Forever . . .

The great paradox of young adult literature is that it was created to communicate a genuine young adult voice, yet that purpose was immediately co-opted by adults. S. E. Hinton wrote The Outsiders when she was a teenager herself in 1967 and created a whole new market-- yet not even ten years later, the mid-thirties Judy Blume was cranking out YA novel after YA novel. Mike Cadden of Missouri Western University touched on this in his article, "The Irony of Narration in the Young Adult Novel" (2000). As he says, "Novels constructed by adults to simulate an authentic adolescent's voice are inherently ironic because the so-called adolescent voice is never-- and can never be-- truly authentic. [...] [T]he YA novelist often intentionally show more communicates to the immature reader a single and limited awareness of the world that the novelist knows to be incomplete and insufficient. It is a sophisticated representation of a lack of sophistication; it is an artful depiction of artlessness" (146).

Where Cadden goes with this is to classify YA novels into three different narrative strategies, based on the extent to which the YA reader is made aware of the inherent irony: is the reader taught that the viewpoint of the novel of "incomplete and insufficient"? It's a useful classification system; where Cadden ends the article is to promote a model for "ethical fiction": Cadden argues that YA novels ought to make clear the limited viewpoints of their narratives, and that authors ought to "help[ ] young readers detect and cope with irony, complexity, and contingency so rich in the world they hope so desperately to know" (153). This fascinates me because one of Hinton's purposes in The Outsiders was expressly anti-didactic, she was tired of novels for teens that delivered pat morals on how to liver properly. But Cadden sees an educational purpose for YA lit, and of the books I taught in my young adult literature course, surely none was more educational than Forever..., which is basically a 200-page brochure on sex for teens. It covers both the logistics and the emotions of it: Katherine visits Planned Parenthood for birth control in a scene that seems like it comes straight out of a brochure, but she also learns about how your first time might not be amazing as you dreamed, and how you might think your first love will last "forever..." but it definitely will not.

I would probably peg Forever... as what Cadden calls "Single-voicedness and Character Narration": "Each text provides a single voice that is so highly confident that it is ultimately unassailable within the text. These books and speakers provide only one argument or position on a matter, and most important, they fail to provide within the text the tools necessary to reveal the contestability of these immature perspective to the equally immature reader" (148). Indeed, Katherine is confident throughout Forever... in her love for her boyfriend Michael, and her belief that is meant to be and will always be. For the adult reader, at least, her wrongness is clear, and Cadden does allow that hyperbole is a tool for revealing what he calls "debilitating world views" (153): "Hyperbole [...] is harder to detect than either the contradiction provided by multiple perspectives or the doubt suggested by a more self-conscious narrator" (149).

But I think that despite the unassailability of Katherine's voice (her parents disagree with her, of course, but the narrative itself doesn't provide the kind of tools that would cause Cadden to classify a book as "Double-voicedness and Character Narration"), Forever... provides a different way of leading to questioning world views: plot and story. Katherine might think she is completely right, but the actual events of the book show that she is wrong, even if the narrative doesn't acknowledge this in a double-voiced way.

The thing is, though, that Forever... is terrible. Katherine's narrative voice lacks any of the spark of Ponyboy's in The Outsiders, or of later first-person narrators like Titus in Feed or Briony in Chime. She is plainly and obviously a way for Blume to disseminate information to the reader about teenage sex, and this makes the book unable to engage an adult reader in the way that most YA fiction can. My students weren't fans, but I didn't expect them to be: I taught this book because its purpose is so unlike that of The Outsiders, despite The Outsiders creating the very genre in which Forever... operates.

