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A wise and cute chronic by Julian Fuks
On the vast world of children, and its example of lightness and freedom
Julian Fuks
Columnist of Ecoa
13/04/2024 04h00
It is called Turtle, a perhaps ironic name, given its impressive speed. Last Monday marked its foundation: the three girls stole out of the usual break and gathered in a recondite room, deliberating the creation of the publishing house. Tulip would be the author, Barbara, the illustrator, Iolanda, the editorial director. As this was not a bureaucratic act, but an artistic one, there they already conceived two or three dozen titles and some thematic trilogies. It was mentioned that "The secret library" was the pioneering work. To point out the uniqueness of the experience. Iolanda's grandfather would build wooden shelves to accommodate the entire collection.
In this first catalog draws attention the repetition of characters whose life contradicts their supposed essence, who are forced to deal with a counterfeit identity, an unresolved vocation. "The toothless tiger", "The fish that didn't know how to swim", "The teacher who didn't know how to count", or "The giraffe Lili", the story of a giraffe with a too short neck, accused by her friends of not being a giraffe at all. "How to make friends with a beast" is a title in the collection that may help to understand these hardships and setbacks of existence. "The giant who wanted to be kind" Tulipa promised that she would dedicate it to me, and I tried to smile with utmost kindness.
In the recess of Tuesday, the publisher was no longer so secluded, and public information ended up raising the first criticism of the enterprise. As the approaching classmates tended to be repulsed by the founding team, a just slander inevitably spread. There were those who accused the Turtle of exclusivism, closed in their conspiracy and cronyism. There were those who judged the publisher not very open to the more radical and heterodox new voices of Brazilian children's literature. It is possible that something of this harsh experience will be recorded in a diptych of more recent books: "School is such a fun!" and " School is so tiring!"
Nothing, however, cooled the momentum of the girls, whose life had come to have as its core the unbridled making of — books, something quite surprising, if we consider that they do not exceed six or seven years and have just learned the most rudimentary writing tools. Their characters face their own limits, face the setbacks of life, but are supposed to overcome them with dexterity and some haughtiness. "Girls can be everything" says one of the catalog's most resolute and feminist titles, a title that has been complemented by another, "Boys can be everything", perhaps in anticipation of the criticism they might receive from a conservative audience.
On Wednesday, a decisive event took place. Absent mindedly making the books, once again they neglected the secrecy and did not notice the approach of an authority in the middle of the playground. The teacher was enthusiastic about the project, and they were enthusiastic about the enthusiasm of others, only then discovering that they did something worthy of praise. The project was taken into the classroom and presented to everyone, becoming the next homework: each student should choose a title from the vast collection and write his/her version of the story. The reduced authorial team, then, of a publisher that someone would call artisanal, started to be composed of a few dozen authors and authoresses.
On Thursday, another unexpected move. Early critics, unhappy with the official character the company was beginning to gain, protested against such favoritism, warning that they too had created a publishing house a few days ago. As usual, literary subjects acquired a bellicose tone, submitted to the typical skirmishes of the publishing market. With the arbitration of the teacher, therefore, a difficult fusion was carried out, and so emerged in the school a new company of unthinkable proportions, which already has in its catalog more than a hundred books, and will require from Iolanda's grandfather an additional effort. Today it can be said, without much exaggeration, that the Turtle is an editorial conglomerate.
Inert, silent, closed in my office, I reflect on the busy week of my daughter and let out in the air a sigh of admiration, which in its last moment dissolves itself into a breath of lament. Since Monday all I did was to fight a battle against a single sentence, the opening of a chapter that I do not know if I want reflective or direct, tortuous, or concise. Doubt has consumed every one of my gestures, and literature has become a sober and senseless thing, a strange form of engineering that builds nothing.
I look at Tulipa, excited by her unstoppable creations, taken by her ambitious project, and realize how much I lack her lightness, her innocence, her freedom. I want to learn how to play with it, I want writing to be in me this full-blown fun, this speedy conquest of the world, this continuous revelation of the unexpected. "My life changed when you were born" I read in one of the Turtle titles that Tulip intends to dedicate to her sister. My life has changed a lot, I must agree, and I am sure, and I hope, that under her influence much will still change. (Google translator+ some light editing).
www.uol.com.br
On the vast world of children, and its example of lightness and freedom
Julian Fuks
Columnist of Ecoa
13/04/2024 04h00
It is called Turtle, a perhaps ironic name, given its impressive speed. Last Monday marked its foundation: the three girls stole out of the usual break and gathered in a recondite room, deliberating the creation of the publishing house. Tulip would be the author, Barbara, the illustrator, Iolanda, the editorial director. As this was not a bureaucratic act, but an artistic one, there they already conceived two or three dozen titles and some thematic trilogies. It was mentioned that "The secret library" was the pioneering work. To point out the uniqueness of the experience. Iolanda's grandfather would build wooden shelves to accommodate the entire collection.
