Ask the Author: Robin Talley
Answered Questions (2)
Robin Talley
(For anyone who may be wondering, this question refers to my short story in the anthology A Tyranny of Petticoats: 15 Stories of Belles, Bank Robbers and Other Badass Girls, edited by Jessica Spotswood. My story is called "The Whole World is Watching" and it's set during the Democratic National Convention protests in Chicago in August 1968. The whole anthology is amazing and you should read it!)
I've always been fascinated by the protest movements in the 1960s, when the civil rights movement and the anti-Vietnam War movement collided with all the other dramatic social changes that took place in the U.S. and elsewhere over the course of this period. As for why I chose to write a story set at the DNC protest specifically, it started out as me simply wanting to know more about it -- it's one of those historical events I'd heard a lot about but never really understood -- but once I started doing research, I was really stricken by what a turning point it seemed to be in many ways. There had been plenty of uprisings in U.S. history, and there had been plenty of cases where the police retaliated violently against protestors. But up until then, it had been rare for that sort of retaliation to be broadcast on TV, and this particular attack was broadcast live, before a huge national viewing audience. Many people were horrified by how they saw the protestors being treated, and many other people were rooting for the police to treat them even worse than they were.
I didn't realize until I was well into my research that the chant "The Whole World is Watching" was used during that protest (possibly for the first time?), but it definitely inspired me once I did. I first heard that chant in the year 2000 at a protest in downtown Washington, DC against the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund. I had no idea then that it had such a long history!
I've always been fascinated by the protest movements in the 1960s, when the civil rights movement and the anti-Vietnam War movement collided with all the other dramatic social changes that took place in the U.S. and elsewhere over the course of this period. As for why I chose to write a story set at the DNC protest specifically, it started out as me simply wanting to know more about it -- it's one of those historical events I'd heard a lot about but never really understood -- but once I started doing research, I was really stricken by what a turning point it seemed to be in many ways. There had been plenty of uprisings in U.S. history, and there had been plenty of cases where the police retaliated violently against protestors. But up until then, it had been rare for that sort of retaliation to be broadcast on TV, and this particular attack was broadcast live, before a huge national viewing audience. Many people were horrified by how they saw the protestors being treated, and many other people were rooting for the police to treat them even worse than they were.
I didn't realize until I was well into my research that the chant "The Whole World is Watching" was used during that protest (possibly for the first time?), but it definitely inspired me once I did. I first heard that chant in the year 2000 at a protest in downtown Washington, DC against the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund. I had no idea then that it had such a long history!
Robin Talley
From my end, the publication process for WHAT WE LEFT BEHIND was the same as for any other book. My publisher is really excited to be putting out a story with a genderqueer protagonist, and they're totally behind the book. I'm glad we're starting to see more and more young adult books come out with characters across the LGBTQ spectrum, including nonbinary characters, and I hope we see those numbers continuing to increase over the next few years.
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