What really fascinated me about the book was how much my students reacted against it. I mean, I didn't like it very much, but they took particular exception to Michael, who they saw as violating Katherine's consent. Not that he rapes her or anything, but the pressure he applies to Katherine (at one point he accuses her of being a tease) is uncomfortable, moreso to a group of millennials in 2017 raised on discourses around consent and rape culture that I just don't think were there in 1975. Blume appended a preface to the novel at some point (I'm not sure when exactly, but it's in my 2014 edition and contains a web address, so that provides something of a range) indicating that the book doesn't say as much about STIs as it ought, but I think the pressure that Michael puts on Katherine, and Katherine seems to accept as normal, has dated far worse. Not to accuse my students of inconsistency (because the different viewpoints may have actually been held by different people), but after lambasting the book for how didactic it was, and also agreeing that one of the good things about The Outsiders was its lack of moralizing, they also thought it hadn't taught something it ought to have taught, they there was a "debilitating world view" that had gone unaddressed. I'm not sure what to make of this inconsistency in our expectations for young adult literature, one that would recur throughout the semester. show less

It can be easy to dismiss Forever... right away simply because it's 35 years old. Katherine's moved onto an age where she's asking her own children when they're going to have children already. And she certainly didn't have access to the modern technology that would have changed everything between her and Michael in the story - so how relatable is it today?

At the same time, the feelings stay the same. When you're young, you love love. If you want to know why something like a Twilight is so popular today, this is exactly it. Judy Blume captures it far more effectively in Forever... with the electricity of the anticipation, the hotly made promises, the magic of hormones and the sense of excitement that exists when you're young and mutually show more attracted. Who doesn't remember this feeling? Who doesn't love love in this way? This is something Blume understood was the exciting part and that other authors exploit to no end.

Unlike our highly romanticized no-downside vampire lover of today, Blume doesn't shy away from the downside. In this thin novel, she throws in a plethora of teen issues that are fit for the finest of After-School-Specials and even some Lifetime-Movie issues. Depression, Teen Pregnancy, Unknown Paternity, Teen Drinking, Casual Drug Use, Abortion Discussion and even Impotence makes an appearance. Of course, this is all sort of circling Katherine in that it could happen to you...but not really! way, but at least it's still there. show less

While I had high expectations for my first Judy Blume, I found that this felt juvenile and almost as if it was supposed to send a message. I'm not sure if it's because I was reading this forty years after publication, but I didn't really appreciate this.

This whole book was about a relationship. The whole book. There was barely any subplots, just talk about Kath and Michael and Michael and Kath. I love my romances and I love my YA romances especially, but there needs to be more than what was here.

I did appreciate that Blume confronted the sex topic, especially for the time, but it took over a lot of the book despite barely being a conflict. Michael was a good guy and didn't pressure Kath, so I don't see why it was such a big issue.

The show more most interesting side note was Artie, whose mental health was questionable and who had an intriguing relationship with Kath's best friend, Erica. Also, Sybil was an interesting character, getting into top universities yet getting pregnant. I thought these two had a lot more depth to them than Kath and Michael, honestly.

Also, maybe this is a stylistic thing of the time period, but the amount of ellipses used in this book drove me up the wall. They start in the title and they never end. Additionally, Ralph was just weird.

At the end, it felt like Kath's parents won and got their 'I told you so' moment, and the whole book was just proving their point. I felt like, as a young adult, that I was being a little bit patronized.

Maybe I'll give another Blume book a shot since I had heard such great things, but this wasn't my style. show less

Well, one thing you can say about this book is that when someone reviews it, they can sure reveal a lot about themselves. For example, one reviewer said that this book is pornographic. Another said it's totally predictable. Another said it's pretty tame compared to what real teens do today. Some people react by putting their fingers in their ears and crying "Abstinence! Abstinence!" Others will tell you that Judy Blume helped them understand how to have sex responsibly. You know an author has really struck a chord when she inspires such strong and varied reactions.

So here's my reaction to this book: It's not pornographic, but it's graphic. Pornography, by definition, is intended to stimulate. The detailed sex scenes in this book are, I show more think, not intended to be stimulating--they're necessary for the book to work. How can you write a book about a girl's first sexual relationship without writing about the sex? It's not gratuitous, it's honest. And graphic.

I didn't think the story was predictable, either. In the middle of the story, I thought the point was that teenagers can fall in love and it can be real and strong. But by the end of the book, Blume had actually pulled the rug out from underneath her heroine Kath. We see that teenagers rarely know themselves well enough to make big promises like "I'll love you forever."

