and the Territory" --

[Rhonda] OK.

[Frank] -- which is from 2010 and it won the Prix Goncourt, which is a big French prize. I think it's like the biggest literary prize in France.

[Rhonda] Oh, like a Pulitzer type of?

[Frank] Yeah. You know, we all have our own awards that we came out. So, I read it.

[Rhonda] OK.

[Frank] And where to begin? I don't know. Well, you know what, I'll take a note from some of our listeners. Tell -- Because I always feel like telling the plot of a story in some books is just like not the point, because it's not really plot-driven.

[Rhonda] Right.

[Frank] Because we know about the gateways to different books. But just to give people something to hold on to instead of my rambling nonsense, but --

[Rhonda] I like your rambling nonsense.

[Frank] You just gave me a hug. Thank you.

[Rhonda] I'm on it.

[Frank] Thank you, sweetheart. So sweet of you. Well, then we'll get to organize and clear with you. But -- So the "Map and the Territory" is essentially about an artist named Jed Martin or Martin. I'm not going to bother with -- I'll try not to bother with French accents. Jed, and it basically traverses his life through childhood to death really. So you get sort of like a building from artist's coming of age and to maturity, and then finally in decline, and -- But that's says almost nothing about what the book is about because it's not particularly plot-driven. Even though it does take forays into a particular kind of story, which I'll say in a sec, it's more a thought please -- It's almost like being with somebody -- Reading this book was like being with somebody who's very interesting, exasperating at the same time. And actually, that's what the book mostly does for me is this -- It's usually this juxtaposition of two or more things that might, if you're really engaged, illuminate a greater whole, but sometimes just seems like, "Oh, so he thinks that." And then you realize as you move on, "Oh, no, no, no, he thinks that." And you don't really -- I don't really feel a sense of trust. I was thinking about this book when I was reading it that sometimes when you -- you feel like you trust the author to take you places and you're like, "All right, I'm going to go with you, because I trust you." I didn't have a sense of trust with him, Michel Houellebecq. Yeah, I wasn't sure why he was -- Because there's like a lot of humor. I mean, I can see the humor. It's not like slap my knee humor. But I didn't know if he was satirizing something, or really believed it sometimes. Like --

[Rhonda] Right.

[Frank] -- he said something like at one point about an older couple that they were very much in love, which is not something you'd find in that part of rural France, that romance would not engender from such a hard human existence, or something like that. And I was like, does he really believe that, or does he -- is he making fun of them? Like, I wasn't sure. And I had to work that through, because I also knew about his reputation as being a bad boy of French literature. And I was a little like hmm about it. But it does move and -- There -- All right. So Jed Martin is the artist and you meet him, and he goes through his life, and he creates different art pieces throughout his life. He has a couple of brief relationships. I mean, Michel Houellebecq, again, the controversy has some -- controversy about how he'd used women. And also he's made some comments about Islam in the press that got some notoriety about whether he was inciting hate or not. I mean --

[Rhonda] Oh, wow.

[Frank] -- people can look that up. But he's a thinker. And I do want to read, and that's part of the intrigue for me, I do want to read people that I might not agree with, or I might not think are good people or something good. I want to actually encounter stuff that might be a little bit challenging and a little bit like, why would he go there? Why would he say such a thing?

[Rhonda] Right.

[Frank] Like there's a -- One of the biggest moments that is unexplained and a little bit, again, controversial in the book is that at some point, Jed goes to -- The main relationships are with Jed, his father, and a character, and this might give you an idea of what kind of book this is a character named Michel Houellebecq, I mean, the author put himself into the book.

[Rhonda] It's him? It's actually him or just someone?

[Frank] Well, I mean, that's a great question. Like, what does that mean? It's actually him. Like that's to be discussed. Like he -- But the -- But Michel, the author, decides to put Michel the character in the book. So he's a character, but he's calling it by his own name. So you have -- That's exactly what you have to think, is this really him, what is he saying, and that kind of thing.

[Rhonda] Right.

