While I understand what you mean, it's a weird comparison and highlights what to me are the inherent limitations of YA. During the code-era of Hollywood, there was no other choice, movies had to follow the rules and work within the limitations, sometimes it made great films.
Admitting that the defining characteristic…

McCarthy may not, but Stephen King does.

The way I see it, some books that have pretensions to be universal can have appropriate subjects and language level for teens and young adult, a YA novel will be deliberately limiting itself to a young audience.

I wasn't ascribing value, these are just statistical categories which only take into account how many books are read, someone who reads 50 Harlequin books a year will be considered a serious reader, someone who reads one modernist classic a year and that's it will be a non-reader.
By your description, you are a serious…

None taken, that's fair (you're off by a decade btw, that was the late 90's), I'd be curious to see a similar poll now (or then for the US), and if it has changed to reflect a higher representation of YA authors, you can just as well argue they are meeting a need that was unfulfilled.
Although surely American teenagers…

I don't have numbers, but my sister was assigned it for instance (at an age where it was appropriate to be fair, and before the movies were released).
And generally, she's five years younger than me, and even if not just HP, I found that her reading requirements were fairly "easy" and to a standard that would put you…

More than self-hatred, I think part of it is a mix of self-righteousness and laziness seasoned with a spoonful of populism, in that people will want what they like to be recognised as the best (or possibly among it) and generally like to have their opinions validated, but ideally they would also not step out of their…

But there's a bit more to it, rightly or wrongly, academia and culture is still focusing on an agreed on list of classics, they can be fun but they are also more.
By replacing them with books that are only fun (and sometimes a bit more), you're actually doing a disservice to the kids who then arrive in university at a…

To an extent you did, Harry Potter really made children's books ok for all ages (and YA, but the first few books are for kids, not YA, they matured with their audience), but when I was a teenager, the most read authors in my high school were Zweig, Kundera, and Bret Easton Ellis, and I distinctly recall polls by age…

I have the first volume of LOTR (well actually the first half) published in a children's books collection (which was therefore then in six volumes), but that was before YA became a thing. But the publisher also published it in its fantasy collection.
Overall, fantasy seems to be a separate thing even if it does appeal…

I think it's due this Wednesday.

But it's also an argument to be made about art in general, not just YA lit. And the "gendered" image of a work or genre is linked to its audience more than the artist (as the article acknowledges when it brings up The Beatles), I might be wrong but I get the feeling John Green's books also mostly appeal to girls, they…

I can't speak for the US, but I believe it would still apply somewhat, in France, statistically, a serious reader is someone who reads 25 books a year or more, that's 20,000 people (assuming the proportion among the general population would remain the same in the US that would be more or less 100,000 people). Any book…

Needless to say that in France, it's not part of the conversation (even if you know that most conservatives are also Christian). But the Church of England actually seems pretty relaxed about most things (from my very distant viewpoint), a nice contrast with what seems to be the case in about every other country.

I'd love to see the Greens do well, but stupid first past the post system makes it unlikely, and now I'm worrying they might cost Labour a few seats.
Just because it bears repeating, first past the post is stupid and as a consequence the UK barely deserves to be called a democracy.

Probably, I think I'll gomfull hermit for the election though.

I'm always surprised when I get to see that there are people here who are actually religious, they're a lot quieter than in the US or even France. Or maybe I've almost successfully become a hermit.

Don't worry, equal marriage in the UK was only passed thanks to Labour, more than a few tory MPs voted against the law.

Never seen it (it was roundly eviscerated), but I guess it will always be remembered in France as a movie causing a change in the law.
I was a bit surprised when moving to the UK that it was on all the world cinema shelves in shops (next to Godard, Jeunet, or Melville), but I then quickly found out that French is a…

I live in the UK now, they seem pretty uptight when it comes to sex and profanity (you would absolutely never get a restriction in France just on account of language), don't know about the rest, Spain I believe is pretty relaxed too.