Tracing the Career of Tween-Lit Doyenne Judy Blume

After 44 years, Judy Blume’s first feature-film adaptation, Tiger Eyes, arrives next week. In honor of that, we present below the tales of a fourth-graders’ superstar.

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Biography

1958

Twenty-year-old Judith Sussman, daughter of a New Jersey dentist, arrives at NYU to study education. She meets John Blume, a law student. They marry the next year.

1961

Graduates from NYU, already pregnant, and moves to Scotch Plains, New Jersey. Quickly tires of that life: “It was a nice marriage, but I was dying.� Hangs her diploma over the washing machine.

1966

Signs up for a writing class with children’s author and editor Jane Lee Wyndham.

1969

First book published: The One in the Middle Is the Green Kangaroo. “When I started to write,� she says later, “my husband thought it was very cute … but what I was doing was not a joke.�

1970

Two more books for middle-school kids: Iggie’s House, about race politics, and Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret, all bras and first periods and pubertal travails, including the exercise chant “We must—we must—we must increase our bust!� The Times raves, and she faces her first boycott—from her own kids’ principal. But, she says, “It was uppermost in my mind when I was a kid: the need to know, and not knowing how to find out.�

1971

Publishes Then Again, Maybe I Won’t, a male coming-of-age story full of awkward erections and wet dreams.

1972

Recurring character Fudge makes his debut in Tales of a Fourth Grade Nothing. It’s Not the End of the World (divorce seen through the eyes of a sixth-grader) is dedicated to her husband, John.

1973–1974

Publishes Deenie and Blubber, two of her most banned and contested books. “One girl wrote to me about Deenie: ‘If there is something bad in this book, could you explain it to me—because I don’t know what it is!’�

1975

Divorces John, saying, “I wanted to go to Woodstock. I wanted to be active in the women’s movement and the sexual revolution.� Publishes Forever …: the big one, about a girl losing her virginity.

1976

Marries again (to a physicist); moves to Los Alamos, New Mexico, with her children. The couple divorces two years later.

1977

A different, semi-autobiographical book: Starring Sally J. Freedman As Herself, about a 10-year-old who uses fantasy to escape her fears. Blume offers that Sally “explains how and even why I became a writer.�

1978

First novel for grown-ups: Wifey, about STDs and swinging. Blume appears in People in a lacy teddy, under the headline THE JACQUELINE SUSANN OF KIDS’ BOOKS GROWS UP.

1978

Forever … is made into an issue-of-the-week TV movie on CBS.

1980

The Reagan era arrives, bearing angry conservatives. In Missouri, a family tears up its library cards to protest the presence of Forever …. Blubber is pulled from school libraries in Maryland and Arizona. Jerry Falwell signs a letter on behalf of the Moral Majority opposing books like hers. Blume’s personal life, however, is picking up: After she’s set up with George Cooper, a law professor, by a friend (with some help from Cooper’s daughter), they move in together after two dates, and marry in 1987.

1981

Just before the publication of Tiger Eyes, her editor advises her to cut a masturbation scene. She puts up a fight, then agrees—the only time, she says, that she’s voluntarily censored herself.

1983

Smart Women, her second adult novel (about a love triangle among friends), is panned by critics, including Michiko Kakutani: “Her characters’ penchant for psychobabble makes the reader feel as though he were paging through the latest self-help text.�

1995

Has a hysterectomy following a cervical-cancer diagnosis, which she doesn’t discuss for more than a decade. Fudge, the TV series, premieres, running for two seasons. “They wouldn’t let me anywhere near it,� says Blume later. “It was terrible … a degrading, humiliating experience.�

1998

Summer Sisters, dealing with lesbian experiences, becomes a best seller.

2009

At a testimonial dinner, the activist and comedian Paul Mooney jokes: “I’m very honored and privileged to be here for Judy because I’ve never seen people hate a white woman the way they hate her.� The crowd gets into a fist-pumping chant of “We must—we must—we must increase our bust!“

2012

Announces via blog that she’s had a mastectomy and reconstruction for breast cancer. “I have small breasts … ‘A-cups?’ the breast surgeon asked at our first meeting. She nailed it. I told her the exercises didn’t work for me. Not sure she got my attempt at a joke.�

June 7, 2013

Tiger Eyes, her first feature-film adaptation, will be released, directed by her son, Lawrence. And a new book is in its first draft.

