tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26654079.post5026635474912589983..comments2023-05-21T14:46:54.138+01:00Comments on FictionBitch: It's Just a Middle-Class Money Thing...Elizabeth Baineshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17193751871434773972noreply@blogger.comBlogger4125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26654079.post-3968013292495346492008-06-19T00:51:00.000+01:002008-06-19T00:51:00.000+01:00Huh!(Hi Pants xx)Huh!<BR/><BR/>(Hi Pants xx)Elizabeth Baineshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17193751871434773972noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26654079.post-18213681409056678642008-06-19T00:37:00.000+01:002008-06-19T00:37:00.000+01:00HI FBI think there are still libraries that prohib...HI FB<BR/><BR/>I think there are still libraries that prohibit the borrowing of books from the adult shelves with a Junior library card. No Austen or Dickens for you then Junior.<BR/><BR/>xxx<BR/><BR/>PantsPantshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00712642194215828800noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26654079.post-19246136188518535052008-06-17T21:59:00.000+01:002008-06-17T21:59:00.000+01:00Hi, thanks for this. I did think after I'd written...Hi, thanks for this. I did think after I'd written 'his' that maybe that was way off the mark, and wondered why I'd done it... (there's a whole essay there. of course!). I have been thinking about this - the point you make about the people on the cusp - and I do agree with you on that. I just worry about the kids on either side. I agree with the campaigners that book-oriented kids are more likely to be put off than switched on (and that they have more say on the books they read than people generally seem to be assuming - this assumption in itself makes me see red and seems a total underestimation of kids' intellectual autonomy). Also important to me as a writer is the issue of categorizing books and fencing off their possibilities by this kind of over-targeted marketing. As for the kids at the other end of the spectrum: well, yes this is what's really exercising me: I too have taught kids who have been sleeping on the top of their granny's sideboard because their dad has run off to England (from Scotland) to avoid the police and their mum's just alcoholic and out of it etc, and it's the ignorance or dismissal in this debate of the existence of this (large)sector of society - which is probably in greatest need of the redemption which books and reading can provide - which has had me, quite frankly, fuming.Elizabeth Baineshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17193751871434773972noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26654079.post-11696674535521270572008-06-17T21:31:00.000+01:002008-06-17T21:31:00.000+01:00Hello, thanks for the postiive comments about my p...Hello, thanks for the postiive comments about my post even though you didn't agree with me. It is 'her' conslusion by the way not 'his' though I appreciate this is not overly apparent on the blog. Just to clarify, I don't anticipate most, many, or even a sizable minority of parents of the kids I used to teach will go and buy books. Parts of the UK are really quite Dickensian and actually many of the kids don't have parents (ie live with grandparents, older siblings, boyfriends even though under age, foster parents and children's homes, and worse). But I do think there is a graduation, not a sudden stop, between those who would never think of buying books, and those who can't stop themselves. It is those on the cusp who would be most helped by some kind of age banding, and when you think of the educationally deprived lives here, even if it is only a few thousand people across the country who might take the opportunity offered, I think it is worth the doing. None of which is to say I don't share some of the reservations mentioned by you and others on the No side, but I have been frighened by the lack of understanding of "how the other half read" by our literary great and good.Juxtabookhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17102279698993288454noreply@blogger.com