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Cathy Camper
186 Plays5 years ago
Cathy Camper is the author of Lowriders in Space, Lowriders to the Center of the Earth and Lowriders Blast from the Past, with a fourth volume in the works, Lowriders to the Rescue, all from Chronicle Books. She has a forthcoming picture book, Ten Ways to Hear Snow (Dial/Penguin), release October 13, 2020, and also wrote Bugs Before Time: Prehistoric Insects and Their Relatives (Simon & Schuster). Her zines include Sugar Needle and The Lou Reeder, and she’s a founding member of the Portland Women of Color zine collective.
A graduate of VONA/Voices writing workshops for people of color in Berkeley, California, Cathy worked as a librarian in Portland, Oregon, where she did outreach to schools and kids in grades K-12.
https://cathycamper.com/media/
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Transcript
Introduction and Kathy's Background
00:00:00
Speaker
You are listening to something rather than nothing creator and host Ken Volante editor and producer Peter Bauer This is Ken Volante with the something rather than nothing podcast and this episode we have a Kathy camper and I
00:00:28
Speaker
just really enjoy Kathy's work. She's written a few books. She's also a librarian, but her books are called Low Riders in Space, Low Riders to the Center of the Earth, Low Riders Blast from the Past, and I'm going to be excited to hear about her new book, 10 Ways to Hear Snow, which is going to come out in October.
Childhood Influences and Creativity
00:00:52
Speaker
So I'm looking forward to a great conversation with Kathy Camper,
00:00:57
Speaker
wanted to welcome you to the show, Kathy. Hi, it's great to be here. I'm honored. Thanks so much. We start off with
00:01:09
Speaker
What were you like as a young child? Were you always into books, into art, reading? What were you like? I was. I was. I grew up in Madison, Wisconsin, so you'll notice I have a slight Midwestern accent that comes out. But
00:01:27
Speaker
My parents and my family always encouraged reading and I loved, you know, the library always seemed like a treasure to go to the public library. So it's not a surprise that I ended up working as a librarian. And I think that I was lucky that I had parents that encouraged us to draw and to write as a fun thing, not just as something to do for school. Yeah, that's great to
Inspiration from Lowrider Culture
00:01:55
Speaker
hear. I thankfully
00:01:58
Speaker
Talk to a lot of my guests in here that a lot, a lot of times the the fuel of their creativity. It can be a reaction to authority, but you know parents, a lot of times help encourage you know the the art and obviously it creates a different dynamic, whether it's
00:02:17
Speaker
whether it's viewed as a spurious activity or something. Right. Well, I agree with you. I was reading something where authors talked about it was a question like what inspires you to write. And people were saying all these kind of alcoholic, happy things.
00:02:33
Speaker
And I thought, actually, I'm often inspired to write because I get angry about something. And and I thought it was interesting that people didn't didn't say that, because you usually need something that that makes you feel passionately about something that will drive you to to do it, you know, so so I think anger counts. And it's not always like a bad anger. It's it's something like
00:02:58
Speaker
you read something and you go, wait a second, that's not right. And then you start writing something. Yeah, I think it can be like, I know I operate off a lot of nervous energy. Like I used to question it, but then I realized it's kind of part of my makeup and it kind of pushes me to do things. So yeah, like whether it's anger or something of the emotions to create. I ran into your books, Kathy, low riders,
00:03:26
Speaker
which I enjoy the art in there, Raul the third, the artist, your writing and the kind of Spanish language, English language kind of, I don't know how to describe it exactly, a little bit of a pastiche that you do. Can you tell the listeners a bit about Low Riders, the Low Riders series, how it kind of came about
00:03:55
Speaker
Sure. I moved to Portland, Oregon to live with my boyfriend in 2005 and I was lucky to get a job here to do outreach to schools as a librarian. So one of our functions was to bring books that kids could take, free books
00:04:14
Speaker
during free lunch when they were giving out lunches. So we were outside and we'd spread the books on the grass and kids would take them. And I saw that there was a couple of nonfiction lowrider books that had photographs and facts and they just got grabbed right away.
00:04:31
Speaker
And something started in my head then, and it was like, this is often how art starts, is like a little daydream. And I was like, wow, that's cool, but there's no fictional stories. And lowriders are so cool.