[Frank] So it's really those three men. And in some ways, it occurred to me they could be three men -- the same man at different points in their life, because Jed is younger, his father is older, and Michel Houellebecq is middle-aged. And that's an interesting way to look at it that they're all three of the same person because they're the most entrenched relationships in the book. But Jed has a difficult relationship with his parents. His mother committed suicide when he was seven. His father was an architect, basically wanted to be an artist, wanted to be revolutionary, wanted to break out of what the architectural style at the time was, which is cold and functional, but without any kind of beauty, Jed's father thought. But he eventually bowed down to the commercial world and had to make money, and became a designer and architect of like resort hotels or something. And you follow his trajectory as well, Jed's father, Jean-Pierre, until -- through various situations, Jean-Pierre, at the end of his life decides to euthanize himself. And he goes to Switzerland where it's legal. And Jed follows him there and has an encounter with an administrator of this establishment that allows one to die peacefully. That's very violent, and it's out of nowhere, and it's out of character for Jed too. And it's been discussed in some reviews as being ridiculous and off. But it was there, and I sort of can't stop thinking about it. From what I know about Michel Houellebecq too, his books are extraordinarily loaded with sex, and sex tourism, and that kind of thing. And this book, which has been sort of snarkily said, does not feature a great -- a lot of sex at all. It's mostly alluded too. It's not graphic by any means. And some critics have said, "Well, that's why he got the Prix Goncourt because finally the French establishment is like you're maturing and not being so juvenile with your sex talk all the time." Because it's very little in this. And at sometimes, I was like, darn, I think I read the wrong book. But -- So, well, that was a tangent. But, yeah --

[Rhonda] Wait. The encounter was violent with the --

[Frank] The administrator of the, I don't know what'd you call it, like where people are euthanized voluntarily.

[Rhonda] Right.

[Frank] And it's legal in this part of Switzerland, who is sort of -- And you know, Michel Houellebecq makes a point of saying that the cost of euthanizing someone and cremating them is so low, but they charge a great deal. And it's not legal in the world, except there. And so they sort of have the market selling up and they make a great deal of money.

[Rhonda] OK.

[Frank]So, the violence might come out of that, because there is for sure an issue that goes through this book of commerce versus the individual. I mean, the capitalistic commercial world and what it does to us versus us as people, that -- you know, how that -- how economics and money can though -- As the system is set up, we need it, but because of that possibly, it also takes away elements of us that we prize most as being human. I mean, I think that that can be true and I think it's obviously something that's been discussed before, because Houellebecq goes through lengthy discussions on French tourism, and how the tourist industry has become dominant, and how even little small towns that were just rural villages have authenticness are now have, you know, billboards saying, "Here's the history of this little town," that it's all geared for outsiders. He talks a lot about that. And you get this sense he really loves France, actually. If nothing else, Michel Houellebecq does seem to have a love for his country. There is a lot in the book that might go over an American readers had.

[Rhonda] That's what I was wondering.

[Frank] Like in mind.

[Rhonda] Yeah.

[Frank] Because he does make fun of the media elite in the book. And all of them are real people, but none of them I know. They're all French presenters, or comedians, or news people. And I mean, I got the point but I couldn't be like haha because I didn't know the history --

[Rhonda] Right.

[Frank] -- and that particular person. And he does seem to have a love of even stating French street names and village names. And he does -- his mind, as I said before, is like being with this exasperating intelligent person who can elucidate the history of the housefly on one minute, and then the next minute, he's talking about a camera's inner workings. Like you're fascinated, but like, where are you going with this?

[Rhonda] Right.

[Frank] So he does have that, you know. That's the book. The plot is the plot, but the book is really those detours and fragments and vehicles for this smarty pants to tell us about things. But, yes, it -- And you -- So you're not going to get a -- which I seek sometimes, like I want to know where this -- where we're going, what's the point, like what's the big lesson, what's the big idea? What's the big idea that you're going to tell me about? And I feel like there's -- maybe this book has such big ideas that they're almost unapproachable, like globalization, and capitalism, and, you know, fear of death. I mean, huge issues that, you know, you can -- Well, you know, actually, one thing I did realize or think about was that these are such big issues. The book is called the "Map and the Territory". So "Map and the Territory", territory is the actual land, the streets, the tactile world we know, and the map is the representation of that. Right? You know, there was this idea that, here I even wrote it down, that -- philosophical idea that the mind create maps of reality, in order to understand the only way we can process the complexity of reality is through abstraction. Meaning a map makes the reality of the world manageable. Like we're in the middle of New York City, let's say. I can't see the whole entirety of the city, I just see my, you know, couple of feet around me. A map of New York City would then show me, "Oh, I know where I am. I'm in this spot. X amount of miles from this spot. There's water around us. There's this." So it makes -- it tastes a reality and makes it an abstraction so my brain, the human brain can understand it. Does that make sense?