The book is certainly dated, but Blume's right when she says in the preface to the newer editions that feelings don't really change. I think a lot of girls today struggle with the same decisions Kath struggles with. No one wants to be a tease or a prude. No one wants to rush into something they're not ready for. Man, it's freaking difficult to be a teenager. Your body is ready for things your heart isn't. Everyone has an opinion about what you should or shouldn't do. Reading this book made me glad to be an adult.

So I would definitely recommend this book to teenagers who are thinking about having sex, or already having it. It certainly wouldn't do any harm, and could just possibly help them make up their minds about their own tough decisions. show less

Written in the seventies, Forever manages to have a fairly timeless quality to it, touching on subject matter and emotions relevant to coming of age in any era.

The premise is very, very simple, Katherine, in the last half of her senior year of high school falls in love for the first time, and she navigates all the complicated territory that comes along with that, such as sex, maintaining your own identity in a couple (with college looming on the horizon, does she switch paths to be closer to him?), and just how big of a promise forever is at only eighteen years old.

The sexuality in this book might be a bit much for readers who prefer “a closed door,” however, there’s a reality to those scenes that I thought was really show more well-executed, the language is frank rather than flowery or idealized, and it felt honest in the expectations, the disappointments, and the pleasure aspect, too, it doesn’t pretend that everything is perfect nor does it shame or punish its teenage heroine for enjoying sex.

Aside from the Ralph nickname/euphemism, the pacing is really the only area of this book where I had mixed feelings. On the one hand, the quick pace suited the story, it kind of mimicked how fast your life and your feelings change at that age, it captures the hurried intensity. On the other hand, I would have liked to see this book be just a little bit longer to fully explore some of the topics this really only brushes up against like teen pregnancy, mental health, and questioning your sexuality.

Still, this is solid storytelling that has aged incredibly well, if you like realistic contemporary young adult books, this is definitely worth a try. show less

I will remember this book "Forever", it changed me. I read it in 6th grade back in the 80's because there was so much buzz about, I actually found it in the school library! I have to say that I learned a lot from it, more than I ever did from my mom (she had no clue what I was reading back then!) I feel that it comes from an honest place and is still a fair representation of first experiences; love, sex, and heartbreak. What I respected the most was that it shows young girls that life goes on and that there are plenty of new experiences waiting to happen. I actually would let me daughter read this when she reaches a certain age of maturity and can handle the content.

I can't remember when I first read Forever, and am actually not 100% sure that I read it when I was younger at all, even though that seems very strange for a child of the '70s and '80s who definitely gobbled up Judy Blume's books for slightly younger readers. Whether I did or not, it seemed positively revolutionary to me reading it as an adult in 2015, and I have even more respect for Judy Blume now than I already did. I read an interview with her earlier this year where she described herself as more of a storyteller than a wordsmith (or something to that effect), and that is true. No one will be wowed by the language or descriptions in Forever, but it is a good story laced with important messages about sex. Katherine is a young woman show more (a senior in high school, who turns 18 in the book) whose parents (and grandparents!) respect her ability to make responsible decisions, who acknowledge and affirm her sexual coming of age, speak frankly with her about it, and make sure that she has the information and skills she needs to acquire and use birth control when she decides she is ready to be fully intimate with her boyfriend. She even goes to Planned Parenthood in the book, and describes a place where young women are treated with respect and a lack of judgment. She isn't tortured about her decision to start having sex (which Blume almost always refers to as "making love") in the context of a committed relationship with a loving young man, enjoys it, and knows herself well enough to trust her own instincts when making a difficult decision at the end of the book. Every teenager who is unfortunate enough to live in a part of the country that labors under the delusional assumptions of abstinence-only sex education should be drop shipped a copy immediately! Forever wouldn't work if Judy Blume was just standing on her sex positive soapbox without a convincing and engaging plot and characters to illustrate the message, though, and fortunately, she isn't. Judy Blume is a storyteller, and a very good one, and I'm grateful that she has put that skill to such good use helping teens to negotiate adolescence for the past several decades. Forever was always a controversial book, but it is truly disheartening to read it forty years after its 1975 publication and reflect that the United States has, in many respects, taken steps backward when it comes to the topics it treats. Despite some dated '70s language and references, I hope that teens who pick up this book today can benefit from Blume's perspective. show less