Publishing Challenges and Successes
00:04:48
Speaker
It just kind of went around and around in my head for for a while, you know, and and finally I wrote a script and the original script could have been either a picture book or a comic, a graphic novel, because at that time I wasn't really sure which which way it would sell. And the basic idea was that there's a contest for lowriders and
00:05:14
Speaker
I don't know if the listeners know what a low rider is, but it's a car that's decorated to the max. It's something that's come intrinsically from Latinx culture in America originally, and it's either decorated to the max, but then there's also hydraulics that make the car so it can go up and down, hydraulics on each
00:05:36
Speaker
tire, so you can literally make the car look like it's dancing. And both those things really fascinated me and the fact that the car itself could even move, you know, kind of gives it a life that's special. But also, there's a lot of ingenuity and creativity, and I love the idea that people
00:05:59
Speaker
took what they had and created this whole culture. I love that in all aspects of art. But the idea that you don't have to, like art doesn't mean that you have oil paints and a brush. It can be all these different factors. And if you're a mechanic, you could also be an artist or, you know, how you drive the car is a kind of art, like thinking about all those things.
00:06:27
Speaker
And then also I was just, when I talked about being angry, I was very, very angry that there weren't books like this for kids that represented kids. The books we had at that time were very suburban and white. And we would literally bring them to kids and they wouldn't understand them. Or it was kind of like, why are you giving me this book? Or, you know, asking kids
00:06:51
Speaker
to understand a book like Beverly Cleary book, which is a good book, but it was written in the 1950s and 60s about a United States that no longer exists and the kids reading it wouldn't necessarily see themselves in it.
00:07:08
Speaker
And I had already published one kid's book called Bugs Before Time about giant prehistoric bugs. It was a science book. So I knew some stuff about the publishing industry. So but this was a different time because now there's the internet and publishing had changed radically since 2000 when my bug book came out. And so I contacted Raoul and we knew each other. He lives in Boston and I live in Portland.
00:07:37
Speaker
And I contacted him because I had met him through a third artist that we were both friends with and I really liked his artwork. So I sent him the script and I said, would you be interested in a kid's book? And he's like, show me what you got. And then he wrote right back and said, this is the book I wanted to read as a kid. And he started drawing the characters. So it's fantastic. Wow. Yeah. Just by luck. We had this very
00:08:05
Speaker
I want to say a deep connection, although that makes it sound like it's serious, but we had the same sense of humor, the same kind of work ethic, the same
00:08:18
Speaker
you know, sort of political songs about what's important. And we were both doing outreach. He was doing teaching classes in art at that time, but we both had a very open attitudes towards people and teachers. So to have all those things aligned, I think, you know,
00:08:38
Speaker
is just wonderful, but we had no knowledge of that when we first met. So then it was kind of a long process because I started that right when the recession hit around 2008 or whatever, so nobody was buying books.
00:08:54
Speaker
And the thing about it is when there's a recession, all they want is very popular books that will sell. They wanted illustrators to illustrate fairy tales so they wouldn't have to pay an author, that kind of thing.
00:09:11
Speaker
We tried and we tried to get an agent and we were getting really good rejections like, love the story, love the art, too marginal an audience. Understand that I was telling them in my letters that by 2050, a third of the country is going to be English-Spanish speaking. The idea is if you publish this now, you're going to have generations that will grow up with these books.
00:09:39
Speaker
And that's how you get readership for kids' books. But they didn't want to recognize that. And also, most publishers were in New York City. So Latinx culture, as we know it, pretty much the rest of the country, it doesn't necessarily exist or didn't exist in their viewpoint at that time.
00:10:01
Speaker
I was
Art and Cultural Dynamics
00:10:02
Speaker
kind of racking my brain about how to publish this. And I saw that there was a contest called Pitch a Palooza. Some husband and wife team called the Book Doctors was coming to Powell's Books, which is a big bookstore in Portland. And it was an opportunity to pitch your book.
00:10:20
Speaker
And I thought, well, I have nothing to lose. I don't know who the judges are. I won't know people in the audience. At least I could test my idea and see how people respond to it. So I went to it and there was about 30 other people there. But it was kind of funny because in my job as a librarian, one of the things I have to do is do book talks to kids.
00:10:46
Speaker
The day that I pitched, I'd literally gone to six classes pitching other people's books. So in my heart, I was thinking, if I can do all these book talks for other people's books, I can do that for mine. So I practiced it and I timed myself. I didn't just kind of go in there.
00:11:05
Speaker
unprepared. And so I did my pitch and I turned out that I won it. And what I hadn't realized was there was actually a prize. And it was that this couple, the book doctors would help help advance our book. So they, they gave us some tips about how to kind of reimagine the the pitch package. And they connected us with Chronicle books,
00:11:32
Speaker
And then we waited and we waited and then because Chronicle is interested and then they said we think Chronicle might make a move so we'll connect you with your agent so they did that and then the agent quickly sent it out to a bunch of other publishers and it turned out that we had some interest but we ended up going with Chronicle.
