Why Judy Blume's taboo-breaking books 'get' teenagers like no others

By Natasha TripneyFeatures correspondent

As Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret, the bestselling book by beloved teen author Judy Blume comes to screens, Natasha Tripney asks what made it, and her other books, so relatable – and groundbreaking.

Judy Blume's books – more than 25 novels for children and adults – are often celebrated for their openness about sex, menstruation, bullying and other teenage concerns, but if this was their sole strength, it's doubtful people would feel as deeply about them as they do. Her books are often about young people getting to know themselves and learning how to navigate the world, written with sensitivity, compassion and an acute understanding of the things teenagers worry about. 

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Published in 1970, Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret remains her best-selling book. Its title has seeped into popular culture, quoted by everyone from Ted Lasso to Deadpool, and the book itself remains a coming-of-age rite for young girls, transcending cultural and generational boundaries. Now a new film version, adapted and directed by Kelly Fremon Craig, is set to introduce her work to new audiences, while the Amazon Prime documentary Judy Blume Forever, co-directed by Davina Pardo and Leah Wolchok, explores her life and her continuing influence.

The film isn't the first screen adaptation of Blume's work. There's a 1978 television movie of her 1975 novel Forever – very unmistakably a product of the 1970s – and a 2013 film version of Tiger Eyes, co-written by Blume and her son Larry, who also directs. But Margaret, arguably the most beloved of her books, had never been filmed before Blume entrusted it to Craig and her mentor, director James L Brooks (Terms of Endearment, Broadcast News). 

"I am such a fan of the book and such a fan of Judy. It was important to me to do right by her, to make a film that felt like a reflection of her and the spirit of her book," Craig says, describing the moment when Blume gave her the rights as "wildly surreal".

The film is, perhaps not unsurprisingly, faithful to the book and nostalgic but not overly so. Uprooted from her New York home to the New Jersey suburbs, 11-year-old Margaret Simon (played with immense charm and warmth by Abby Ryder Fortson) desperately wants to be normal. She can't wait to get her period, wear a bra and be kissed by a boy. Like so much of Blume's work, it's also a novel of self-exploration. Margaret's Jewish dad and Christian mother have left her to decide her faith for herself and so she looks for God, in temple, in church – and talks to him.

That was the part that really struck Craig when she re-read the book. "She searches for a sense of the divine and doesn't find it in the typical places; she finds it alone in her room. There was something so beautiful and true about that," she tells BBC Culture.

The film also shares an honest quality with Blume's book. It's still rare, for example, to see a character putting on a sanitary pad on screen. They're usually a source of horror comedy, if seen at all. "That scene was electric to film," says Craig, "It felt like we were throwing off shame and embarrassment."

The film shows Margaret experiencing what it feels like to wear a pad. "We had to represent the truth of it in all its specificity," she says. "You're walking around with a little diaper on. It's such an odd feeling. How do you represent that as honestly as possible?"

Craig was also nervous about filming the scene where Margaret and her friends perform their bust-increasing exercises. "That's the thing everybody remembers from the book, so filming it was a big deal. I knew we had to get that right."

"I feel a tremendous responsibility," Craig says. "A responsibility to Judy, but also to Judy's fans, and to the people that haven't read her books, for whom this will be an introduction to her." 

'The Blume cocoon'

It's easy to see why Craig feels that way. The book meant so much to so many people when they were growing up. "Reading Margaret was hugely helpful in my childhood," Alison Michael, who co-hosts the Blume Saloon podcast with Jody Worthington, tells BBC Culture. For the past six years they have been rereading Blume's oeuvre and reflecting on her work. Growing up, says Michael, "I didn't have a tonne of people to ask these questions of and reading the book, while having the same questions as Margaret about religion and periods, was really affirming." 

In most of Blume's books, she says, "there's someone who's unsure of themselves, someone who's questioning their place in the world." The books generate a sense of safety, she continues. "They create a space for you to be yourself and to not feel embarrassed to have questions." They describe this feeling on the podcast as the "Blume cocoon".

Conservatives did not see it that way. Written in 1973, Deenie is an account of a girl who is diagnosed with scoliosis and has an overbearing mother, but it also contains a passage where Deenie touches her "special place," and many people were unable to see past this. To them, it was the "masturbation book". The documentary contains a clip from the TV show Crossfire in which US conservative commentator Pat Buchanan lists all the instances of masturbation in her books, along with all the other things he deems inappropriate. "Did you read the whole book or just the highlighted parts?" Blume coolly replies.

Worthington remembers reading Deenie and not really understanding that part – "is she talking about her elbow?" – but that's fine, she says. "It didn't scar me. These books hit you at the right time, when you're ready. I think parents sometimes don't give kids enough credit for knowing when they're ready."

Forever caused even more of a stir. Written at the urging of her children, who wanted to read a book in which teenagers have sex and no one dies as a result, it has been a source of controversy since publication well into the 21st Century and has frequently been the target of censorship. Our school library in the UK contained a copy of Forever that got passed around the class, like a kind of ritual. Worthington recalls something very similar happening when she was at school in Melbourne, with her and her schoolmates gathering to read from a dog-eared copy which inevitably fell open to certain pages, namely those featuring "Ralph", the name the protagonist Michael gives to his penis.

Though it's Ralph that most people remember, Forever's message – that a first sexual experience can be fun, awkward but ultimately positive, and that first love does not always equate true love – still feels necessary and relevant. A Netflix series based on the book is on the cards.

A timeless quality

While Blume's novels were a source of guidance to so many, so was the author herself. Young people across the US wrote to her asking for advice, about everything from masturbation to bereavement and surviving sexual abuse. She frequently wrote back and with some, as movingly shown in the documentary, she developed an ongoing correspondence. Some of these letters were published in 1986 in Letters to Judy, a book which encapsulates her readers' love for her. She gave them the answers they weren't getting elsewhere; she assured them their worries were normal, they were normal. 

Blume was – and remains – a vocal campaigner against censorship. For a time, her books were some of the most challenged in the US. She sought out the National Coalition Against Censorship for support and remained on their board until recently.

"We've always looked to her as somebody who could speak out on these issues and be listened to," says Chris Finan, executive director of the NCAC. It's important to remember, he says, that all the attacks against her books ultimately failed. Her books became bestsellers. "No one was writing about this stuff at the time. There was this huge demand and thirst for this information."

"She won that battle which encourages us to believe that these current battles will also be won," he says, in reference to conservative attacks on books about LGBTQ issues. 

Only recently, Blume affirmed her allyship with the trans community. "Anything to the contrary is total bullshit," she said in a statement following an interview with The Times, which was headlined: Judy Blume: 'I'm behind JK Rowling 100 per cent', and had sparked controversy online.

Worthington and Michael think Blume's books remain so popular in part because the kids who grew up on them now have children and even grandchildren of their own. "If you read a book together with your kid, it's an opportunity to have conversations and bond and grow closer," says Michael. 

That's only one factor, though. The books, while rooted in the time they were written, have a timeless quality because the things teenagers worry about are largely the same and few writers understand that the way Blume does. For the podcast, Michael and Worthington have read a lot of what they call "Judy-adjacent" books, but nothing quite matches up. "Judy has this special connection to the inner thoughts of children and teens," says Michael. "She remembers what it feels like, in a way that I just don't think a lot of writers can do."

Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret is in cinemas in the US now, and in the UK from 19 May. Judy Blume Forever is on Amazon Prime Video now.

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