<
https://theconversation.com/luke-bateman-says-boys-need-books-written-for-boys-to-become-readers-but-its-not-that-simple-288602>
"This week,
Australian Story profiled former NRL player, BookTok creator and
fantasy author Luke Bateman. The episode explored his recovery from addiction,
his struggles with mental illness and his love of reading, which led to a
three-book publishing contract after his BookTok account went viral.
“It was not something that men did,” he said, describing how he hid his
childhood love of reading. To address this reading gap, he said, we “want to be
writing more stories that boys want to read”. (Though, he reads books by women,
and a week ago, posted a BookTok video of himself weeping over a romance
novel.)
Bateman’s efforts to encourage boys and men to read is worthy of recognition.
However, his online aesthetics, which include hypermasculine Australian tropes
such as tractors and blue singlets, suggest he appeals to an audience of women
rather than men looking for role models.
Calls like his for more “boy books” are common, and often suggest we need more
books on a narrow range of topics “boys love”, like sport, zombies and science.
But boys actually read more widely before they reach high school, and have been
told over and over what they’re presumed to like. And decades of research shows
that boys (and boy protagonists) have long been overrepresented in children’s
literature.
Calls for “boys’ books” misdiagnose both the problem and its solutions."
Cheers,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
