The Higher Power of Scrotums: Book Drives Librarians Nuts!

As a music and film librarian, kids' books are not my area of expertise. Lately, however, controversy has gripped the library world over a kids' book, and like the wreck of a clown car, it's been impossible to look away.

This particular controversy is about the use of a word. A word which, in the opinion of some, utterly negates any value of the story. Although the book, The Higher Power of Lucky, impressed the Newbery Award Committee enough to honor it, this word is making it impossible for some librarians to read the book aloud, to recommend it to children, even to carry it in their collections.

The word is "scrotum."

The first I heard of this was a column in Publisher's Weekly, discussing the fact that certain library Listservs were aflame with this nightmare. I had to re-read the article several times to confirm that the controversy is, in fact, about the actual word "scrotum", and not the use of some other euphemism for the word scrotum more often found on made-for-cable series about cowboys or gangsters. Alas, the controversy really is about the word "scrotum."

"Because of that one word," said a school librarian, "I would not be able to read that book aloud." Some complained that the use of the word was totally unnecessary. Some implied that there were many other choices the author could have used instead.

I like contemplating this plethora of words the author could have used instead of scrotum, which is the anatomically accurate name for a specific body part. None come to mind that are not on that aforementioned list of premium cable euphemisms guaranteed to get your average 10-year-old mouth washed out with soap.

Armchair editing like this drives me bonkers. "The author ought to have used this word instead of that word." "The author used a word that was 'unnecessary,'" as if the selection of words, specific words in a specific order, is not the very definition of what it means to be an author. It's like saying it was unnecessary for Picasso to use so much blue paint. It's ridiculous to argue that an author used a word, any word, "unnecessarily." They used the words that they used.

Article Author: Kati Irons

I am a film and music librarian for a public library system. Like many of my kind, I suffer from RKS, or Random Knowledge Syndrome. These musings are the inevitable end result of that condition.

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