00:11:53
Speaker
So, you know, anybody out there that's interested in writing or illustrating books, there's a mixture of talent and luck and timing, you know.
00:12:06
Speaker
And like later, people said that our book, if it had come forward like two or three years earlier, it wouldn't have gotten published. But the country was just tipping and starting to realize that Latinx culture was growing and was huge. And like now, I think it's much more obvious than it was then. And again, you have to realize that everything is money based and
00:12:35
Speaker
you know, marketing based and stuff like that. But so that that's kind of our, you know, I'd say our success story. But behind that, like Raoul is a super talented artist. And, you know, I have, I have tons and tons of manuscripts that have been rejected. So
00:12:54
Speaker
you know, the, the, and Raul too, I mean, he's tried tons of things that didn't work out. So, so the, you know, the pinnacle of the iceberg, the success underneath that there's like constant trying and rejection and redoing and, and stuff like that. Yeah. And, and thank you so much for that. I, I'm, I'm just, uh, I love hearing, um, the backstory of that and,
00:13:21
Speaker
And also to hear about some of the pieces with Raul the third did the art on low riders. I mean, obviously with you two working, I mean, two very talented people and just hearing as far as, you know, how do you, how do you get it done? Right. Cause this is, if, you know, if talent got you through, like you said, then, then, then, you know, you'd be through, right? But it takes, it takes more than that. Um,
00:13:50
Speaker
So, Kathy, one question, I got the big question here, what is art? But I wanted you to maybe make a couple of comments on the question, what is art? One of the things you had mentioned about, say, low riders and some of the, what I would say, the aesthetics around the low riders, sometimes viewed as kind of like low brow or cars or kind of like popular art.
00:14:17
Speaker
you know, where I view, I mean, I own each of those volumes and they're fantastic and beautiful and vibrant. For you, I mean, you know, what is art and could you kind of maybe look at or address aspects of, you know, the thinking around like lowbrow art or something like that? Well, I think art, like in its basic sense, is sort of human expression
00:14:47
Speaker
that goes beyond perfunctory sort of, you know, so spiritual or emotional. And I was watching a show on public television about the invention of writing, and they were saying how they think it started basically in Mesopotamia from bookkeeping. But we would never think of bookkeeping as art, but then
00:15:14
Speaker
They then they also looked at Egyptian writing, which was hieroglyphics, where you have the mixture of pictures being sort of turning into letters. And like when we look at hieroglyphics on a wall, we we would probably think that it's artistic. And
00:15:35
Speaker
you know, there's calligraphy that is artistic. So I guess there's an element of pleasure in viewing art, although then you could think of art that's gruesome or something.
00:15:50
Speaker
I think it's, but there's definitely something about it and I think it's also been used against art that, you know, it's connection to pleasure or non-usefulness. You know, I mean you can think of a lot of religious banning of art because it is those things or I can think of
00:16:11
Speaker
when novels first started the idea that people would just lie around and read novels was considered really scandalous. Yeah. Yeah. And sort of seductive. And I think the stuff about lowbrow is it's just a class thing that's overlaid and it switches because like if you look at graffiti
00:16:38
Speaker
At first, it would never be in a museum and then suddenly rich people like it and suddenly it's commanding millions of dollars and artists like Banksy, you know, their whole career plays with that sort of that that valuation.
00:16:54
Speaker
But what I think is interesting, especially for kids, is that not every kid has access to museums and, like I said, paints and art history. But even with that,
00:17:11
Speaker
kids still create art. And like Raoul jokes, he'll say that that his museum was the spin rack of comics at the drugstore. Yeah, you know, as a kid, that's very, very true. Or both of us grew up going to the library and that, you know, those weekly visits where you would come home with 20 picture books or something, you know, that's like like an art show, in a way, you're seeing this, this art passed before you. And
00:17:40
Speaker
So back to the lowrider cars, if you don't have a canvas but you start painting on an old car and you don't have a brand new car, so you get a junker and you redesign the whole car and maybe you spend all your extra money putting chrome on every single part of the engine,
00:18:00
Speaker
and creating like this jewel of a car that's better than any manufactured car. I just think that that's really fascinating and it shows ingenuity and excitement. And I
Themes in Kathy's New Book
00:18:14
Speaker
guess the other thing I should mention is there's a lot of low rider cars that are filled with humor. So what people from the outside mind go, oh, that's
00:18:25
Speaker
you know tacky or lowbrow they're not getting the joke that it's supposed to be over the top you know like um one lowrider car i saw had like you know like
00:18:37
Speaker
like 15 televisions in this one car, like way more than anybody could ever watch. But the idea was, you know, sort of a parody of luxury in a way, like, like you're saying, if I buy a TV, you know, I'm, I'm, I'm moving on up, but like, so then let's buy 20 of them, you know.
