PANSY BOY

By Paul Harfleet

(Barbican Press, 2017)

I stumbled upon this picture book at the library today. It looked like someone had propped it up as a display on a lower shelf, only to be knocked over by someone else. But maybe just seeing the title made me assume the worst.

The dedication page simply says, “For my seven year old self”. So many of us already know what author/illustrator Paul Harfleet means. The story introduces us to a boy “from an average town” who loves drawing, writing and marveling at the birds overhead. Alas, joy and freedom do not last. “Holidays passed in reverie but school was filled with jeopardy.”

His stance and demeanour may have been fey

His nature girlish and potentially gay…

Fairy, pansy or just queer

Were the words he came to fear

Somehow this boy had to find a way to withstand the bullying. He needed “a simple plan to tackle the hate”. Inspired by flowers that marked graves and invited reflection at a local cemetery, he began planting pansies in places where he was bullied. At first, no one understood why the flowers popped up in so many places on school grounds. When he finally explained to teachers, they took action and the bullying ended. Consider it as fanciful a happily-ever-after as there ever was.

The story is “a fictionalized origin story” of The Pansy Project, an idea that germinated in the mind of Harfleet back in 2005. He’s been planting pansies ever since.

Everything about the look of this book feels special, from the gorgeous, colorful flowers on the cover to the charcoal gray pages to the words that appear in white font and form curved passages of text. Today is Pink Shirt Day (aka Anti-Bullying Day) in British Columbia where I live and it saddens me that this book should be flattened on a bottom shelf instead of being in a classroom for teachers to elicit discussion from students.

This is a book worth tracking down and sharing with others. It’s beautiful enough to be prominently displayed on a coffee table or mantel, perhaps with some fresh flowers nearby. Track it down. The publisher is from Great Britain (www.barbicanpress.com). Maybe you’ll be inspired to plant a few pansies of your own as you reflect on your past.

TOTALLY JOE

By James Howe

(Atheneum, 2005)

If only there had been a Joe (aka JoDan) Bunch in my class in grade seven or eight.  I’m thinking selfishly here.  Poor Joe would have been brutalized by peers who would taunt him for painting one fingernail, streaking his hair and just being, well, as the title says, totally Joe.  But I would have had someone to set the gay standard.

Some people have their identities whispering at them in sometimes conflicting inner voices.  Not Joe.  His identity loudly came into being at a young age, back when he was a four-year-old, walking the neighborhood in a dress and playing with his collection of seven Barbies.

If only I had had parents who were as enlightened, who did not fear what their inner voices told them about their young son, their Great Hope to become a doctor, the Prime Minister or a Right Winger on the Montreal Canadiens.

I thank author James Howe for introducing a younger generation to a memorable character with an irrepressible personality.   

I can’t recall any Joes from my childhood.  As far as I could tell, I was as Joe-y as it got.  I came to know several Joes in my twenties, once I left Texas where even The Irrepressibles might have found a way to repress, given the unchecked speeches about eternal damnation and the occasional article about gun-toting good ol’ boys hunting for gays.  In Los Angeles, I met Mason, an affectionate, often obnoxious force who learned to dish it out as a means to survive.  I dated Evan, a makeup artist who scared me off with too much talk about my dire need for skin moisturizer.  Sadly, Joes struggle for acceptance, even in gay circles.

Totally Joe is structured as a class writing assignment, an alphabetical autobiography, a year-long journal with Joe’s entries ranging from Addie, his strong-willed best friend, to Zachary, his newest friend who may or may not be gay.  The alphabet is not just a listing of names—L is for Leftovers, P is for Popular (Not).

Joe survives school by hanging out as one of The Gang of Five (which then and always consisted of only four).  It’s hard not to be envious, reading how Joe is completely accepted as he is by this close co-ed group.  Although Joe only comes out midway through the book, fully encouraged and supported by an amazing Aunt Pam, he never strives to pass as straight.

Yes, there are nemeses—namely, a hateful classmate named Kevin Hennessey and his sidekick, Jimmy Lemon.  And then there is Kevin’s mother who leads the cause against establishing a gay-straight alliance at Joe’s school.  This is just the plot point to prompt Joe’s (and Addie’s) parents to step up.  Again, I thought, If only...

Howe’s first-person narrative is zippy, often amusing and totally entertaining.  At times, it’s poignant without being preachy.  Here’s an excerpt wherein Joe recalls an early obsession:

                                My mom says that I played wedding for about a year and that

                                I kept asking everybody if they would marry me.  Even Jeff

                                [Joe’s brother].  (That was the only time anyone can

                                remember Jeff threatening to clobber me on a regular

                                basis.)  I had my Lainy doll marry my Ken doll.  I also had

                                her marry some of my Barbies.  And G.I. Joe.  (I hated that

                                the soldier doll had my name.  I mean, please.  I didn’t play

                                with him much.  He was another Christmas present from my

                                clueless grandparents.  One time when they were visiting,

                                my grandpa asked me if G.I. Joe had been in any wars lately.

                                I said, “No, but he and Ken got married last week.”  Every

                                Christmas since then, my grandparents have sent me a

                                check.)

Totally Joe is a quick read that would be a perfect book choice for a gay-straight alliance or, maybe one day, in a regular grade seven classroom.  The Joes—and Not-So-Joes—of this world need the exposure and the understanding.