Today we continue the series in
which award-winning nonfiction authors discuss the joys and challenges of
writing narrative nonfiction
and expository nonfiction with an essay by Cynthia Levinson.
Thank you, Cynthia.
Although I’m sure Melissa didn’t intend to
cause me angst, pondering her question “Why do you write narrative nonfiction?”
has led to something of an author’s identity crisis. Why do I do what I
do? (At least, some of the time, since I also write both expository nonfiction
and historical fiction.)
My first thought was that I write narrative
nonfiction because it’s hard. Getting every detail accurate while also telling
a compelling story is challenging.
—No
made-up dialogue allowed! (That’s why I record and carefully transcribe
interviews with my subjects and people who know them, why I watch videos of
them, why I read and cross-verify dozens of secondary sources.)
—No
guessing about the weather on a particular day! (Weather Underground is invaluable for
whether it was sunny or stormy when, say, Hillary Rodham graduated from
Wellesley College).
—No
assuming what my subjects wore to an event! (Thank you, Library
of Congress,
Birmingham Civil Rights Institute, and multiple other photography
archives, not to mention friends and family members of my subjects).
—No
imagining how a certain hymn sounds in a particular church! (Bless you, Folkways Records).
—To
capture the right verbs, I even try some of the derring-do my subjects do. This
might explain why the Literacy and Social Responsibility SIG of the
International Literacy Association commented that I did a “ridiculous amount of
research” when it awarded me its Social Justice Award for Watch Out for Flying
Kids.
But, then, I realized that ALL nonfiction
writers do a ridiculous amount of research to avoid making things up. Just look
at any of Melissa’s books. Yes, sculpting the facts into a storyline with an
arc of rising tension, a crisis, and a resolution—picking and choosing,
weighting and deleting them—is taxing. But every good nonfiction book relies on
a deliberate structure to work well.
Then, I thought that maybe I write narratively
because I want to understand my subjects’ motivations. What propels them
to do what they do? As I wrote in We’ve Got a Job, “What kind of
nine-year-old volunteers to go to jail? And what kind of parent would make sure
she gets there?” Delving into the religious faith of civil rights activists—by
going to church with them, listening to their testimony—gave me deep and
gratifying insights into the source of their courage and confidence.
Still, at the basis of every nonfiction
writer’s search is the question, “Why?” The title alone of Melissa’s expository
nonfiction book No Monkeys, No Chocolate conveys the cause-and-effects
relationships within an ecosystem. So, again, narrative as a means to communicate
motivations seems neither special nor necessary.
Okay, if my personal, internal preference
doesn’t explain my approach, maybe I do it for external reasons. Perhaps I write
narratives because my readers like stories. How we ended up with the Electoral
College as a way to elect our president, for instance, makes for some riveting—and
appalling—reading in Fault Lines in the
Constitution.
While I hope young readers do enjoy my writing, however, as Melissa, Jennifer
Swanson, and I indicated in an article we wrote for Publishers Weekly
called “Hey, Grownups! Kids
Really Do Like Nonfiction,”
different students like different kinds of writing. Some prefer active or
browseable. Some like all kinds of nonfiction. In other words, I can’t blame my
audience for my own predilections.
One more stab into authorial self-reflection: I
tend to write about topics that relate to social justice—civil rights,
immigration, equal education, for instance. Having a protagonist whom readers
can visualize and with whom they can identify throughout a storyline can help
them feel the weight of discrimination and the joy of ultimate triumph. Personalizing
an issue connects subject and reader emotionally.
Yet, young people feel outrage about all sorts
of issues—the environment, for example—simply by reading expository newspaper
articles. They don’t need a named victim to get indignant about injustice.
So, where does that leave me? Above, I
mentioned that I also write expository nonfiction and historical fiction. How
do I decide which genre to use with any given topic? I don’t necessarily know
until/unless, after I’ve floundered for a year or three, an editor says, “I’ll
take that one.” At that point, I realize that I finally heard what the
manuscript wanted itself to be. I’m coming to the conclusion that, although I
identify myself as a writer, I’m less in control than I might like to think.
Cynthia Levinson writes (mostly)
nonfiction for young readers, ages five and up. Her books have won a variety of
awards, including the Carter G. Woodson Award, the Jane Addams Book Award, the
Crystal Kite, a Golden Kite and Orbis Pictus Honors, and a finalist for the
NAACP Image Award, among others. Her most recent book is The People’s
Painter: How Ben Shahn Fought for Justice with Art, which has received five
starred reviews.
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3 Responses
I love this insight so much!
Thanks, Cynthia, for your insights and the books you create.
Cynthia is brilliant…and yeah, that is a huge amount of hands-on research! 😀