Talk:Young adult literature

Tolkien

No mention of Tolkien in the article. This seems odd, even though The Lord of the Rings is categorised, sometimes, as adult fiction: "Of Tolkien's works, the YA library should have The Hobbit, The Lord of the Rings and The Silmarillion, and also Unfinished Tales - with further material from The Silmarillion". Rwood128 (talk) 18:14, 10 May 2023 (UTC)

Tolkien is not YA nor was his work significant to YA. Dan Bloch (talk) 21:15, 10 May 2023 (UTC)

Not even "The Hobbit?

The Hobbit was nominated for the Carnegie Medal and awarded a prize from the New York Herald Tribune for best juvenile fiction of the year (1938). More recently, the book has been recognized as "Most Important 20th-Century Novel (for Older Readers)" in the Children's Books of the Century poll in Books for Keeps. (from the Wikipedia article The Hobbit)

I did more research and found that HarperCollins markets The Lord of the Rings for ages 9 to adult. And of course it is a sequel to The Hobbit. See also the Boston Public Library's catalogue.

Sorry, I was in a hurry when I wrote this and I missed that citation did say that Tolkien was YA. I think this is still really questionable. The original source of this essay, the "St. James Guide", includes nearly 500 authors, using a very expansive criterion; apparently just that some YA age readers read these books. This is not the criteria that librarians and publishers use. The St. James Guide includes many adult authors (Arthur Conan Doyle, Aldous Huxley, Elie Wiesel, Ayn Rand, Sylvia Plath, etc.) and some middle grade authors. But it is a reliable source by Wikipedia's definition, and it's too much trouble to find sources that contradict it, so carry on.

I would argue that the other sources are WP:SYNTHESIS, but you only need one. Also note, most of the recipients of the Carnegie Medal have been middle grade so this isn't an argument that a book is YA. Dan Bloch (talk) 22:04, 11 May 2023 (UTC)

Thanks again Dan Bloch. I'm continuing to learn while editing here. I'm not a librarian nor high school teacher, so my edits may reveal blindspots in my knowledge.--Rwood128 (talk) 22:21, 11 May 2023 (UTC) I will revise the discussion of The Lord of the Rings.--Rwood128 (talk) 22:26, 11 May 2023 (UTC)

The original definition of YA as realistic has obviously been replaced: what would be one for 2023? --Rwood128 (talk) 18:46, 18 May 2023 (UTC)

It would depend on how sources define it for 2023. Schazjmd (talk) 19:34, 18 May 2023 (UTC)

I know that! – but was hoping that there was someone, with more professional expertise in this field than me, – who could bring forward a good definition for today. Doesn't YA fiction now includes fantasy?

I recently read the ''adult'' novel What Strange Paradise which has a teenage protagonist who helps rescues a nine year old Syrian refugee. It could easily have been marketed as YA. The novel won the 2021 Giller Prize. So, is there no real definition outside the market place? Rwood128 (talk) 20:15, 18 May 2023 (UTC)

Dan Bloch, while I am not an expert in the world of YA, I'm still puzzled by your dismissal of Tolkien's writings. Do we need to add something like: "Though the Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings by J. R. R. Tolkien appeal equally to young children and adults, because they do not deal with the lives of teenagers they are not young adult fiction".Rwood128 (talk) 14:49, 22 May 2023 (UTC)

See also:

The Lord of the Rings has become one of the key books which teachers and librarians recommend to young adults to lead them towards adult literature; but it was not always so. The making of the book was a series of accidents, and, once published, young people insisted on reading it despite the hostility of literary critics and some educationalists, and the then difficulty of obtaining all three instalments in the right order.

This discusses the absence of Tolkien from high school curriculum, further indicating that this matter requires some discussion in the article. Rwood128 (talk) 14:49, 22 May 2023 (UTC)

As I think I said before, I don't consider Tolkien YA because the definition I use is fiction written for 12-18-year-olds. But as I also said, since you've found a reliable source which says that Tolkien is YA (the Tolkien Society essay, or the book it came from), you're free to treat it as YA in this article. You don't need a long disclaimer, something like "Though not written for young adults..." is fine. Dan Bloch (talk) 18:03, 22 May 2023 (UTC)

References

Genre fiction

Hi Dan Bloch, Re your recent deletion, can you explain why YA fiction doesn't fit this definition:

In the publishing industry the term "category fiction" is often used as a synonym for genre fiction, a term used in the book-trade for fictional works written with the intent of fitting into a specific literary genre, in order to appeal to readers and fans already familiar with that genre.