00:19:00
Speaker
Or I mean, another thing is even like sometimes they'll have a rear view mirror, but instead of one, they'll have like five in a row, you know, as a decorative effect, but it's also sort of a joke. So so I really like that that part of it, too. I, you know, I know where I'm interviewing here. And of course, we had these wildfires out here in the Pacific Northwest, and it's actually sunny.
00:19:28
Speaker
and not raining. You got me dreaming of being in a low-rider going down the road. I know, I know. And thank you for your answer. There's a lot to think about, and I definitely appreciate your comments. I'm trying to just build in. I find that within popular philosophy, you're talking about popular art or different forms of art.
00:19:57
Speaker
One of the biggest bullshit pieces of things that I think is just so rampant is the kind of prejudice or preconceived notions that we have towards, I don't know, whether it's outsider or whether it's lowbrow, whether it's good, whether it's on the proper medium, whether it's displayed in the right place. I think I like to celebrate not anything that's being done, but
00:20:20
Speaker
folks who are expressing themselves in ways that I think that the viewer needs to open their eye a bit more, not the, you know, the artist is doing their thing, so. So, Kathy, what about the new book, 10 Ways to Hear Snow, that it's coming out? What can you tell us about it? Yeah, so one of the things, you know, being an author, I think, just like being any kind of artist you'd like to,
00:20:50
Speaker
to express your voice in different ways and to me it's one of the most interesting things about doing books for children is that you can work with different artists and people that collaboration and with Raoul we had a very close collaboration because we conceived of it together and then brought the product
00:21:11
Speaker
you know, or the books to find a publisher. But generally, people don't always know this, but in children's books, you are supposed to submit the manuscript and then the editor assigns an illustrator. And that has benefits in that. Then the editor is
00:21:31
Speaker
you know, kind of like overseeing the project. Like I mentioned, Raul and I were lucky that we had all these things in common. But say that I submit a book with an artist's friend and they have a horrible work ethic. So then, you know, if I can't get them to do the artwork, or if they're screwing off, then it can really ruin the relationship.
00:21:56
Speaker
So having that editor negotiate that can be helpful. And I mean, once Raoul and I got a contract, then the editor did and the art directors, they were working with Raoul too. So my book, 10 Ways to Hear Snow, I submitted it and it got accepted by Coquila, which is from Penguin, an imprint of Penguin that represents diverse authors.
00:22:25
Speaker
And Kenard Pak is the illustrator. And he's very, I guess I'd say, not atmospheric, but he's really good at portraying things like seasons and weather. And so it was a good match for the book because the book comes out of my background, which is Arab-American.
00:22:47
Speaker
And it's about an Arab American family where a little girl wakes up and there's been a blizzard. And it's that wonderful feeling when you kind of open the curtains and it's like, oh, the whole world has changed because it's covered with snow.
00:23:04
Speaker
And she was going to go make grape leaves, stuffed grape leaves with her grandma. But now she has to walk through the snow to get there. And her grandma is losing her eyesight. So on her walk, the little girl is thinking about all the ways you can hear snow. And so it's a very
00:23:27
Speaker
like sense-oriented book, but also sort of switching the senses around because you don't usually think of the sounds of snow. You think more of the look of snow. So I was really excited. I finally got, they send you your author's copies and it's gorgeous. So I'm very excited about it, but it's a whole different audience, a whole different mood.
00:23:54
Speaker
It's more for four to eight year olds, which Below Riders is a little older like Probably, you know eight to twelve and up to adult So I'm excited to see how this this book does Yeah, I'm very I mean it is a beautiful title and obviously, you know evokes, you know the the
00:24:19
Speaker
the thought there. And you being from Madison and, you know, speaking about snow, I'd remember imagine there's some connection.
Societal Influences on Literature
00:24:27
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Well, and also I think an important thing about the book I was talking to someone is the idea that grandparents can can share with grandkids a food that that has meaning to your family and your culture. Like, I think that's such an exciting
00:24:48
Speaker
way for your family to kind of pass on its heritage, I guess you'd say. And I was thinking, you know, I'm talking about my Arab American background, but probably all your listeners can think of something that they've done that's similar like that. I mean, it might not be with food, but food is a common one where there's some food in your family that you share.
