Non-Fiction Article Response: "Darkness Too Visible"

 "Darkness Too Visible" by Megan Cox Gurdon is an article about the troubling content in Young Adult Literature and why it is not appropriate for this age group.  The author is trying to prove to the readers that the themes in Young Adult books are too dark.  She wants people to think about the damage they could cause for teens as well as how it affects them.  Throughout the article she uses author’s crafts and perspectives to support her opinions on Young Adult literature.

     In the article, Ms. Gurdon used many specific craft moves and opinions to support her claim.  For example, Ms. Gurdon uses imagery to describe the view of Young Adult fiction, "if books show us the world, then fiction can be like a hall of fun-house mirrors, constantly reflecting back hideously distorted portrayals of what life is."  This shows how she uses imagery to negatively portray how Young Adult reflects the events in the world.  Ms. Gurdon also uses loaded words to show her opinion.  For example, in the text it weaves words into the article such as daring, savagely, controversial, profane, lurid and many others to stretch her point and make the books seem darker than they truly are.  In addition, Ms. Gurdon uses certain perspectives to prove her point.  For example, in the article there is a quote from a mother of teenagers that says, “nothing, not a thing, that I could imagine giving my daughter.  It was all vampires and suicide and self-mutilation, this dark, dark stuff.”  Ms. Gurdon uses this  quote to show that a mother, someone most adults can relate to, could not find a single book to buy for a simple gift, so how could teens be reading books like this on a daily basis?

     Overall, I disagree with Megan Cox Gurdon’s point of view in the article.  I believe that YA literature is important for teens to read, whether because it shows that there are people in the world that you can relate to, or to open your eyes to things that are going on in the world that you wouldn’t have otherwise known about or been expose to.  In the article I learned that YA fiction can be sometimes too mature for young readers, but it really depends on the person reading the book.  And lastly, one thing that I did not like about the article is that it uses a very biased selection of quotes.  No quote is from an actual teen, so how can people know for sure that your adult literature actually affects teens?