Harriet the Spy author’s truth-telling launched generations of diarists

In Louise Fitzhugh’s 1964 seminal children’s novel Harriet the Spy, a young girl keeps a notebook to record her observations about her friends, neighbors, and classmates. Creative Writing Professor Leslie Brody encourages her students to do the same.

“Louise Fitzhugh was herself a truth-teller and a realist,” says Brody. “She recognized how children, in particular, are hostages to the ideological winds. Louise makes the case in all her books for children’s liberation; she provides life-preserving strategies children may employ in their power struggle with adults. Lying is one time-honored tactic; self-reliance is another.”

Brody authored a biography about Fitzhugh, Sometimes You Have To Lie: The Life and Times of Louise Fitzhugh, Renegade Author of Harriet the Spy (Seal Press, 2020), as well as a stage adaptation of Harriet the Spy, which has resulted in nearly 30 productions in the last five years.

Fitzhugh was brought up with the conventional argument that small fibs lubricated social relations, and sometimes it was kinder to lie. A girl especially needed to calculate the odds in an unforgiving social code that could turn a misunderstanding into a lifetime grievance. “In adolescence, when Louise realized that she was a lesbian, she also came to understand the risks attending exposure: condemnation by family, denunciation by religion, punishment by state and federal laws,” adds Brody.

“She has shown free-thinking children they can be happy as themselves, while her truthtelling has launched a million diarists. That’s the legacy for which so many readers love her and why they fondly remember their Harriet experience.”