00:25:15
Speaker
and maybe not with grandparents, maybe other relatives, where you can teach kids and then kids grow up and they're like, I know how to do this because my grandma or my mom taught me this. And I know now I'm old enough, like my grandma's been dead for years, but it kind of gives me chills sometimes when I make some of these recipes because they've been passed down that way from other people.
00:25:45
Speaker
And I and I also think it's not a religious book at all, but it's a great book for winter and the holidays because the snow is just like I said, that that that sort of wonderful muffling that you get when that when you wake up and there's that big snow and everything has changed. Yes, that distinct. It's like the distinct. It's soft sound, but it's loud because it sounds so different.
00:26:10
Speaker
It's like I notice it a lot, the sound of what's out there, even though there seems to be less sound, it's just muffled. Well, I'm really, really glad to hear about that book and for you to be able to get that out there. I look forward to that. When's the release date on the book?
00:26:31
Speaker
It comes out October 13th, so that means that's when it'll be in stores, but you can pre-order it. I'm telling people, support your local indie bookstores for sure. Of course, you can get it on Amazon, but if you have a bookstore that allows you to order books, support them because we need them.
00:26:56
Speaker
I know that that Amazon, you know, it kills local businesses and we need them because with the quarantine, they're they're struggling double. Yeah. Well, and thank you for that. Yeah, that's 10 ways to hear snow. Kathy, I have another question that I wondered if you could kind of give some comment on.
00:27:20
Speaker
Um, just with the, the, the various, you know, uh, folks talk about 2020 and the, and the challenges or the disruptions and changes revelations in society, disease, whatever the combination of things are. I mean, uh, with the pandemic, um, uh, hopefully growing awareness about the, the, the, the deep violent, uh, racist history of the United States. Um, a lot of, a lot of
00:27:47
Speaker
a lot of these tensions being worked out significantly this year. What role, say you, but in the roles that you play as an author, artist, librarian, do you feel that the present state of things have caused a greater import to the work that you do or the art that you create?
00:28:17
Speaker
Oh, definitely. I mean, on the one hand, I think I would always do this kind of work. And looking back on my history, you know, like even in high school, I was working on some, you know, like zines and underground papers and stuff like that. So so I mean, I think that's just my nature. And I kind of go back and forth, Ken, because
00:28:40
Speaker
Part of me feels like, you know, obviously it's very different times and we're feeling you wake up every day and you feel like what's the new thing that's, you know, going to make me feel totally freaked out and stressed. I mean, it's very anxious times, very threatening times. But I think we've been through this before, like the six
00:29:07
Speaker
And I think that in some ways the United States has been privileged not to have this kind of fear because like we've never had a war fought like from somebody attacking us on the outside and then fighting that on our own turf. You know, we've always had things sort of at a distance except for the Civil War recently.
00:29:34
Speaker
And I think that, or even disease, so many other countries live with daily fears of disease and with very little resources to cure it or to solve it.
00:29:54
Speaker
I kind of go back and forth about that, you know, like, like, maybe this is just us waking up to, to, you know, what a lot of the rest of the world experiences daily. And of course, being Lebanese American and looking what happened in Beirut, you know, like that huge explosion on top of everything else collapsing the bank system, reliable government, reliable transportation, you know, and still people survive.
00:30:25
Speaker
And I also think that at times of great change, you know, part of the like, like it's a reaction
00:30:37
Speaker
to a lot of change rather than like what we're seeing. It's not all negative. Like a lot of it is because there's been huge amounts of change in the past five or 10 years. I mean, I didn't ever expect to see a Black president in my lifetime. And that I did, I think that's amazing. But it also is showing that there's a lot of backlash to that.
00:31:06
Speaker
Sure. Or I think what we're going through right now in the definition of gender, like that it might not be binary as we've been locked into the definition of gender for so long. I mean, that's a huge change. So it's going to create a lot of reaction. But it also, we haven't had this discussion this upfront before.
00:31:36
Speaker
So that that also means, you know, that that there's a movement. Or I also look at just, you know, that the statistics that the U.S. won't continue to be white majority. Again, that's going to cause a backlash. But but inevitably, that's going to roll forward. And I in the last census, they said the biggest growing ethnicity was multicultural or multi ethnicities.
00:32:06
Speaker
So how kids of the future will identify is going to be different than it is today. And that's one thing I think, because I write for kids, it's like the cutting edge of what's going to be the future is also, you know, who's kids now? What are kids now like? So some of the stuff that we're seeing in some ways, it may be the last gasp of some people that won't be here.