[Rhonda] Yeah.

[Frank] So, I think that's really a lot of what's going on here is that he's taking abstractions he's taking an abstraction I also was thinking about is taking components from a reality -- taking some components of reality and focusing on them and leaving others out, so as to better understand the thing itself. So you have to remove elements from something in order to maybe better understand it. Like a map removes the actuality of the enormity of the world, but it does give you a sense of what's going on. And he even says at some point in the book that sometimes having a bad representation, like our human brains need an abstraction or representation to understand even if it's a bad one, like, you know, how you might be back in the day have drawn a very crude map, let's say, of where --

[Rhonda] Right.

[Frank] -- you have to go, because there was no GPS or whatever? It's -- You needed that representation to get where you need to go, even though it wasn't to scale or it wasn't even very good. But our brains needed that to get it there. So I think Houellebecq is working on that principle. He's taking, as his brain can do, abstractions of the world as he sees it and offering them to us to make sense of the whole thing. I'm a smart.

[Rhonda] That was deep, Frank.

[Frank] I know. I'm -- I don't know.

[Rhonda] No, it is. I mean you really -- I think you got your brain worked out with this book.

[Frank] I did.

[Rhonda] You got to wrap your mind around all of these kind of big themes.

[Frank] There's a lot here. And I think it's for that reader who wants to take time, who wants to chew over stuff, who wants to ruminate and sort of sit next to someone else's brain and then to see how they behave. It is very French centric.

[Rhonda] Yeah.

[Frank] By any -- But by no means isn't incomprehensible to an American reader by any means. I just want to say one thing, which has nothing to do with what I just said. It was just a moment in the book that personally hit me because if you notice, I also -- I think partly why I read this too is because it was about an artist's life.

[Rhonda] OK.

[Frank] And I read the Iris Murdoch a couple of weeks ago, which is also about art. I somehow -- It sounds very highfalutin, but I don't know, I'm not thinking of it that way, that I feel very interested in art right now at this point. Like what is art? What is the point of it? And even more so, like for me personally, as the manager of a library, I almost feel like I'm not an artist, but I want to enable people to be artists. Like I want to be able to help them create. It's very much something I think about all the time in the -- with the programs we do. But there's an exchange with Jed and his gallerist. And I've sort of loved -- This is just like a small part of the book, but I loved what the gallerist said to Jed when they're talking about his work, Jed's artwork. That Jed tends to do something, and then abandon it when it's just naturally done in his brain and starts something completely new. And there are three major art series that Jed creates in this book. So Jed is having, you know, French drinks with his gallerist in a cafe. And Jed says -- So basically, you know, the gallerist says, like, "I wanted to represent you. You were doing that project before and I didn't think it was that great. I thought it was a little bit too, like you were a little sure -- too sure yourself and I didn't like that. But now you dropped that and you've started a new project to be determined." And then Jed says, "But I'm not at all sure what I'm going to do. I don't even know if I want to continue with art at all." And then the gallerist says, "You don't understand. It's not a particular art form or manner that interests me. It's a personality, a view of the artistic gesture of its situation in society. If you came here tomorrow with a simple sheet of paper torn from a spiral notebook on which you'd written I don't even know if I want to continue with art at all, I would exhibit this sheet without hesitation."

[Rhonda] OK, wow.

[Frank] And I love that because it goes on a little bit more. But I love that because it's basically saying art is not commerce to me. This guy is saying, again, one of the big issues of the book, it's not commerce. It's a human feeling about you. And whatever that feeling is, I don't know, I can't describe it, but it's there, and I feel it and it's intuitive, and I'm going to support it. And I love that. Like Jed's like, "I don't even know I want to do art at all." He's like, you know what, as far as I feel about you, there's something about you I trust, I find interesting, I would even put -- I would put that up as art, a piece of paper that says, "I don't even know if I want to do art at all." And then that little story I sort of love. I don't know why, but I do. I think it's sort of how I feel. And it seems weak to say when you're intuitive or you're instinctive, but I don't know, that's really all there is. And I do love that it's separate from money. And that's also the library, like we're free.