YA is described – and marketed – as category fiction. Wouldn't it have better to have edited, rather than delete, the section? Rwood128 (talk) 15:36, 23 May 2023 (UTC)

No. First, I'm pretty sure YA isn't considered genre fiction. It is a genre, but in a colloquial sense, not a technical publishing sense. As we say in the lead paragraph of the article, "The YA category includes most of the genres found in adult fiction". I would argue that, e.g., YA science fiction is genre fiction, but realistic YA isn't. Second, the section you added said nothing about YA. It was just a definition of genre fiction, apropos of nothing. But third, even if it were motivated, it would be wrong to copy a definition of genre fiction. This isn't the Wikipedia paradigm. You would say, e.g., "YA is an example of genre fiction, and if someone were curious they would click on the link. Any time you find yourself copy/pasting between Wikipedia articles (which I see you've done elsewhere in this one), it should be a red flag. Dan Bloch (talk) 16:47, 23 May 2023 (UTC)

I note you are just "pretty sure" but not certain about this. And I focussed on the idea that YA was a category.

Aren't there genre fiction categories such as YA romance, YA sci/fi, YA fantasy, and more? Personally I dislike this kind of categorizing: there is just good, poor, and bad literature --Rwood128 (talk) 17:21, 23 May 2023 (UTC)

I'm no longer sure what the issue is. If you don't want a detailed discussion of categories and I don't want a description of genre fiction, we should both be happy. Dan Bloch (talk) 19:16, 23 May 2023 (UTC)

I'm sorry if I was unclear. If fantasy is a category of genre fiction then isn't YA fantasy also? – and YA romance, sci/fi, etc.? That is the "genre fiction" section should be restored. --Rwood128 (talk) 20:43, 23 May 2023 (UTC)

Still no. Of the three reasons I gave above, the most important is that we will be wasting the time of anyone who reads that paragraph, since they won't have learned anything about YA. Dan Bloch (talk) 22:51, 23 May 2023 (UTC)

The use of the word genre in connection with YA can be confusing and the early definition from the 1960s does make it sound like a sub-genre. Some of what I said may have been a little confused. However, if "The main genres are crime, fantasy, romance, science fiction and horror—as well as perhaps Western, inspirational and historical fiction," are examples of genre fiction(from the lede of genre fiction), then why aren't YA examples of these genres also genre fiction? In 2016 I thought I knew the answer Talk:Genre fiction#Literature for children and young adults.--Rwood128 (talk) 11:45, 24 May 2023 (UTC)

They are genre fiction. I said that above. If you want to mention this in the article it's not out of the question, but it would need a source, and it's a tiny detail which doesn't add to readers' understanding of YA so I'd recommend against it. But the paragraph I deleted was just about genre fiction and not about YA at all. Dan Bloch (talk) 14:48, 24 May 2023 (UTC)

References

On Harry Potter

Block evasion by User:Dcasey98.
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
I'm taking to the talk page on this. I think people have difficulty placing this series because it evolves significantly over the course of the 7 books. I don't think there is any justification for counting Harry Potter as a "middle grade series" (a la Diary of a Wimpy Kid or Percy Jackson & the Olympians) given the lexile level of the books, their length, the age of the characters, the darker, more violent content, some of the conventions used (like the 7th book's epigraphs from Aeschylus and William Penn) and the very occasional use of language ("slut", "bastard", "bitch") that is not under any circumstance published in titles considered "Middle Grade". I acknowledge the somewhat subjective nature of this debate, but this makes it difficult to cite any one source to properly support either claim - many will say they are Young Adult, some will say Middle Grade, some say that the series progresses from Middle Grade to YA by about book 3 or 4, and the series is often casually referred to as a YA series. The Fantastic Beasts prequel stories to Harry Potter contain adult main characters, World War II imagery, and instances of infanticide. The wizarding world films are mostly PG-13 or 12 rated. The multimedia franchise overall, I'd argue, has complicated this by stretching the appeal and target audience of the franchise and its originating book series significantly. I don't think there is any meaningful argument to support the claim that Harry Potter is Middle Grade beyond "the first book is". I'm happy to revert the page back to where it was before my edits until a consensus is arrived at. Threefrgy (talk) 04:44, 23 September 2023 (UTC) "the very occasional use of language ("slut", "bastard", "bitch")" Your point being? I live close to a kindergarten, and regularly hear the kids using the equivalent Greek words, and others of that type. Dimadick (talk) 07:12, 23 September 2023 (UTC) I’m sure you can make facile excuses as to why any content should be allowable at middle grade just because Harry Potter has it, but publishers don’t publish books as middle grade with that language period. I made a number of other points, too. Threefrgy (talk) 18:51, 23 September 2023 (UTC)