00:32:36
Speaker
you know, 10 or 20 years from now. And I mean, you know, one way to think of that is, is how would have people in the, say the forties or the thirties ever conceived of the internet and how it's affected all our lives, you know, so, um, I think there's some profound change. And I think, I think you're right. I mean, sometimes you have to step back in place, you know, over the last five or 10 years, some of the things that happen,
00:33:04
Speaker
And I've been deeply fascinated by what pieces have opened up both intellectually and culturally in the United States. But I'm reminded daily as a 48 year old cis white male that my reaction is not the standard reaction.
00:33:22
Speaker
uh, to those changes. I'm intellectually curious. That doesn't place me in a higher position than anybody, but I'm curious about the changes and I want to understand what language around gender is right and learn more about, um, race and ethnicity in, in the United States. But the reaction to my, of my prototype is very different is quite simply a vote for Trump and a middle finger to the rest of the country. Um, and I think.
00:33:50
Speaker
you know, there's great potential in a lot of the dynamics that you describe historically that are happened. But, um, the challenge that those changes create and the kind of political reaction to them is, um, just downright scary, uh, that I've seen inspiring, inspiring, because I believe that people are going to win at the end of the day, at the end of history, but that's, that's a very abstract notion at the moment.
00:34:16
Speaker
Well, and I think in a larger picture, I mean, I mentioned I wrote a book, Bugs Before Time. So that was about the like that sort of the evolution of insects and kind of paralleling the dinosaurs and, you know, the history of of life, really. And and
00:34:32
Speaker
One of the things I like, I always love geology and fossil hunting and stuff. And one of the reasons I like it is it puts in perspective, I mean, the dinosaurs were here for millions of years, they were way more successful than humans. And there's been several times in geological history where humans have almost been wiped out, like, greatly reduced. And there's been many times when life itself has been
00:35:02
Speaker
reduced and then come back.
00:35:05
Speaker
and and bubbled as one cell or you know very primitive kinds of life and then gradually re-evolved and like I was reading about the when the asteroid hit that killed the dinosaurs and one of the things they think now is not I mean it was a huge explosion down near the Caribbean so you know if you think of this huge crater of something hitting but they said it pulverized so much
00:35:33
Speaker
earth that then that blackened the skies and caused immediate winter and then there was like a rain of sulfuric acid you know and I was reading this and I'm going like it sounds like something you know like the biblical end of the world but that's that's like that's like nature you know that that's not anything that humans did it's like
00:35:57
Speaker
you know the way of the the it's not even the way of the world but the way of the cosmos is we could be hit by you know this falling chunk of something and it just ends everything that makes sense to us and and you know sort of that that that we live in a chaotic universe that doesn't it doesn't align with our
00:36:21
Speaker
you know, all the things in our brain that say this is right and this is wrong and this is good and this is bad.
00:36:28
Speaker
you know, a lot of art and religion and philosophy, it's all trying to make some kind of sense out of that huge chaos. And so sometimes seeing that chaos, it's almost in a weird way reassuring, like it doesn't even matter what we do in a certain amount of things that, I mean, that doesn't mean we should ruin the earth or kill people, but it also means that
Importance of Diverse Representation
00:36:56
Speaker
You know, it's not all our control. There's a way of things that's bigger than we can grasp, kind of. Yeah, we can't necessarily control the ending. There's a lot of control, that question, right? Control the ending, control what's going to happen. I think my solution is a little bit simpler. As of October 13, having a copy of 10 Ways to Hear Still.
00:37:22
Speaker
I think that can provide some solace. I've spent 12 years in Milwaukee and Madison, Wisconsin myself and know that
00:37:32
Speaker
The peaceful sound of the snow and maybe not the 15 inches that creates havoc. Well, when you're a kid, you don't have to drive. You don't have to go to a job. Schools cancel. That's just kind of a wonderful, wow, snow. And I hope when you see it, I worked with them. Originally, the drawings looked much more East Coast. And I said, no.
00:37:58
Speaker
There's big Arab populations in, like, Dearborn Michigan and Detroit. So I really wanted it. And then my background in the Midwest, I wanted it to look like a Midwestern city because, again, there's sort of a hidden prejudice with New York publishers. Everything sort of ends up being more about New York. And it's like, but there's all the rest of the country. Yeah, otherwise everything's going to be a brownstone, right? Right, right, right.