[Rhonda] Yeah, that's what I was going to say. You know, I feel the same way.

[Frank] But there's a lot more going on in this book, "The Map and the Territory" by Michel Houellebecq. And there you go.

[Rhonda] And I just want to say, I'm so glad that the person in your book discussion group did encourage you to read translated author, because I would have done the same thing if I know you weren't into translated words, because I think there's so -- as someone who loves like Russian literature, it's just, it is, it's invaluable to read things from different cultures and from other points of view. And like you said, there are definitely going to be things that we just won't get from not being part of, you know, French society or not speaking the original language. But I think there's still, as you kind of just pointed out, there's still a lot that we can get from it.

[Frank] For sure.

[Rhonda] Yeah.

[Frank] Absolutely. I mean, it was like, again, like the story I just told, like when that participant in the book discussion said, emphatically, you must read. It was all I needed, because I like her, and I trust her. And somehow I was like, OK, you're right. It was like an exchange between two human beings, and I just accepted it, rather than resisting it. And just was one of those things. And now I'm glad I did. It was -- It's silly. You didn't read a translated author, did you?

[Rhonda] I did not. I did not. You know, we chose two very different ends of the literary spectrum for this week, which is good.

[Frank] Yeah.

[Rhonda] Which is good. So I guess I'll start with -- So, you know, I was on vacation a couple of weeks ago, and I was I was visiting my family's home. And I -- you know, my mother -- grandmother passed recently. And I was going through some of her things, and I found like all her books.

[Frank] Oh, no.

[Rhonda] And one of the things that she loved was memoirs. And I don't know if you're a memoir reader, but she loved reading about people. So she loved biographies, and memoirs, and autobiographies, but especially memoirs.

[Frank] Really?

[Rhonda] Yeah. And I was thinking, you know, I haven't read a good memoir in a while. Like I love a good memoir. You know, some you really just like learn about other people's experiences. And then some are kind of fun because, you know, that could be like a little gossipy. Like one I think of is one called like "How to Murder Your Life" about this girl's, you know, experience in the high fashion magazine industry. But they're fun, so.

[Frank] Yeah.

[Rhonda] I love this book. It just came out last year. I bought it a while ago but, you know, just never really picked it up. And it's called "All Boys Aren't Blue, A Memoir Manifesto".

[Frank] Wow.

[Rhonda] By George M. Johnson. And I did not know this, but it's actually a YA memoir. Yeah. I heard about it for a while. I mean, it's still knew, but I'd heard about it. And I didn't know it was YA till I picked it up. But that, you know, that's not a big deal. But that'd would be interesting to point out because you and I usually don't read a lot of YA. So I have a YA memoir that I read.

[Frank] Let me ask you, Rhonda, quickly if you --

[Rhonda] Sure

[Frank] -- what are difference between autobiography and memoir?

[Rhonda] So from my understanding, a memoir does not cover a person's entire life.

[Frank] OK.

[Rhonda] Whereas the autobiography will cover an entire life, a memoir may focus on a certain topic of that person's life or a certain time period. But it's not, you know, A to Z is what I understood.

[Frank] Sounds reasonable.

[Rhonda] Sounds reasonable?

[Frank] Yeah.

[Rhonda] OK. This was a memoir manifesto. So, I think I'll get to the manifesto part. But it's by George M. Johnson. And he is a -- he's about in his 30s. He's a young, black, queer man. And queer is the term that he uses. And he also uses he/him pronouns, which I'm pointing out, because it's a lot about gender identity. And the introduction, just the introduction of the book, kind of really got me thinking, because in the introduction, he kind of introduces the idea to us about, you know, gender identity. And one example that he kind of discusses is that, you know, there's this new kind of found popularity of these gender reveal parties. And for those who are not familiar with gender reveal parties, it's basically before someone has a baby, they have a party in some very creative way to reveal whether the baby is a boy, or whether the baby is a girl. And usually, it result -- involves something like releasing like blue balloons, or cutting into a cake and the filling is like pink or something like that.

[Frank] Yeah.

