Ep 54: Judy Blume

Are you there Judy? It’s us, CFX, and this week we are here to ask you, when will we grow? Haha, all kidding aside. That’s right, we are covering the great Judy Blume, an author who has influenced several generations with her frank, honest and realistic books for kids and young adults. We go into her history, highlighting a few of the books that are both her most notable and also most controversial. Of course, we talk about Are You There God, It’s Me Margaret, Blume’s breakthrough and most famous book and we also touch on the recent film adaptation. We cover the followup to that book, Then Again, Maybe I Won’t, Blume’s one stab at dealing with teenage boys. We talk about Blubber, probably one of the darkest books not only on childhood but on human nature. And, how could we do an episode on Blume without covering her most banned book, Forever…, possibly the first book to depict first time sex from a female perspective? We also talk about how Blume is not only a writer but an anti-censorship champion and how she went above and beyond to correspond with thousands of kids who looked up to her for guidance. In this episode, we really go out of our way to tackle Blume’s work with a mature and academic approach or… then again, MAYBE WE DON’T. As you’ve come to expect, while we respect these books, we also have a lot of fun with them, and along the way, we learn… What male body part should not be covered in aftershave Which of our podcast hosts didn’t actually learn anything from Blubber What a nymphomaniac is and how it nearly got a 19 year old B. Dalton bookstore employee fired Why Slip never had a wet dream What medical condition led to Jeff’s biggest sound FX fail yet How Slip, momentarily, became cool via literature and liberal parenting Note: Apologies for the shitty sound as we had a microphone technical failure at the CFX studios :(  Check us out on Instagram (https://www.instagram.com/culturalfutures/) for links and additional content related to this and other episodes as well as clues to upcoming shows or write to us at [email protected] All audio clips are used under the "Fair Use" Copyright Disclaimer Under Section 107 of the Copyright Act in 1976; Allowance is made for "Fair Use" for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching, scholarship, and research. Fair use is a use permitted by copyright statute that might otherwise be infringing. Non-profit, educational or personal use tips the balance in favor of fair use. All rights and credit go directly to its rightful owners. No copyright infringement intended.