LIFE OF A READER
JUDY NEWMAN
Chapter and Versus When I was a kid, it was definitely not okay to say the word “suck” out loud or in any kind of writing for school (or at home for that matter). It was considered a curse word, one letter away from the really bad one. These days, I see the word used freely in schools, in books that librarians and teachers and parents recommend and feature on library shelves, and on authors’ and educators’ public social media. When I hear someone say “verse” as opposed to “versus”—as in Brown “verse” Board of Education or New England Patriots “verse” New York Giants—I wonder if a similar acceptability shift happened. Even though it sounds like nails on a chalkboard to me, is it now considered okay to say “verse” instead of “versus”? I consider myself a big thinker. My day job as President and Reader in Chief of Scholastic Book Clubs is to work with lots of smart and talented people at Scholastic to develop strategies for getting 800,000 classroom teachers across the country and their students connected to brand-new and favorite books. We want to help inspire all kids to see themselves as readers. But I also sweat the small stuff, particularly when it comes to word usage and grammar. I was born what we would now call a “word person.” In addition to not using the word “suck” in school, we didn’t really have “word persons” back in the day. 30
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We didn’t refer to someone as a “people person” or an “animal person” or an “instant-coffee person.” You just liked people, or animals, or Sanka—or you did not. I didn’t have many hobbies, but I read and loved words and word games and puzzles and quiz shows. I used my precious TV allowance to watch word-based game shows such as College Bowl and Password. I started playing Scrabble as a kid on a flat playing board. It was exciting when the turntable was introduced so you could rotate the board and see the letters upright no matter where you were sitting. I got one for my 11th birthday. With my babysitting money, I bought stacks of Dell crossword puzzle and word-search books. Years later, when I first came to New York, it was a special thrill to be employed by Dell Publishing’s then-Director of Publicity, Isabel Geffner, to work in the publicity department—just one floor away from the staff who created and marketed my beloved Dell crossword puzzles! In addition to hiring me to work so close to the “puzzle people,” Isabel sharpened my writing. She edited my work on press releases and The Dell Dateline, our weekly newsletter for booksellers. Isabel insisted on excellent copyediting and grammar. Forty years after she first explained to me when to use “between” versus “among,” it is a real thrill to report that Isabel, who is