[Rhonda] But he's saying, you know, that the reason that we're seeing more of these kind of gender reveal type events is that there's this push back on people who are openly kind of identifying ways that do not fall within one specific box. And I'm just going to read like what he says. He goes, "Gender reveal parties have become a trendy way to celebrate the child's fate, steering them down a life of masculine or feminine ideals before ever meeting them. It's as if the more visible LGBTQIAP plus people become, the harder the heterosexual community attempts to apply new norms." So, this is kind of his preface of saying, you know, now that people are more open about how they identify, there's this kind of pushback. And I thought that that was interesting, because I've looked this up, and I found this article, and this is a little bit of a side called "Five Gender Revealed Disasters", wildfires, fatal explosions and plane crashes.

[Frank] Yeah.

[Rhonda] And one of the wildfires in Southern California was actually started from a pyrotechnic device from a gender reveal party.

[Frank] I read about that one. Yeah.

[Rhonda] Yeah. And then last year, a woman died because she was struck in the head by an exploding device at a gender reveal party. And I'm just kind of thinking like, why are these things so violent? You know, like what is this? Why are these gender reveal things becoming more literally and kind of figuratively explosive?

[Frank] It always interested me too like considering -- Like identity and it's a spouse fluidity by a lot of people that there is such a big deal about the -- Like it almost seems to be the opposite of that. Like the gender reveal is about there's only girl and boy, and we're really, really, really, really, really, really excited to announce which one it is.

[Rhonda] Exactly, yup. And that's exactly the point. Like, you know, you're this or you're that?

[Frank] Yeah.

[Rhonda] And we're going to put whatever this is on you before you're -- before this child is even born, you know? So this -- they're kind of putting all of these ideals of what a boy is, or what a girl is on someone before they even come out into the world.

[Frank] Oh, I see. And it's titled "All Boys are Not Blue"?

[Rhonda] Exactly.

[Frank] Right.

[Rhonda] "All boys aren't Blue". And so, I thought -- So that author -- I like that he introduced the book that way, because it kind of automatically got me thinking in terms of how we view gender identity. And, you know, just kind of putting it in the context of these gender reveal parties. So, you know, I said, it's a memoir, and he talks about moments in his life, you know, of being a queer -- a young, queer black man. And, you know, kind of -- And I'll talk about kind of how he -- why he decided to put it in kind of this manifesto form. Because he's -- I guess, you know, he's talking to a very specific audience. He wrote this for a very specific group, basically, kind of writing it to who he might have been when he was a young person.

[Frank] Right.

[Rhonda] And, you know, just to kind of get into it, he starts with this chapter called, and I'm not going to say it, but basically it's called F words play football too.

[Frank] No.

[Rhonda] And the story that he tells in it, you know, it kind of really broke my heart. And basically, you know, he was a young boy. He was in elementary school. And you know, when you're in school, and you're like the year is just starting, you kind of trying to find your group, right? You're trying to find like, who am I going to be around, who am I going to hang out with? And he discovered, you know, that these girls that played double Dutch every day on the playground. And he's -- he said, you know, let me try it. And basically, he just kind of fell in love with double Dutch and jump roping, and these girls became his friends. And every day, he looked forward to, you know, doing this on the playground, but of course, you know, he was the only boy who was jump roping. And so, kind of one day, his -- he had, you know, a few boy -- friends who are boys, and one of the boys kind of pulled him aside and said, "No, you're my friend." And these kids -- they're kids, right? And he goes, "You're my friend. So I just want to let you know that like the other boys are talking about you, they're calling you the F word, and, you know, I kind of have an idea of how you can remedy this." And you can do this, you know, by coming to play football with us on the playground and not doing -- and not playing double Dutch. And so, you know, at this time, he kind of had to make a choice, right? He had to say, "Well, this is what I like to do." But you know, they're beginning to kind of put this thing on me, this kind -- you know, calling me the F word, so what do I do? So he decides that he wants to -- that he leaves his friends, and goes plays football. And he writes, you know, but I struggled with not being liked. I was also a skinny kid, didn't have any cousins around to fight this battle as they moved on to middle school. This is a choice I was making to ensure that I was able to get through my days. Even if it meant I was pushing away the things I loved, it was worth it for the momentary feeling of being liked. So, you know, that's something that all the kids go through --

[Frank] Yeah.