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Fun Facts

• One bookstore misfiled Are You There God It’s Me, Margaret in the bible section.
• Is a passionate tap enthusiast. Once danced with Mandy Patikin.
• Has a girl crust on Zooey Deschanel: “I’m going to say it—she’s adorable.�
• After ‘Forever …’—in which the male character names his penis “Ralph�—was published, she got a letter: “Dear Ms. Blume, On behalf of all boys named Ralph … how could you do this to us?�
• Daughter Randy, a former airline pilot, wrote a novel called Crazy in the Cockpit: A Woman Pilot’s Adventures in the Air.
• She’s rejected offers to license jeans, toys, and bras.

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Notable Quotes

On why she wrote for children early on

“I was a child … I had no experience as an adult.�

On requests to write a sequel to Are You There God? with a menopausal Margaret

“I don’t think so … to me, Margaret will always be 12.�

“I can imagine next year’s headline: GOODNIGHT MOON BANNED FOR ENCOURAGING CHILDREN TO COMMUNICATE WITH FURNITURE. And we all know where that can lead, don’t we?�

“My own adolescent rebellion came late, somewhere around the age of 35. I don’t recommend waiting till then. Better to drag your parents through it than your kids.�

Sample tweet

“Good things about turning 75. Don’t have to take off shoes at airport security. Don’t have to submit to body scanner. Woot!�

From 2008

“I love men, apart from one: George Bush.�

On her hate mail

“Perhaps most shocking of all was a letter from a 9-year-old, addressed to Jewdy Blume, telling me I had no right to write about Jewish angels in Starring Sally J. Freedman As Herself.�

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Which Book for Which Age?

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A History of Outrage

Protesters have steadily tried (and usually failed) to have Blume’s books pulled from libraries and schools. Selections from three decades of their “justifications.�

Blubber

XENIA, OHIO, 1983
“Undermines authority since the word ‘bitch’ is used in connection with a teacher.�

MUSKEGO, WISCONSIN, 1986
“The characters curse, and the leader of the taunting [of an overweight girl] is never punished for her cruelty.�

PERRY TOWNSHIP, OHIO, 1991
“Bad is never punished. Good never comes to the fore. Evil is triumphant.�

Then Again, Maybe I Won’t

ST. TAMMANY PARISH, LOUISIANA, 1984“[Its] treatment of immorality and voyeurism do not provide for the growth of desirable attitudes.�

TYRONE, PENNSYLVANIA, 1990
Challenged at an elementary-school library because it explains how to drink whiskey, vodka, and gin.

Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret

XENIA, OHIO, 1983
“Is built around just two themes: sex and anti-Christian behavior.�

UTAH STATE LIBRARY BOOKMOBILE, 1980“The vilest sexual descriptions … [If given to] the wrong kid at the wrong time[, it would] ruin his life.�

Deenie

UTAH STATE LIBRARY BOOKMOBILE, 1980
“The vilest sexual descriptions … [If given to] the wrong kid at the wrong time[, it would] ruin his life.�

Forever …

GREEN BAY, WISCONSIN, 1983
“It demoralizes marital sex.�

CEDAR RAPIDS, IOWA, 1984
“Pornography … [it] explores areas God didn’t intend to explore outside of marriage.�

CAMPBELL COUNTY, WYOMING, 1986
Would encourage readers “to experiment with sexual encounters.�

SCHAUMBURG, ILLINOIS, 1993
“It’s basically a sexual ‘how-to-do’ book for junior high students … it puts ideas in their heads.�

MEDIAPOLIS, IOWA, 1994
“Does not promote abstinence and monogamous relationships [and] lacks any aesthetic, literary, or social value.�

ELIOT, MAINE, 1987
“Cast of sex-minded teenagers is not typical of high schoolers today.�

FROM THE AMERICAN LIBRARY ASSOCIATION’S BANNED BOOKS RESOURCE GUIDE (2010 EDITION).

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Title Copycats

• Are You There, Vodka? It’s Me, Chelsea, by Chelsea Handler (2008)
• Are You There God? It’s Me, Monica: How Nice Girls Got Casual About Oral Sex, by Caitlin Flanagan (in The Atlantic, 2006)
• Are You There, Blog? It’s Me, Writer, by Kristen Lamb (2011)
• Are You There God? It’s Me, Mary: The Shangri-Las And the Punk Rock Love Song, by Tracy Landecker (2012)
• Dialogue from “Are You There God? It’s me, Jesus,� South Park’s 1999 year-end episode: “Are you there God? It’s me, Stan. If you wouldn’t mind, I don’t want to be the only kid who doesn’t get his period before the New Year.