Requested move 13 January 2024

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

The result of the move request was: Procedural close. Withdrawn by nom. – robertsky (talk) 14:59, 16 January 2024 (UTC)

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Young adult fiction → Young-adult literature – We hyphenate adjective phrases on Wikipedia and the scope is "literature" not fiction. For instance, the page includes the "novel" 61 times and the word "film" only once, so it is far and away about a particular type of fiction: written fiction AKA literature. Wolfdog (talk) 19:01, 12 January 2024 (UTC) Wolfdog (talk) 19:01, 12 January 2024 (UTC) This is a contested technical request (permalink). – robertsky (talk) 02:17, 13 January 2024 (UTC)

comment contesting the technical request

@Wolfdog: Addition of a hyphen to the title has been reverted twice: in 2016 and in 2007. Those moves, particularly for the 2007 reason, lead me to believe that this is potentially controversial and should be proposed via a requested-move discussion, which you can open by pressing "discuss" on your request. There was also a 2007 move from "literature" to "fiction". SilverLocust 💬 20:06, 12 January 2024 (UTC)

• Strong oppose - "Young adult" is the name of the literary genre. "Young-adult" is not. It appears virtually nowhere on the web. Dan Bloch (talk) 04:21, 13 January 2024 (UTC)
• Oppose per Dan bloch. This isn't how it's used in practice. Names are just names, they don't have to be "grammatical." See this 2022 Washington Post article for an example which uses "young adult literature" with no hyphen. SnowFire (talk) 15:45, 14 January 2024 (UTC)
  • SnowFire: No one was trying to be particularly grammatical; I was trying to be Wikipedian. Wolfdog (talk) 14:58, 16 January 2024 (UTC)

Hi, all. I've decided, after Robertsky's bringing to light some history, that my actual proposal (which I did not recognize would be controversial at the time and therefore end up in a discussion) is to the name listed below, without a hyphen. Please feel free to close this discussion, however that works. Thanks. Wolfdog (talk) 14:58, 16 January 2024 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Requested move 16 January 2024

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

The result of the move request was: moved. (closed by non-admin page mover) BilledMammal (talk) 01:44, 7 February 2024 (UTC)

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Young adult fiction → Young adult literature – The scope of the article is clearly "literature" not fiction. For instance, the page includes the word "novel" 61 times and the word "film" only once, so it is far and away about a particular type of fiction: written fiction... AKA literature. This is also an important term in the marketing world and education. Ngrams shows the slight preference for my label: thus WP:COMMONNAME. Wolfdog (talk) 14:58, 16 January 2024 (UTC) — Relisting. (t · c) buidhe 17:23, 23 January 2024 (UTC) — Relisting. BilledMammal (talk) 01:12, 31 January 2024 (UTC)

• Oppose A browser search returns three times as many hits for "Young adult fiction" as for "Young adult literature", so evidently "Young adult fiction" is the more common phrase for this genre. Additionally "literature" encompasses more than fiction (for example, non-fiction, poetry, essays), and I have never heard of any such young adult literature.—Anita5192 (talk) 15:29, 16 January 2024 (UTC)

  1) That's why we use ngrams, which encompasses more physically published materials. Try Google Scholar, where there are roughly half the hits for "fiction" as for "literature". 2) We're also talking about the scope of the current article, which is clearly literature. Furthmore, rest assured that there are plenty of young adult non-fiction works, poems, and essays. Do you need me to provide further evidence of those to convince you? Wolfdog (talk) 15:37, 16 January 2024 (UTC)

  Here is Google Ngrams as you mentioned. SilverLocust 💬 21:23, 25 January 2024 (UTC)

Note: WikiProject Children's literature has been notified of this discussion. Vanderwaalforces (talk) 21:16, 16 January 2024 (UTC)

• Support A long overdue move to reflect the scope of the subject -- Robina Fox (talk) 09:37, 17 January 2024 (UTC)
• Support. The ngram count is a wash. Fiction is the more encompassing term, and should be preferred for this. However, most convincingly, in the references, the use of “literature” to “fiction” is 28-15. —SmokeyJoe (talk) 10:31, 28 January 2024 (UTC)
• Support: Doesn’t matter that more people want to see YA fiction; we only have literature, and we shouldn’t oversell it Aaron Liu (talk) 13:28, 6 February 2024 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.