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Dark YA Themes

© Sue Reichard

Adolescense is fraught with angst and despair, but also balanced by days of euphoric giddiness. An emotionally turbulent time, the teenage years are sometimes overshadowed by the grim reality of problems beyond their control.

This sense of darkness is often mirrored by today's young adult fiction and non-fiction. Adults often times find these themes disturbing. Sexual abuse, domestic violence, mental instability, AIDS and homosexuality are some of the "dark" issues brought to light in recent years through YA books.

Norma Fox Mazer's When She Was Young is about sibling abuse and mental illness and really does not have a happy ending.

Young adult literature seems to have changed in the 1960s. A turbulent time for all, life's realities seem to come to the forefront and out of the shadows with books such as The Outsiders and The Pigman.

Patty Campbell, a columnist for the The Hornbook says these books are really no more grim than others written in an earlier time. "People are just more aware of these books because four of the major books published this season were outstandingly dark."

Some newer themes deal with the failure of parents to parent, drug addicted parents and other dysfunctional parent and family themes.

An up-and-coming hot topic in non-fiction writing is "cutting." This is the act of self-mutilation, which is especially common among girls. Some of the books written for young adults on this topic are A Bright Red Scream to be published by Viking in October. There does seem to be an escalating incidence of this problem. Lasy year, the book The Luckiest Girl In the World was published on this subject by Scribner.

Robert Cormier, the author of The Chocolate War (1974), explores this gripping subject matter and has noticed an increase in the number of books dealing with dark subject matter. Cormier says, "I think there are more books that deal with tough subjects, more honesty and more willingness to face reality. I also think books reflect the times we live in."

The young adult audience is younger than ever. The definition of young adult used to mean high school-aged readers. Many YA writers still target this age group when they write, but these books seem to be falling into the hands of kids as young as 12.

Do these novels with controversial subject matter provide a legitimate platform for discussion of these topics? Novels take the readers into situations and force them to consider questions and ideas they might no have though about otherwise. Is this their redeeming value?

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