Love in the Library

I read the children's book (based on the author's family history), Love in the Library, about a couple finding love in a Japanese internment camp.  It's a nice story told through the voice of her grandmother, a young woman who found a haven in the midst of injustice.  Well illustrated.  

The author had a chance for wide release via Scholastic publishing but (as was infamously noted in NYT and other outlets) only if she took out a discussion of the racism of the situation in the author's note.  As she bluntly noted on her blog:

And excuse my language, but absolutely the fuck not.

For a moment I wondered if there was a way to edit it so we could agree on it? But then I looked at the proposed edit, the one my offer was contingent upon again. The removal of the word RACISM made it all too clear. There was no compromise to be had here. There was no way to work with this. It was a Faustian Bargain, and I couldn’t take it. And, forgive my weakness, but I cried.

She has an update, where it seems like the company admitted error, but still was trying to CYA and not address what she wanted to promote "restorative" justice.  This included addressing allegations that they were not LGBTQ-friendly (the NYT article suggested they were LGBTQ-friendly) and not doing wrong in the future.  They also didn't want to admit the request was not just basically one person having a bad day.  

They were sketchy about the whole thing. As she noted in a recent comment: 

There is a metaphor I use when I present Love in the Library in schools, and it’s this: Imagine a bully. And one day, they punch you. Later they apologize to you. They say they shouldn’t have done that, that it wasn’t fair. But then the next day you see them punch someone else. And then the next day they kick someone. Each of these incidents are separate, sure, in that whatever the perceived slight on the Bully’s part was may vary. But they are also the same in that the Bully has been cruel to each of you. Would you accept that apology? Would you believe that the Bully meant it if they persist in their behavior? 

So, she says the answer is still "no."  I respect her sense of justice.  I am confused about the line drawing by the company.  I read the book.  She noted before that the company "wanted to take this book and repackage it so that it was just a simple love story."  I'm really unsure how you do that.

The edit of the author's note did not want a total erasure.  You can check and see.  For instance, we are still told that the Japanese were "robbed of their rights and dignity" and "wrongly imprisoned."  The book also is not merely a love story.  The whole book (it's a small picture book) concerns her finding love while trying to maintain her humanity, basically.

How do you do this as merely a love story?  You can vaguely talk about Japanese internment, I guess, so the reader can just think she is handling being imprisoned.  Let's say like that old young adult book about a teen girl meeting a German POW in an American prison camp.  I find this somewhat hard.  The book is not a neutral account.  The author's note is not out of left field here.  The erasure of "racism" seems even more arbitrary.  

An edit of a film for the sake of a rating can be a matter of a cut that seems to some trivial.  A few more seconds of a scene can make it seem more racy or controversial.  But, this is not really what is happening here.  The wrong of Japanese internment remains.  It is a fine line to talk about all of this without making it about racism.  We did not similarly put Germans and Italians in camps, including on the East Coast where Germans possibly could invade (saboteurs even were landed there).  

"Japanese American then was treated like a crime."  Can't just be since they were enemies.  Not "German" American.  The bad conditions, even for "elderly people, children, babies." were cited.  How "unjust" it all was.  How the camp was "built to make people feel like they weren't human."  Yes, the power of books, and love to be a "miracle" is also cited.  

People who read the rest of the note are likely aware of the racism or would be inclined to find out more about the situation.  Censorship again can be arbitrary.  "Racism" is a hot-button issue these days.  On that level, I am not surprised at the line drawing.  It just seems absurd in the context of this book.  If you are concerned about racism being talked about, you should not pick this book.  It is definitely not just a love story.  

The part of the note that the company wanted to be removed put the "racism" of the internment as part of wider racism in the past and modern times, including police murdering Black (her capital letter) people and Muslim bans.  Racism is "an American tradition."  Yes, it's harsh, but again, look at the story itself.  It was harsh too, down to the pictures of barbed wire and soldiers with guns.  Just a love story?  Good luck!  

Perhaps, you rephrase the original paragraph to tone down that talk of the "murder" of black people by police or something.  The note is somewhat more mature ("food deserts" is not something a child will be too familiar with) than the book itself.  The NYT article said that the book "is aimed at 6- to 9-year-olds."  The note seems meant more for parents.  

The book has a point of view. The attempt to remove a discussion of "racism," including the issues of the day, is not in the spirit of the book.  Who are we trying to kid here, anyway? 

Maybe, she can write a new book about a modern-day Japanese author who finds out people want to arbitrarily edit the past. It might be rather interesting.  

ETA: I checked the status of East New York and see they canceled it. Oh well.  I didn't always like it, but even liking a series sometimes is big.  They ended things on a nice note.