Nobody understands what it feels like to stand on the cusp of adolescence quite like author Ann M. Martin.
At least, that’s what dozens of scholars, writers, and fans of her series “The Baby-Sitters Club” have told Connecticut Public over the course of producing the podcast “Generation: Baby-Sitters Club.”
So, we had to ask Martin herself: How did she manage to create such relatable tween characters in her novels?
Turns out, she wrote what she knew.
“ I think it was, first of all, the way I wanted myself to be seen then, and I know my friends did, too,” Martin told Connecticut Public in an interview.
The themes of friendship, entrepreneurship and independence that ran through over 250 ‘Baby-Sitters Club’ novels attracted millions of young readers to Martin’s stories.
Readers ages 8 to 12 looked up to her characters for a glimpse of what their next phase of life could look like.
“I felt so protective of these characters that I wanted to be able to shepherd them through all of these obstacles and family differences,” Martin said.
Her characters experienced divorced parents, second marriages, the death of loved ones — and so much more — all while going through the growing pains of adolescence in the fictional coastal town of Stoneybrook, Connecticut.
“It was such a hard time, and I wanted the characters to be able to navigate through it,” she said. “I was hoping that it would show readers that you can get through that time.”
Rooted in true female friendships
Readers connected to all of “The Baby-Sitters Club” characters, but usually saw themselves in one girl, specifically. We’ve met Kristys and Marys, Annes and Staceys, Dawns and Claudias.
Martin said they were each based – at least partially – on people from her life.
She mentioned her best friend who she met when she was 4 years old.
“Beth/Kristy was always the one with the big ideas and the sort of can-do attitude, and I was very happy to go along and do whatever Beth had thought up for the day,” Martin said. “I was the shyer one, much shyer, with interests very much like Mary Anne, sewing and reading.”
“It was very easy to base Mary Anne and Kristy on me and Beth and our friendship,” she said.
Other characters are a bit harder for Martin to trace. She sees composites in friends – and even students she taught back at the Plumfield School in Darien.
“Claudia, well, she was named for one of my best friends from Smith College, and we're still very, very close friends,” Martin said. “But, Claudia, the real Claudia, is nothing like the Claudia in the book.”
Claudia, the artist, is fashionable and proud to go her own way. Martin met the real Claudia at Smith College, the women’s school in Northampton, Massachusetts.
“When you go to the campus at Smith, it's just in the air. All of these strong women who feel that they can try anything, do anything,” she said.
Sound like a BSC meeting to anyone?
A place that shaped American writers
Martin attended Smith College in the 1970s during a time of hope and change for women.
That same decade, Smith alumna Gloria Steinem co-founded Ms. Magazine and federal law first protected a woman’s right to get her own credit cards, mortgages and business loans.
Connecticut Public visited Martin’s alma mater, about an hour north of the station, to look through the Mortimer Rare Book Collection.
Curator Erin McGuirl even showed off Martin’s yearbook photo.
“She was the class of 1977,” McGuirl said. “There she is! Education and psychology major.”
Martin wore a turtleneck with a classy bowl cut and the kind of smile that makes you want to smile back. But the yearbook photo was just the start of the tour.
The Smith College archives are like Disneyland for fans of all kinds of women’s literature.
Martin’s work is part of the same collection that holds the papers of another famous alumna: poet Sylvia Plath, author of “The Bell Jar.”
Martin donated “The Baby-Sitters Club” materials to the college so there would be a record of how the hit series came to be.
“There's 30 feet of material in the archival collection,” McGuirl said. “I think she recognized that opportunity to sort of tell more and deeper stories about creating fiction for girls.”
Learn more
“Generation: Baby-Sitters Club” is the third season of the Connecticut Public podcast series “Generation: The media we love & how it shapes us.” Over five episodes, we ask how these novels shaped children’s publishing and literacy, and inspired future leaders of writer’s rooms, boardrooms and beyond.
The season finale of “Generation: Baby Sitters Club” is out now on your favorite podcast feed. Follow and subscribe so you won’t miss our announcement for the next season!
