This simple board book is part of the ongoing partnership between LGBTQ advocacy organization GLAAD and Little Bee Books. It tells readers a little about her life, from her early stand-up performances to her sitcom, coming out as gay, her show’s cancellation, and her eventual return to television with a successful talk show. It ends with a mention of her marriage to Portia De Rossi, the many ways she works for “equality and fairness,” and her receiving the Presidential Medal of Freedom from President Barack Obama.
The book deals clearly but gently with the bias she faced. “Ellen helped people understand that being gay was not something to be afraid of,” it says, explaining, “Gay people did not have the same rights as others. It was not legal to get married or jointly adopt children. It was hard to buy a home together or even visit a sick partner in the hospital.” After she came out, “bullies said and wrote mean things about her.” If the book never quite explains why gay people didn’t have the same rights or why being gay was seen as “something to be afraid of,” perhaps that’s because there really is never a good reason for such bias (and complex discussions of systemic injustices are for older ages).
We see Ellen’s determination in spite of the obstacles, however. “Brave Ellen wouldn’t give up. She wanted to show the world that gay people could succeed, too,” the book tells us. It notes the many gay fans who supported her and how “with courage and kindness,” she helped make the country and the world “a more accepting place to live.”
Yet that target age range from Little Bee seems miscalibrated to the level of language used here, which feels better suited to 5- to 7-year-olds. That’s not because the queer content is inappropriate for the very youngest children; but words like “trailblazer,” “scholarships,” “eventually,” as well as more complex sentences and concepts (like what a “comedian” is, what it means for a network to cancel a show, and the idea of something being “legal”) may mean younger children simply won’t understand it yet.
This approach seems to be part of a trend, noted by Elizabeth Bluemle in Publishers Weekly last year, “where books meant for ages 4-7 are suddenly in toddler format,” even though “the stories just don’t connect with the children whom board books aim to serve.” She observes about several other (non-LGBTQ) board-book biographies, “While children should be introduced to real role models as early and often as possible, often the stories we share mean zippity-doo-dah to a two-year-old…. Wouldn’t it be better to wait just a few years until young children can truly appreciate these admirable heroes? Or work a little harder to marry the delivery of the information to the age of the listener?”
Exactly. And there are plenty of ways to create LGBTQ-inclusive board books that are geared linguistically to the very youngest children—such as these, which focus on themes of family, ABCs, and rainbow colors. (Little Bee’s own Our Rainbow
Yes, you could simply use this biography with slightly older children, for whom it would be terrific—but even five-year-olds, at the upper end of Little Bee’s target range, may not want to read books whose board-book format marks them as “baby” books. Still, this is not a bad story by any means. I just hope that children who are old enough to understand its language aren’t turned off by the format. And introducing children of all ages to LGBTQ heroes is a fine goal—GLAAD and Little Bee are to be commended for reminding us of this ongoing need.