00:38:27
Speaker
in the library we've seen that one of the examples we saw that was kind of disturbing a while back we were looking somebody wanted to know like the best 200 picture books that showed black kids so we you know when we're a big urban library so we put everything on hold and was looking through and it was like one brownstone after the other and it started to get really upsetting because we couldn't find any
00:38:53
Speaker
books about black kids on the West Coast or black kids in Detroit or St. Louis or Chicago or Kansas City where there are huge black populations and a very important black culture. So this was, you know, it wasn't that all the publishers in New York said, okay, only show this, but it showed their hidden subconscious prejudices about what they thought
00:39:20
Speaker
you know, how a black family should be represented, which was a brownstone in New York, you know.
00:39:27
Speaker
So some of those things, like there's upfront prejudices, but then there's ones that we've absorbed that we don't even realize it. And so and I can say something, even my book showing an Arab family in snow is, again, it's breaking a stereotype, because almost every other book, you're going to see Arabs in the desert, Arabs and camels, even though, like I said, Dearborn Michigan is where
00:39:54
Speaker
in America where there's the heart of Arab population. In Michigan winters. Right, right. In other places, Ohio and Brooklyn. I mean, there's Arabs that live in California and warm places too, but it's so easy from the media, the inundation of the media to have these stereotypes formed that we don't even realize
Exploring Cultures through Books
00:40:24
Speaker
And then when somebody says that, you're like, Oh, yeah, that's right. I'm gonna, I'm gonna, and I, those, those details and some of the things I never really thought about of, of, of setting, not only like who the characters are in the book, but the, the, the physical setting and how it appears. Um, you know, I think it really appoints to.
00:40:45
Speaker
You know, I would say, you know, you work as a librarian, seeing a lot of books, seeing how things are represented, seeing what words are used, seeing what colors are there, seeing what cities. I think those are the type of details that when people, whoever they are, see themselves in, you know, that whole thing of settings.
00:41:06
Speaker
that that look familiar to them that their teacher looks you know maybe like their uncle or you know or like exactly there's a connection to the reality that's being expressed in culture that reflects well or even things like like class like seeing working class families and it often to me it doesn't hit me until i read a book um
00:41:29
Speaker
where I see something and I go, wow, I really connect to that. And then I realized it's partly because I never saw myself in the book in that way. And I know I'm fairly light skinned, but growing up in Wisconsin where people were very blonde, it's like if there was ever a character that had dark hair or darker skin, that's the one that I connected to as a kid. And so,
00:41:57
Speaker
It's very subtle how that can happen, but showing kids more different worlds. And then the opposite is that books are a good way to explore things that we don't know about. So whoever you are, you can also learn about a lot of other different kinds of people just by reading a book.
00:42:18
Speaker
And it's also a very safe way to explore stuff, you know, and then and then in your real life, maybe you go out and do more exploring, you know, but just like you read a travel book before you go travel, you can read books about anything, any culture, you know, all different
00:42:36
Speaker
you know, levels of fantasy and things like that. And then and then kind of say, is that for me or not? You know, and I think that's a super important part of kids growing up to be able to do that. Yeah. And thank you for your contributions to it. Like I said, you know, both in the work you do in the kind of historical importance of librarians, but also, like I said,
00:43:04
Speaker
you know, um, you know, creating material that, that, you know, we'll reach kids. And I think both of us know that within the capitalist market, right? I mean, things that fit into what already exists move along pretty well because they mesh with the culture and those that stick out or cause pause or don't reach a demographic readily. It takes work. And I've heard that, you know, about the work you've done to make sure that, um, that gets out there.
00:43:32
Speaker
Um, I got one, I got a, I got a question I wanted to ask you before the, the big, you know, why is there something rather than nothing? But prior to that, given, you know, your around books, um, love them, uh, any like super important authors that you've encountered lately that you'd want listeners to be like, check this out. Cause this is really cool.
00:43:55
Speaker
Oh never ask a librarian that because I feel like when I get asked that there's so much but then I can't think of any titles but I wanted to give a shout out for my author friend Isabel Quintero. She is a writer and she also published a picture book called Me Poppy Has a Motorcycle I think I might be saying it
00:44:17
Speaker
slightly wrong, but it's with the same publisher. I have Kokila, but it's about a little Latinx girl whose dad is a carpenter, and he gives her a ride on the back of his motorcycle. And when I read that, I had that experience we were talking about where I was like,
00:44:37
Speaker
I remember those days when I got to hang out with my dad just alone. And for me and Madison, what I remember is one time he rented a rowboat down by the union at the lake on the college campus. And I got to go, he rode out into the lake and as a little girl, I was sitting there and I got to go for this rowboat ride with my dad.