In this first catalog draws attention the repetition of characters whose life contradicts their supposed essence, who are forced to deal with a counterfeit identity, an unresolved vocation. "The toothless tiger", "The fish that didn't know how to swim", "The teacher who didn't know how to count", or "The giraffe Lili", the story of a giraffe with a too short neck, accused by her friends of not being a giraffe at all. "How to make friends with a beast" is a title in the collection that may help to understand these hardships and setbacks of existence. "The giant who wanted to be kind" Tulipa promised that she would dedicate it to me, and I tried to smile with utmost kindness.
In the recess of Tuesday, the publisher was no longer so secluded, and public information ended up raising the first criticism of the enterprise. As the approaching classmates tended to be repulsed by the founding team, a just slander inevitably spread. There were those who accused the Turtle of exclusivism, closed in their conspiracy and cronyism. There were those who judged the publisher not very open to the more radical and heterodox new voices of Brazilian children's literature. It is possible that something of this harsh experience will be recorded in a diptych of more recent books: "School is such a fun!" and " School is so tiring!"
Nothing, however, cooled the momentum of the girls, whose life had come to have as its core the unbridled making of — books, something quite surprising, if we consider that they do not exceed six or seven years and have just learned the most rudimentary writing tools. Their characters face their own limits, face the setbacks of life, but are supposed to overcome them with dexterity and some haughtiness. "Girls can be everything" says one of the catalog's most resolute and feminist titles, a title that has been complemented by another, "Boys can be everything", perhaps in anticipation of the criticism they might receive from a conservative audience.
On Wednesday, a decisive event took place. Absent mindedly making the books, once again they neglected the secrecy and did not notice the approach of an authority in the middle of the playground. The teacher was enthusiastic about the project, and they were enthusiastic about the enthusiasm of others, only then discovering that they did something worthy of praise. The project was taken into the classroom and presented to everyone, becoming the next homework: each student should choose a title from the vast collection and write his/her version of the story. The reduced authorial team, then, of a publisher that someone would call artisanal, started to be composed of a few dozen authors and authoresses.
On Thursday, another unexpected move. Early critics, unhappy with the official character the company was beginning to gain, protested against such favoritism, warning that they too had created a publishing house a few days ago. As usual, literary subjects acquired a bellicose tone, submitted to the typical skirmishes of the publishing market. With the arbitration of the teacher, therefore, a difficult fusion was carried out, and so emerged in the school a new company of unthinkable proportions, which already has in its catalog more than a hundred books, and will require from Iolanda's grandfather an additional effort. Today it can be said, without much exaggeration, that the Turtle is an editorial conglomerate.
Inert, silent, closed in my office, I reflect on the busy week of my daughter and let out in the air a sigh of admiration, which in its last moment dissolves itself into a breath of lament. Since Monday all I did was to fight a battle against a single sentence, the opening of a chapter that I do not know if I want reflective or direct, tortuous, or concise. Doubt has consumed every one of my gestures, and literature has become a sober and senseless thing, a strange form of engineering that builds nothing.
I look at Tulipa, excited by her unstoppable creations, taken by her ambitious project, and realize how much I lack her lightness, her innocence, her freedom. I want to learn how to play with it, I want writing to be in me this full-blown fun, this speedy conquest of the world, this continuous revelation of the unexpected. "My life changed when you were born" I read in one of the Turtle titles that Tulip intends to dedicate to her sister. My life has changed a lot, I must agree, and I am sure, and I hope, that under her influence much will still change. (Google translator+ some light editing).
Julián Fuks: Sobre o vasto mundo das crianças, e seu exemplo de leveza e liberdade
Chama-se Tartaruga, nome porventura irônico, dada sua velocidade impressionante. Na última segunda deu-se sua fundação: as três meninas se furtaram ao recreio costumeiro e se reuniram numa sala recôndita, deliberando a criação da editora. Tulipa seria
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