[Rhonda] -- I think is just, you know, you want to have friends, you want to be liked, but also again, kind of bringing it back to this idea, like well, this is what boys do. And this is kind of what girls do. And so, if you don't want to be put in this box, you have to do what the boys do. And, you know, he kind of shows like these are, for a long time, these are the kind of decisions that he kind of had to make to survive. And he also talks about in terms of, you know, there's this whole thing about sports, and he's actually really good at sports. But, you know, being good at sports also helped him have a better relationship with his father, because his father was kind of, you know saying things to him about how he was kind of a little bit too feminine and things like that.

[Frank] Yeah.

[Rhonda] And that when his father saw how good he was able to throw a football, you know, that was what really created this bond within him. So kind of this idea of like, how the sports and how they're associated with masculinity was one of the things that was kind of like, a survival tactic for him when he was young.

[Frank] Interesting he had a friend that -- Like that friend is an interesting character, a person because he had someone who cared about him enough, even if he was sort of exhibiting the F word tendencies, whatever, you know that he had a --

[Rhonda] Right.

[Frank]> -- a friend that said, listen, I want to help you. That --

[Rhonda] Exactly.

[Frank] A lot of these memoirs are about very solitary people who don't, or at least don't remember having friends like that

[Rhonda] Again, and he talks about that friend and he's saying, you know, in order to -- his friend was kind of doing the same thing that he was doing in order -- you know, saying, you know, he was -- the friend was also protecting his own reputation, kind of thinking like, "Well, if I want to stay friends with the kid who plays double Dutch, then that kid is going to have to stop playing double Dutch," you know?

[Frank] Right.

[Rhonda] Or he was kind of protecting his own self as well saying, if we're going to be friends, this is kind of what has to happen.

[Frank] Middle school is like brutal animalistic.

[Rhonda] It is, right?

[Frank] So what I -- I know it's cliche, but when I think about it now, it was so brutal. Oh, my god.

[Rhonda] It is, right? And it's just anything, like you know, thinking about these things so early, having to make these decisions so early. I don't know. Yeah.

[Frank] Yeah.

[Rhonda] I get why a lot of people block it out. I have a lot of memories from middle school, so maybe, you know?

[Frank] I mean, it was like, I remember being shocked to the core when I went to middle school from grade school, because grade school was sort of like innocence. Like middle school is when your hormones start kicking and your body's changing rapidly. And it was suddenly, like thrown into a snake pit.

[Rhonda] Exactly. Yeah. It's just -- You know, and I get like you have this whole thing of like I want to be liked, you know, I need to have friends. And what do you do, you know?

[Frank] Yeah.

[Rhonda] Yeah, absolutely. I know.

[Frank] Is it the book just about his middle school years or?

[Rhonda] No, it's not. He goes all the way up through college.

[Frank] Yeah.

[Rhonda] Yeah. And the way he tells the stories are, it's not completely -- it's not all the times linear. Like he breaks it up, in some ways -- and some chapters are actually letters to people. So, there's -- I actually hadn't planned to get too much into this part of it, because there's so much of this book to cover. But, you know, he writes a letter to his grandmother, who he's very close with. But then he also writes the letter to a cousin of his who had actually molested him when he was really young. And he didn't use that word. And the cousin wasn't much older than him. So he framed it like, this is -- this was wrong, but this person was also trying to kind of figure out what was happening with their own sexuality. And so he writes this kind of open letter to them about how he feels. And he's also saying, like he had debated putting the sexual encounter in the book because it was a YA book for young adults, but he was saying, but this happened to me when I was, you know, a young adult when I was young.

[Frank] Yeah.