00:45:03
Speaker
and reading her book just brought that back so vividly, but she does this wonderful father-daughter connection, but showing a working-class dad that way, and he drives around, and he's waving at some of the carpenter guys he knows, and it just, you know, it showed me a bunch of things that I hadn't seen in kids' books before, and it's a wonderful book.
00:45:32
Speaker
My puppy has a motorcycle. Yeah, my puppy has a motorcycle. Yeah, thank you so much for that. I tend to do that. I get librarians around. I extract as much as I can from them, so sorry.
00:45:50
Speaker
No,
Existential Reflections
00:45:51
Speaker
and then I feel like like I said I have a horrible memory So I I'm always like oh and then there was that book that kind of blah blah blah But I can't remember the exact title and the author but I'm the exact I'm the exact same way and when you know the the episode comes out maybe we can you know throw a few little extra tags on there and you know if you think about it a little bit more but
00:46:16
Speaker
The big question, name it a podcast. Kathy Camper, I know you have an answer for why is there something rather than nothing? Why is there something rather than nothing? I'm not quite sure there is something rather than nothing. That's OK. That is an answer. Yeah, I think that I
00:46:42
Speaker
I guess it goes back to what I was saying. I feel like things have evolved this way, but it kind of tickles me that it's totally random and that there could be, like say the asteroid hits and we all die and there's some other kind of evolution. It could be intelligent cockroaches or it could be slime mold or it could be nothing like on Venus where there's a toxic atmosphere, that that's all
00:47:12
Speaker
but something rather than nothing, I'm not really sure. We're all, you know, every episode, you know, we're all taking stabs at it. We're all taking stabs at it. Yeah, I mean, I guess like as a kid, I always was frustrated by that, like, you know, when you read physics and it's like talking about the end of the universe. I mean, if you think of the universe kind of like as a table,
00:47:40
Speaker
or anything, you know, at some point you reach the end. But, but they say, you know, when they say there is no end or that it goes on forever, I'm like, well, that's that I can't conceive of that really. So, you know, I don't know, or like, like when they some some theories that think that we're somebody's daydream in another universe or something, you know, like multiverses in
00:48:05
Speaker
Yeah, or
Connecting with Kathy Camper
00:48:06
Speaker
that whole thing that there's infinite amount of universes, then it's like, well, how does that all fit? You know, like, like, because then there seems like there's a space that it fits in. So that space goes beyond. I don't know. Well, I know. And but you know, in I'm gonna I'm gonna make and thank you for free for your answer, because
00:48:31
Speaker
I get it, too. But I'll make it easier, the last one, in this particular multiverse that we're in. How do listeners connect to you, your work? Where do they go? Just to make sure they connect with great stuff. Oh, thank you. Well, probably just if you search on the internet, KathyKamper.com, I have a website. So if you wanted to contact me, you could do it through that.
00:48:59
Speaker
that, or I try to keep it updated. I'm on social media, definitely Facebook, a little bit Twitter, a little bit Instagram, and that's just because I don't really feel super healthy being on social media a whole lot. I'd rather be out wandering around outside somewhere.
00:49:21
Speaker
Yeah, I guess, I guess that's it. And, you know, I'm, I'm open for doing school visits or, um, you know, if you have a book festival and need an author, I'd love to show up. So thank you. Yeah. Thank you so much for that. Um, in, uh, Kathy, Kathy camper, um, I gotta tell you, it's, it's been so nice, um, to, to talk to you and actually to, you know, uh, learn more about,
00:49:46
Speaker
you know, about your work and about your art. I really think it's great, not only what you make, but in talking to you about your process and how you're thinking about it, what you're trying to do and what you're trying to create, whether it's for kids, for adults, for young adults, what have you. I just wanted to thank you for the things that you create and to thank you for
00:50:15
Speaker
for joining the podcast. Oh, thank you. Well, there's nothing that touches me more to like, sometimes people have emailed me or written me and kids. And, you know, when I think of something that to me, like a book is like my daydream, but then when they say, like, you move me, you changed my life, or, you know, I saw myself in your books or something like that. It's just it's like, wow, you know, I'm just humbled by that because, like I say, it's
00:50:42
Speaker
It's sort of like it starts all as a daydream, so it's pretty cool. But now I just gotta find somebody who's got a lowrider down in the area. I know. It's nice outside. We walk around, nice outside, but yeah, thank you. Again, Kathy Camper, Lowriders from Space, and the new book Coming Out, 10 Ways to Hear Snow.
00:51:06
Speaker
and that's gonna be October 13th. Kathy, again, great pleasure chatting with you and hope to chat again soon. Yes, thank you. Bye now. Bye. You are listening to Something Rather Than Nothing.