WEEKEND WORD Turning Over A New Leaf

This is going to be somewhat of a serious post – but it’s something that comes as a result of a lot of soul-searching and talking with other blog friends.

This month it’s National Poetry Month, and we’re all poised to enjoy the beauty and power of poetry – of literature – of words. For a long time, we’ve focused here at Wonderland on finding the joy and playfulness and depth of words through the lens of the young adult world of words, but for a long time, both of us have been struggling to keep up. YA and Children’s Lit is mercurial – a new trend comes along every six minutes, and it’s always something else – the next big new thing to top the charts.

Sometimes reading YA lit feels a lot like being still in high school.

Did you read Joel Stein’s piece in the NY Times? Here is this gorgeous, intelligent person who is embarrassed by adults reading kids’ books. He can’t take people seriously who read The Hunger Games or Twilight. Suddenly, in the eyes of someone younger and on the cusp of his career, we’re seeing ourselves a little differently – maybe in ways we should have been looking at ourselves all along.

Like making clothes for your Barbie that last year of junior high, young adult literature has become a guilty pleasure. But, if we truly believe that there’s power and beauty in words, then it’s the right move to embrace them – as an adult, in an adult sphere. It’s time to reenlist the classics in helping us make sense of the world, and use the full range of our collective minds to embrace the power and potency of literature.

So pardon our dust as we reconfigure and reconstruct and rebrand ourselves into something new. We’ve looked for wonderland long enough. Now we’re finding adulthood, and we welcome you to come along for the ride.

Best,
T&S