Kate Clanchy - poet - is 'cancelled' by her publisher

Here is an article by Monica Rajesh, one of the women who was involved;

www.theguardian.com/books/2021/aug/13/pointing-out-racism-in-books-is-not-an-attack-kate-clanchy

(Sorry, it was three women of colour, not two - I have covid and am not quite with it!)

I mostly followed this as it played out on Twitter and in private conversations within the industry but will see if I can find any other articles

@thinkingaboutLangCleg The girl referred to as having "almond shaped eyes" has strongly defended Clancy and saying she has always described herself as having almond-shaped eyes.

Yes my child with SEN is "unconsciously odd". I say this from a place of love and I love his 'oddness'.

@artificialhells summary is correct- I know Kate a little and followed all this as it happened, including feeling outraged on her behalf when she claimed on Twitter that people were making up quotes (which she herself at the time described as racist), until it was revealed that the quotes in question did genuinely come from her books.

Her books are interesting and her intentions were good but there is no question but that they contained language which is othering at best and a white saviour theme which might have passed fifty years ago but really had no place in books being published today. I think all of that might have been fixed with a good editor and a bit of self-examination. However, the way she handled it all was so appalling, particularly lying about the books and encouraging hostility towards the people who had commented on GoodReads, that I think this outcome is the right one.

Hmmm. Kate, Gillian, Rachel, Jenny Lindsay in Scotland .... You can't help noting what these enemies of the people have in common ...

I have followed this quite closely as it is my field, and I think you’ve misunderstood, OP.

The issues around Clanchy’s book are:
She denied accurate quotes from her book were in there, and launched a coordinated attack on two women of colour who had respectfully drawn attention to them
She was supported by her publisher and the mainstream press to defend herself, while the women who had tried to open a debate were harassed, abused and - yes - cancelled.
Clanchy did not apologise for anything in the book but it was withdrawn by her publishers for an edit.

There has been a slow, grassroots movement (chiefly among feminists) ongoing for many months to support the women who have been victims of this abuse. It is not the first time that Clanchy has been implicated in this kind of campaign against less powerful writers
In the last few weeks, the publishing industry has started to listen more to these womens’ voices. I see that as a victory for feminism.

The issues around the racism and othering in the book are a valid but separate issue to these issues of bullying and racism. Although having said that, there is a link - to do with the relative power and behaviour that middle class while women can have in some contexts, and how the ideas of feminism can be misused to defend indefensible behaviour.

I am myself a middle class white woman who works in publishing, and a fan of clanchy’s work, this has been a very horrible time but I do believe the publishers have made the right decisions. I don’t think Clanchy has been cancelled, so much as held to account.

Hmmm, I read the book in question last year. I found the author’s patronising attitude towards her white working class students far more problematic than her cliched descriptions of her BAME ones. Despite this, I thought she had some really important and insightful things to say about the English education and class systems, however clumsily expressed.

FWIW, “unselfconsciously odd” is a phrase I might use to describe my own autistic child; I don’t see it as pejorative at all.

What's offensive about "almond-shaped eyes"? It's a simple description of an eye shape. And how is it a "racial trope", when it's seen in people of various ethnic backgrounds? I'm genuinely baffled by this.

I don't believe in book burning

There was a lot of classist stuff in there too.

It's really not ok. It should never have been published in the first place.

Huh. Are those the really bad bits? I mean they are othering yes but I would have really liked it if I had thought any of my DD's teachers when she was in mainstream had liked her for an hour...

I think telling the truth is becoming a terrible crime. If we have people in our lives who are different they must be altogether wonderful and we must be saints. Like we're a living glossy magazine story about how rewarding it is to have x issue in our lives.

That's a bit of a derail though as I don't know enough about this woman to say whether she is culpable or not. I just think that this sanitisation of what can be really difficult complex issues (in this case whether people with complex SEN are delightful to be with all the time) doesn't help those of us who actually have live with the reality.

OP, the website you included a link from, quotes from the original source, which states that the publisher has reverted the rights. So I'm not sure how she has been cancelled? One publisher has decided it will not publish new titles nor updated editions of the previous books, but the author has the right to do so in the future via another publisher, or she can self-publish?

www.thebookseller.com/news/pan-macmillan-stops-publishing-clanchy-it-parts-company-author-1300938#

The original furore occurred because she took to Twitter to complain someone had made up some quotes from her book (in a GoodReads review) and outright denied those phrases were in her book. If I were a publishing house, I'd like my authors to be able to accurately quote from their own work, before publicly claiming someone had falsified text from it.

twitter.com/sammiisammii_/status/1423385534412509184?t=Z3NO9HSvERJ7Y9X-e9oE4A&s=19

How ironic that Kate Clanchy won the Orwell Prize with a book Some Kids I Taught and What They Taught Me that has now been cancelled, despite support for her from the people she taught.

Picador obviously knows how to keep on the right side of Big Brother!

George Orwell would have been proud of her.

A good discussion could have been had around the legitimate issues raised by the book (and there has been some good discussion).

I'm not averse to that particular book eventually sinking without trace, or future editions having an extra section that talked about the problems, or re-editing, but for ALL her books to be withdrawn, for it to be decided that EVERYTHING she wrote is without value and tainted.

This scorched earth approach - who does it actually benefit? Was this what her critics were aiming for? Surely not? She's a poet - a good one. I hope she manages to get her work back in print again.

"the use of racial tropes such as “chocolate-coloured skin” and “almond-shaped eyes”, and references to one student as “African Jonathon” and another being “so small and square and Afghan with his big nose and premature moustache”.

Another passage was highlighted for the inclusion of ableist descriptions, in which Clanchy, a poet and teacher, refers to two autistic children as “unselfconsciously odd” and “jarring company”, and writes “probably, more than an hour a week” in their company “would irritate me, too, but for that hour I like them very much”

From the Guardian.

There is no way she could re-write the book. It does contain institutionalised, entrenched, racist attitudes. BUT Kate Clanchy is absolutely not the problem. Yes, when I read it my thoughts were that I wouldn't be employing her as a teacher. It's in the vaguely patronising vein as all of those 'village school teacher' stories from the 1950's. All the heartwarming stuff is actually her slightly approaching the students from a superior perspective. It's morally questionable from a teaching perspective, to be honest. As a Head if Department I would have been looking to get rid of somebody who wrote a book which reflected on colleagues' teaching from a humorous and slightly patronising perspective. I don't think one of those colleagues would have been happy with their portrayal, or the students. So my view is it shouldn't have been written. It feels very unprofessional and uncomfortable in today's world.

BUT- Kate Clanchy is also reflective and sweet. She clearly loves the kids and thoroughly enjoyed teaching them.

It's her publishers and the entire industry that is the problem. This book went through a major publisher RECENTLY. It won a major award. Many, many people were involved in reading it, editing it, marketing it. She is also represented by a major literary agency. To me, that's the entire industry that considers those views to be ok. Blaming Kate Clanchy is pathetic.

I feel really sorry for somebody who is a poetry advocate, who only has good intentions, and who is clearly a nice person. She has absolutely been hung out to dry for the industry's issues.