“Guys Read”

When Jon Scieszka is speaking at a conference, it doesn’t really matter what it’s about – you should go listen. Today he assembled several author/illustrators from his Guys Read anthology to talk about guys and reading in the interest of exploring ways we can work to close the gender gap in reading and scholastic achievement. Erik Kraft talked about his favorite books from childhood, the importance of comics in his development as an artist and reader, and his longtime fear of the wolf in Disney’s Peter and the Wolf story book. Jarrett Krosoczka also talked about how his love of comics as a child led to his interest in writing and illustrating. Timothy Basil Ering talked about how exploring the world and art led to his career in children’s books. And, last, Tony DiTerlizzi talked about the importance of a fifth grade teacher telling him to draw pictures from books for extra credit when he was struggling with longer stories. At the end of the presentation, Scieszka asked the panel questions and then invited questions from attendees.

Several themes ran through the presentation. More than one of the guys talked about the importance of reading and making comics as kids. They also talked about actually making books. Kraft even brought scans of some of his early stories, including “The Curse of the Church.” A couple of the authors talked about loving the Choose Your Own Adventure series. (So did I, incidentally. Why don’t they put them back in print? Kids would sooo read them.) Scieszka talked about the importance of adults recognizing the validity of reading nonfiction, comics, and just generally things that aren’t novels. It’s sad to me that people still need to hear this message, but they really do. Ultimately, as Scieszka also noted, public libraries can be the place that fills gaps and has all the high-interest things that might interest guys and, ideally, any reluctant reader. If you didn’t get to see the session and haven’t spent some time reading about this issue, you should check out the Guys Read web site.