[Rhonda] So, you know? And this could be happening to someone else. So he decided to put that in the book. And then another kind of -- And then he has chapters just kind of more about his family. And one of them that I thought was really, you know, really nice chapter was he -- another open letter to his cousin Hope, who was a transgender woman. And, you know, his family, he said, was kind of unique in the fact that they were always very open to their the LGBTQ members and to this cousin Hope. But he was talking about as a young man watching Hope transition, and his own feelings about that and how even at times, he was afraid to be seen with Hope, because again, he was kind of trying to maintain this certain type of identity and acceptance, but also that this -- watching Hope transition also really did something for him. And I had just marked this part that he wrote to Hope. And he said, "Secretly, I wanted to be like you. When one is a child that grows up with the feelings of being both feminine and masculinity and no space to process them, one tends to go with the best possible reflection of oneself. For me, that was you. I wasn't sure if I was a boy or a girl, or a science project, but I knew you existed, which meant that I too existed out there somewhere in whatever form that may be." So just kind of saying that the presence of Hope, this woman Hope, really kind of said, OK, there are people who exist who are not in one kind of, you know, gender box, and that this representation, this -- having this person in his life kind of really opened that up to him because he was, you know, he -- No one ever teaches people about, at least in this time period, which is like the '90s, about different forms of gender identity. And he goes also into like the whole thing about how people are taught about sexual education in school and how it's very, you know, hetero focused. And then he says this other one last part that I'll read, he talks about, you know his ideas of gender. And he goes, "So my journey looks something like this. As a young boy, I was effeminate and figured that I was supposed to be a girl, because I like girl things and had girl mannerisms. This was all I could process from the age of five until I was about 12, because I didn't have a full vocabulary for gender and sexuality. My daydreams didn't feature me as a boy, but as a girl named Dominique after Dominique Dawes, the gymnast I wish I were." So he's kind of saying, you know, I thought that because I like things that girls were supposed to like, and because I act in a certain manner that I was supposed to be a girl. And as, you know, going back to the gender reveal parties, you know, being this or being that. And so, he kind of goes through and talks about these things. And there are other things that he discusses besides just kind of gender and sexuality, although, that's really the main components of the book.

[Frank] That's so interesting. Without getting too deeply into it, but you know, when you said, oh, they weren't really -- Or when he said, you were saying, he said, in the early '90s, they weren't really talking about fluid gender identity. And I've, of course, read and listened to things like that, you know, lately. And I thought back to when I was really little, or not really little, but when I was just like entering my teen years in the '70s, you know, it was the '70s. And I guess, you know, liberal New York suburb high school or middle school, there were classes like on feminism and things like that, and I took them. And I remember, what I remember most was that the message then was that there are no qualities that belong to either gender. Like we're human, like we all have the same courage, fear, cowardice, frivolousness, you know, so-called feminine, so called masculine. Like there was very much like not one quality belong exclusively to one gender. And so I remember, I guess I took that with me where I never thought of -- I mean, I could sort of see, obviously, biological differences in behaviors in men and women, but I never really said, "Oh, if I feel a little this way, that means I want to be a woman." And I felt like that attitude could be either woman. So -- > Yeah, that's a good point. Good ahead.

[Frank] What I guess I'm saying is that it's interesting how evolution or geography works, in that I could be learning about this in the '70s, which may or might not be true. You might -- Some people might, "Well, there's absolutely qualities that belong to each gender." Whereas in the '90s, he was -- it was even more rigid, like how there are definite demarcations. I remember the '70s were very much more like, "Hey, we all have the same potential."

[Rhonda] Right. And, you know --

[Frank] You know?

[Rhonda] Yeah, definitely. And also, like you said, geography, because one of the things he talks about, he's from a very, very small town in New Jersey. And, you know, it's very, you know, very small kind of like everybody knew everybody, everybody had been there for generations. So, you know, it could be geography, it could be kind of, like you said, the time period. This is early '90s, maybe more conservative.

[Frank] Yeah.

[Rhonda] You know?

[Frank] Interesting.

[Rhonda] So, yeah, I think that's a really interesting point, because you know, and he kind of what I guess what he saw is that you have to just be either one or the other, you know?

[Frank] Yeah.

[Rhonda] He thought he was, which I think is interesting.

[Frank] It's interesting how you can be presented with facts, or a class, or teaching, and how that filters through one's own personality and how you then come to decisions.

[Rhonda] Right.

[Frank] It's interesting. Thanks for rocking my world, Rhonda.

[Rhonda] And I just -- Yeah, no problem. Well, George M. Johnson did. And as I said, he talks about other things besides -- he talks a lot about -- he does talk a lot about race as well. He talks about kind of like, again, kind of more about his school experiences, about understanding what a microaggression is, and you know, talking about, you know, how he was -- he became, later on, like, in his high school years kind of much more outspoken about things in his classes, and how that was kind of, you know, he was getting more punished for that than other students would be. And as I said, he talks a lot, you know. And he talks about his family and things. But the big theme thing is really kind of his view and his experience of sexuality and gender. And, you know, like I said, he -- it's a YA book. And he said the whole reason that he really wrote this specifically for a YA audience is because he really could have benefited from a book like this is what he was saying at this age. And reading it, and the way that he wrote it, I could definitely see how a young person, maybe who's someone who is kind of isolated or in a rural area, or you know, just doesn't have exposure, this could be something that could be almost life changing to see someone who's had these same feelings --

[Frank] Yeah.

