Where, Oh Where Is Superfudge?
In today's kid books, all the good guys are rich.
by Rachel Shukert
February 4, 2008
So much ink, virtual and literal, has already been spilled analyzing the multi-media phenomenon of Gossip Girl that it seems there is hardly anyone with DSL access who is not intimately acquainted with the highbrow shenanigans of the preposterously named Blair Waldorf, Serena van der Woodsen, and the rest as they romp, snort and sleep their way around the Upper East Side, a fairy tale paradise replete with servants, balls and minor European royalty. Countless news outlets (The New York Times, Gawker) have breathlessly chronicled the filming of the TV series, the comings and goings of its stars, the response to the characters from their real-life counterparts at Nightingale-Bamford and Spence. Cultural critics, from Naomi Wolf to the American Library Association, have also eagerly added their two cents, not to mention concerns, about the series: it glamorizes casual sex, drinking and drug use; it all but eliminates minorities from the social fabric of New York City; it's aspirational without being inspirational.
The publishers themselves rather benignly advertise the series as "Sex and the City for the younger set," but this comparison misses the point (and let's not fool ourselves about the age of the younger set — it's not actual teens who read teen fiction, but middle-schoolers and younger). The Gossip Girl books are not about sex, casual or otherwise. They're not about dating, nor friendship, nor anything you were forced to discuss solemnly in health class. Gossip Girl is about privilege. Or rather, the power of privilege — the doors it opens, the pathways it smoothes. Its message: if you didn't have the sense to be born into money — and old money, at that — you'll spend the rest of your days playing catch-up while the people who did look down on you and laugh.
While there is certainly a bleak truth to this sentiment, the lack of apology with which it is presented in the series, as well as in its legions of copycats and spin-offs — It-Girl, The A-List, The Clique — is startling. Raised as I was, on the principles of inclusiveness and diversity and the inherent fairness of the meritocracy (and yes, I know this betrays me as hopelessly, naively middle-class), it seems downright un-American.
The not-so-faint whiff of superiority has spread even to books intended for children too young (for now) to appreciate the cachet of Gucci Aviatrix bags and Christian Louboutin stilettos.
Young Nancy can't understand why her boring family can't share her passion for fashion and all things upper class.
While there are still plenty of cute picture books about loveable penguins on the shelves of the Barnes & Noble Jr. section, there's also the phenomenon of Fancy Nancy, a series of picture books by Jane O'Connor and Robin Preiss Glasser, now approaching their hundredth week on the New York Times Bestseller List. Glamour-obsessed, status-conscious, and achingly posh young Nancy can't understand why her boring family can't share her passion for fashion and all things upper class — she's frustrated at being misunderstood, stranded in a family of (gasp!) normal people without such lofty aspirations, who seem perfectly content to live average lives devoid of privilege or luxury. There's something charmingly drag queen-y about Fancy Nancy. And her down-to-earth family's insistence on values like commitment, devotion and love cut through her princess-y fussiness, redeeming her and the books. The same can not be said be said of Madonna's (yes, that Madonna's) The English Roses, where the rich main character is bullied by a group of Mean Girls (the "Roses" of the title) for the sin of being prettier, smarter, nicer, and better dressed.
©2008 Rachel Shukert and Nerve Media
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