Excerpt: Tavi Gevinson previews the new 'Rookie' book

I like to think I was pretty productive in high school, but Tavi Gevinson puts me to shame.

The founder of Rookie magazine, now a senior in high school, has become a role model for teens and adults alike. Rookie constantly blows me away with its array of cool interviews (Morrissey?!) and ingenious original content ("Ask A Grown Man") that's aimed for younger readers but can still hit home with their parents.

Drawn and Quarterly just published its second Rookie compendium, Rookie Yearbook Two, that includes highlights from the site as well as new content, such as the Judy Blume letter you see here. (It's reprinted at the bottom of this post, in case you can't read it.)

I e-mailed Tavi to get some more info about the mag and her bright future:

Hi, Tavi! Since I'm sharing the Judy Blume letter from the new book, I was just wondering if you were a fan and what your favorite Blume novel is.

Yes! I learned about periods from Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret. Before that I was very into Superfudge and Otherwise Known as Sheila the Great, which was a great inspiration to me as an aspiring snooty tween. It also prompted a couple dangerous rounds of that sleepover game where you all write down what you really think of each other.

Next year you graduate high school. Do you think you'll have to adjust your workload while you're in college? And which schools are your front-runners?

I imagine my workload and schedule will be reworked quite a bit, but I just can't say how until I'm there. I hope to be in New York where working on Rookie will be easier, and the schools I'm interested in there are NYU and Barnard.

You're featured in the great new doc about Kathleen Hanna, The Punk Singer. How did you discover Kathleen's music/work, and what do you admire about her?

I read a book called Girl Power in eighth grade which introduced me to riot grrrl. Aside from her music and incredible stage presence, I admire her for showing that one's personal relationship to feminism is a real ongoing process. I admire that she can talk about mistakes she might have made when she was younger and continue to evolve.

As someone who has experienced a lot in a relatively short period of time, what would you say is the best day you've had in, say, the last five years?

Going to a Fleetwood Mac concert with my parents and my best friends, hearing Stevie Nicks dedicate Landslide to me and meeting her after.

Note: Below is the text from the Judy Blume letter that appears in Rookie Yearbook Two. You can only read it here!

Hi, Rookie readers.

I'm writing a novel right now that's set in the 1950s, a decade I know well because that's when I was a teenager. When my adorable husband tells me it's a historical novel I pretend to bash him over the head. You guys are farther removed from that decade than I was from the Roaring Twenties — you know, The Great Gatsby, and all those flapper dresses and beads.

I thought I hated the '50s. So boring. So bland. Every family pretending to be happy. But out of nowhere I got this idea for a book and it wouldn't let me go. I liked creative challenges as a teenager, and I guess I haven't changed that much because this one is a real challenge.

Speaking of changes, I can't believe how much hasn't changed since then. People stuff, relationship stuff —love and loss and friends and school and families. That's what I like to write about. OK, so we didn't have cellphones or computers and we didn't get our info online. We called our jeans dungarees, a high heel was three inches, and our favorite lipstick was Pixie Pink. (I know!) We slow-danced the night away unless we were doing the Lindy Hop, which was fun but left us sweaty and wondering if our deodorant was still working.

We worried about invasions from outer space and from the Communists. There were movies about werewolves and zombies, but they were too scary for me. Good girls didn't go all the way (but three of the top girls in my class were pregnant at graduation).

I stuffed my double-A bra and lied about getting my period. In sixth grade I pricked my finger to get enough blood to smear on a pad, then wore the pad to school to prove to my friends that I, too, had my period. When I actually got it I was 14, and it was spring of eighth grade. I was so anxious to be like everyone else — too anxious. I kept all my interesting thoughts and ideas to myself. I pretty much kept everything to myself and pretended to always be happy. Welcome to the '50s!

Mistakes weren't as public then. One of my mother's main concerns was with how other people saw us. What will the neighbors think? I can't imagine what my mother would think of Google. Personally, I have a love/hate relationship with Google. Love it for research and info, hate it for what it can do to an individual, especially someone young. A story gets out and you're cooked. You should be able to make mistakes. We all do — there's no way to grow up without making them. We should be able to admit our mistakes, learn from them, and move on. But if it's a public mistake it will follow you forever, thanks to Google. And that doesn't seem fair. A friend of mine from a political family told her kids, "Don't do anything you wouldn't want to read about in tomorrow's paper." That's pretty good advice.

I hope you have enough time to think and to dream, and to enjoy your lives. Sometimes it seems to me you're all so programmed there's no time left to just be. So have some fun! (The kind that won't wind up on the internet.)

Love,

Judy