[Rhonda] -- who had the same experience, and kind of demonstrates, you know, really especially like even with a story with Hope, well, how that kind of representation matters for him. And the last thing I want to say, which I thought was really interesting, is, you know, talking about how this book could really help so many people, but banned books week was last week, I believe. The week every year that I think is sponsored by the American Library Association to kind of, you know, shout out against censorship.

[Frank] Yeah.

[Rhonda] So I looked at every year they released the top 10 most challenged books. And so for 2019, for the top 10 most challenged books, all of them, except for one, were LGBTQIA plus books.

[Frank] Really?

[Rhonda] All of them. And they were all children/young adult books.

[Frank] Right.

[Rhonda] So even though these are out there, there's still the issue of act. So those -- So that's what I read. And --

[Frank] This wasn't by geography. I'm sure like they're not New York, California, you know, unfortunately.

[Rhonda] Yeah, exactly.

[Frank] They're all over the country in different parts. Yeah. Evolution sometimes doesn't work at a straight line, does it?

[Rhonda] Exactly.

[Frank] But like who else? Toni Morrison said you probably know the quote better, something like, write the book you've always wanted to read or write the book you've always needed.

[Rhonda] Exactly.

[Frank] Like George does it seems to have done. Actually, George Johnson and Michel Houellebecq in conversation would be very interesting.

[Rhonda] That'd be fascinating, yeah, I supposed.

[Frank] Actually, I used to have this fantasy about doing a programming library, which I still want to do, but I mean, it's not unheard of, but putting too very different personalities into just in conversation, two people in conversation.

[Rhonda] Yeah, I've seen --

[Frank] Yeah.

[Rhonda] -- similar thing, like the 92nd Street Y used to do something like that.

[Frank] Yeah.

[Rhonda] That they -- I mean, they didn't have authors, but it would just be kind of like maybe some type of public figure who are very, very different. But like you said, who -- the -- what could come out of these conversations?

[Frank] Yeah. Or like, well, like two people of different professions, like an astronomer and an actress. I mean, I don't know. Like, just to see what that -- what happens there. It could be nothing. Like I guess we talked a bunch of weeks ago about William Buckley and James Baldwin. That's a good example of very different people having a conversation. Well, that was more pointed, but whoa, I think I'm -- The coffee is kicking in. Or it's continuing to kick in.

[Rhonda] I know.

[Frank] Oh, it's always a pleasure. Oh, you have to -- We --

[Rhonda] Oh, right, the book, the next book.

[Frank] Our next book from the 125 Books We Love Lists celebrating New York Public Library's 125th anniversary. And Rhonda and I have decided the next book, which we will discuss on the podcast November 5th is "The Parable of the Sower" by Octavia Butler.

[Rhonda] Yes, exciting.

[Frank] After the election, so that will be interesting.

[Rhonda] Oh, boy. Yeah.

[Frank] I don't know what will be like that day, but we'll see.

[Rhonda] Exactly. Who knows?

[Frank] Oh, so much changing happenings, and doings, and OK.

[Rhonda] I can't really think about it. It's so overwhelming.

[Frank] So lose yourself in a good book, everybody, and that book will be "The Parable of the Sower" by Octavia Butler. It's classic really at this point, and I haven't read it, and I'm excited to. I read "Kindred" by Octavia Butler. I'm interested in reading this.

[Rhonda] Yeah. Great.

[Frank] Any final thoughts, darling.

[Rhonda] Just everyone take care of themselves, and like you said, get lost in a really good book.

[Frank] Yeah.

[Rhonda] That's what we really need right now.

[Frank] I agree with you.

[Rhonda] Yeah.

[Frank] Thanks everybody for listening, and we will see you.

[Rhonda] See you next time.

[Narrator] Thanks for listening to "The Librarian Is In", a podcast by the New York Public Library. Don't forget to subscribe and leave a review on Apple Podcasts or Google Play, or send us an email at podcasts@nypl.org. For more information about the New York Public Library and our 125th anniversary, please visit nypl.org/125. We are produced by Christine Farrell. Your hosts are Frank Collerius and Rhonda Evans.