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Book Review
Dear Genius: The Collected Letters of Ursula Nordstrom
by Leonard S. Marcus
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“Dear Genius: The Collected Letters of Ursula Nordstrom” by Leonard S. Marcus often shows up on handouts of “recommended reads” at conferences for children’s book writers. The book is a fascinating read for anyone interested in how the children's book publishing industry evolved.
Ursula Nordstrom was the editorial director of Harper’s Department of Books for Boys and Girls from 1940-1973. The list of authors under her wing while at Harper’s is nothing less than astounding: Sendak, Margaret Wise Brown, Louise Fitzhugh, and EB White to name a few. She called all her authors “Genius” and wrote to her authors often – hence the title – and perhaps her insight and directed musings to her authors helped to form that foundational library of quality children's books that continues to be held up as our inspiration. We can only strive to achieve something close to what Ursula Nordstrom was able to achieve with her writers.
What, as writers, can we learn from Nordstrom's letters? It is interesting to note that Nordstrom herself was a child of divorce, and was sent to boarding school at a very young age. She is quoted as saying that she wanted to be known as the publisher who "published good books for bad children." This meaning that she wanted her books to reflect real truths that children are exposed to in their lives, with honesty and respect towards the child. This is seen in a letter written to Fitzhugh, regarding "The Long Secret," the first children's book on menstruation. Nordstrom wrote to Fitzhugh saying she "was touched by pages 49-50, but one small thing...the girl picked at 'a hurt place'..." and assumed that Fitzhugh meant to say a scab or something like that. "Euphemisms don't have a place in children's books."
I like to think that all editors aspire to be like Ursula Nordstrom, that they will find, nuture, and promote a generation or two or three of children’s writers who will shape the minds of child readers everywhere. I suppose the reality is that no editor stays on staff at a single publishing house for thirty some odd years these days, but perhaps the spirit of Ursula Nordstrom still exists in the soul of the new, young editor, and they take that spirit with them wherever they go.
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