A literary legacy

Readers who grew up in the 1970s and ’80s will remember Judy Blume as the acclaimed American children’s author whose fiction offered a frank approach to taboo subjects such as menstruation, divorce, wet dreams and teenage sex. Blume’s books not only changed the face of middle-grade and teen literature, they also sold more than 90 million copies in 32 languages in the past five decades. Now 88, Blume is the subject of Mark Oppenheimer’s thought-provoking, well-researched biography.

A longtime Blume aficionado, Oppenheimer previously wrote five non-fiction books. He has a PhD from Yale in religious studies and lives in Connecticut.

Oppenheimer’s succinct, lucid narrative consists of 31 chapters. The opening pages deal with Blume’s early life. Born Judith Maria Sussman in 1938, she grew up in a Jewish middle-class family in Elizabeth, N.J., moving with her family to Miami for two years because of her older brother’s illness before returning to New Jersey.

The next several chapters follow Blume’s first marriage in 1959, at age 21, through motherhood in 1961 and her early stabs at finding her creative footing. After a few false starts in drawing, felt art and songwriting, she finally took a night course in children’s writing in 1967 — and then, for two years, collected rejection slips.

The middle section of the book, covering 1969 to 1974, traces Blume’s meteoric path to publication. Halfway through the decade, she’d written 10 books in four years, and was averaging 2,000 pieces of fan mail every month.

During the decade or so afterwards, Blume left her first husband, John Blume, then endured a flailing second marriage to Thomas Kitchens. Eventually she found bliss in her third marriage, to George Cooper, and took more literary risks, penning more children’s books, two adult novels and a book of fan letters with her responses.

The final chapters chronicle new developments between 1988 and 2014 including Blume’s advocacy work, potential adaptations, health issues, a new novel and a bookstore purchase.

One fascinating quality of Blume is her lively imagination. Her 1972 children’s book Tale of a Fourth Grade Nothing is a prime example. A comic story about an annoying little brother nicknamed Fudge, the inspiration came to her from a newspaper article about a toddler who swallowed a pet turtle. Fudge so endeared readers that they requested more books about him; Blume obliged with three sequels.

Another humorous book is her 1970 young adult novel Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret. Blume was inspired to write it to honestly represent the precariousness of early puberty by including breast development, periods and religious identity in the plot. While it’s one of her most popular books, it’s also the most banned — something Oppenheimer discusses in the context of Blume, librarians and parents.

He also delves into autobiographical elements present in Blume’s books, such as the heroine in the 1977 children’s book Starring Sally J. Freedman as Herself, who also moves to Miami because of her brother’s illness. In another instance, the 2015 adult novel In the Unlikely Event revisits three historic disasters in Blume’s hometown.

This thorough biography will appeal to Blume fans and contribute to the canon of writing about her.

Bev Sandell Greenberg is a Winnipeg writer and editor.