Tole
asked
Brendan Halpin:
I really like your books because (apart from great style) you seem to write about a bunch of important issues, (mental health, queerness etc). Do you choose these things because you want to make statements about them, or are they just where you stories go? And how do you make sure you stay representative of marginalised groups you aren't necessarily a part of?
Brendan Halpin
Thanks so much! I really appreciate your compliment and your questions!
I really just write the stories I'm interested in telling. There's a pretty common idea out there that YA fiction has a responsibility to be didactic, but I think this seriously underestimates the critical thinking ability of teenagers. Teenagers are sophisticated consumers of all kinds of media, and they know (and typically reject) when they're being preached at. They can also distinguish problematic or inaccurate portrayals. So I'm pretty strongly against the idea of writing in order to send a message.
Having said that, one of the things I always try to write into my fiction is the importance of empathy, but I think this is more me atoning for being kind of a dick in high school than trying to teach anything to my readers.
As far as writing marginalized groups that I'm not a part of, I mean, you can never really be completely sure that you're portraying someone else's experience accurately. I get a lot from knowing a wide variety of people- I think it's easier for me to write about different kinds of people because I know different kinds of people. The rest is pretty much just empathy--imagining, okay, if this were my situation, how would it affect me?
I really just write the stories I'm interested in telling. There's a pretty common idea out there that YA fiction has a responsibility to be didactic, but I think this seriously underestimates the critical thinking ability of teenagers. Teenagers are sophisticated consumers of all kinds of media, and they know (and typically reject) when they're being preached at. They can also distinguish problematic or inaccurate portrayals. So I'm pretty strongly against the idea of writing in order to send a message.
Having said that, one of the things I always try to write into my fiction is the importance of empathy, but I think this is more me atoning for being kind of a dick in high school than trying to teach anything to my readers.
As far as writing marginalized groups that I'm not a part of, I mean, you can never really be completely sure that you're portraying someone else's experience accurately. I get a lot from knowing a wide variety of people- I think it's easier for me to write about different kinds of people because I know different kinds of people. The rest is pretty much just empathy--imagining, okay, if this were my situation, how would it affect me?
More Answered Questions
Alona Bagley
asked
Brendan Halpin:
My favorite is Donorboy because of how simple it is, told entirely in transcripts, journal entries, messages, emails; all sorts of points of views, but never really any point of view at all. Just what the people in the story thought was important enough to write down, to save, to remember. Many things are only shown by the beginning and the end. I love it. But I was wondering, was it ever hard to write like that?
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