“We’ve always looked to her as somebody who could speak out on these issues and be listened to,” says Chris Finan, executive director of the NCAC. It’s important to remember, he says, that all the attacks against her books ultimately failed. Her books became bestsellers. “No one was writing about this stuff at the time. There was this huge demand and thirst for this information.”
“She won that battle which encourages us to believe that these current battles will also be won,” he says, in reference to conservative attacks on books about LGBTQ issues.
Only recently, Blume affirmed her allyship with the trans community. “Anything to the contrary is total bullshit,” she said in a statement following an interview with The Times, which was headlined: Judy Blume: ‘I’m behind JK Rowling 100 per cent’, and had sparked controversy online.
Worthington and Michael think Blume’s books remain so popular in part because the kids who grew up on them now have children and even grandchildren of their own. “If you read a book together with your kid, it’s an opportunity to have conversations and bond and grow closer,” says Michael.
That’s only one factor, though. The books, while rooted in the time they were written, have a timeless quality because the things teenagers worry about are largely the same and few writers understand that the way Blume does. For the podcast, Michael and Worthington have read a lot of what they call “Judy-adjacent” books, but nothing quite matches up. “Judy has this special connection to the inner thoughts of children and teens,” says Michael. “She remembers what it feels like, in a way that I just don’t think a lot of writers can do.”
Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret is in cinemas in the US now, and in the UK from 19 May. Judy Blume Forever is on Amazon Prime Video now.
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