Comments on: Everything dates (updated)

By: Justine

Justine — Tue, 03 Oct 2006 20:38:20 +0000

Robib L: Don’t be daft, nothing to apologise for. You called me on being handwaving. I should be called on such things!

By: Robin L

Robin L — Tue, 03 Oct 2006 13:18:59 +0000

And there I was being all literal. Sorry about that.

By: Emmaco

Emmaco — Tue, 03 Oct 2006 07:55:59 +0000

Katie: the sequel has been reprinted, I have a copy from the 90s. I agree that it was a shock to find the horrible eugenics stuff in it! But I think it’s still deserving of publication because the inclusion of eugenics in an otherwise nice and innocuous children’s novel is indicative of the wide acceptance of eugenics at the time. It’s like a piece of historical evidence as well as a book. And this is one of the reasons I like datedness in books – they’re glimpses into their time as well as stories!

By: Justine

Justine — Tue, 03 Oct 2006 05:02:10 +0000

Robin L: Six months was just me being handwaving. I have no idea what the real average is. I imagine it’d be pretty hard to figure that out. There are category romances that are pretty much out of print within a matter of weeks. My impression is that adult novels seem to go out of print much faster than young adult’s and children’s books.

Katie: Indeed, the datedness becomes part of the pleasure of the text!

By: Katie

Katie — Mon, 02 Oct 2006 23:23:17 +0000

Lots of ways to be dated:
I still love Jean Webster’s Daddy Longlegs, very dated, in language and many other ways, but still also very fun, even though the movie does have some good stuff going for it, in its own way better too.

But it was so sad to find the sequel, in Project Gutenberg, full of painful eugenics awfulness. There was some good stuff, but you could see why no one would reprint it now. And properly so.

But being dated — sometimes that’s actually the most fun element — even sometimes quite recently. Rueful, laughing, sometimes just shows how silly it all is.

By: Robin L

Robin L — Mon, 02 Oct 2006 19:42:03 +0000

Six MONTHS!!! Wow, I hadn’t heard that. I’d always thought books had at least a year.

By: Little Willow

Little Willow — Mon, 02 Oct 2006 18:48:14 +0000

You cited one of my favorite films. Have I told you lately that you have great taste?

I dislike books that attempt to be super trendy by dropping celebrity names every five seconds and telling readers the brand names of every article of clothing on every character’s body as well as the make, model and colour of their phones.

The Creek by Jennifer L. Holm is one of my favorite recommendations for teens that takes place during the summer but never states a year – nor does it ever need to – It is amazing.