Noughts & Crosses Reflections by Lesley Nelson-Addy

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In her 2023 memoir, Just Sayin’, Malorie Blackman reflects that she wrote Noughts & Crosses in response to the murder of Stephen Lawrence. Twenty-five years later, we are still asking many of the same questions about racism, justice and education. Blackman’s work has a significant presence within the English curriculum. From Pig Heart Boy in Key Stage 2 to Noughts & Crosses in Key Stage 3, and more recently Boys Don’t Cry at GCSE, Blackman’s work has become a significant part of many young people’s reading lives.

I remember reading Noughts & Crosses as a teenager, glued to my sofa as I poured over every page, captivated by a story that reflected elements of my own everyday experience (for example, the moment with the plaster!) Although often described as dystopian, the novel never presents the illusion of a perfect society for any of its characters. Instead, Blackman presents the messy realities of the world and leaves readers to wrestle with what they mean.

Blackman made it impossible for everyone to read the novel comfortably. While I admired Sephy’s freedom, her privilege kept me at a distance. Instead, I found myself clinging to Callum’s scenes. Callum’s relationships with his family and his experiences within the education system resonated most deeply with me.

As we celebrate twenty-five years since Noughts & Crosses was first published, here are three messages that arose from my recent re-read.

Characterisation in literature is rich and complex

Blackman has often spoken about her intention to write stories with Black protagonists, but Noughts & Crosses is particularly interesting because its dual narrative presents two characters with whom she shares different aspects of her identity. Persephone Hadley shares Blackman’s skin colour, yet the experiences she describes in Just Sayin’ align with some of the ways she presents Callum’s life. By making this choice, Blackman immediately complicates the assumption that skin colour alone determines affinity or belonging. Our identities are shaped by intersecting experiences of race, class, ability, opportunity and power.

Re-reading the novel recently made me think about the complexity of privilege. For example, through Callum and, particularly, Jude, I found myself wondering whether Blackman was also inviting readers to consider the experiences of the white working-class. On this re-read I realised that Blackman had created a much more nuanced portrayal of race and power. She does not simply reverse racial hierarchies or invite readers to imagine that oppression operates in identical ways across different groups.

Students and teachers are all learners

Education is one of the novel’s principal sites of conflict. Blackman explores playground politics, selective schooling and complexities around access to opportunity, but the classroom scene where Callum challenges the curriculum remains one of its most enduring moments. He questions the historical narratives his teacher presents and asks whose stories have been excluded.

Through Callum’s experience, Blackman also reveals the burden that curriculum decisions and pedagogical choices can place upon students of colour – the expectation that they will explain, defend or represent entire communities within the classroom. While we admire Callum’s courage in speaking up, we are left saddened that many young people still feel compelled to do so today, often at the risk of punishment. As educators, we have a responsibility to build curricula that invite students’ knowledge while also extending and refining it. That responsibility should never rest solely on the shoulders of our students.

Youth does not shield teenagers from difficult experiences

Throughout the novel, both Callum and Sephy confront profound questions about family, identity, prejudice and love. Blackman refuses to shield young readers from these realities, trusting them instead to grapple with moral complexity. Her novels provide a space where young people can begin asking difficult questions long before they encounter them in their own lives. Rather than writing down to children, she honours their emotional and intellectual capacity to engage and develop a personal response.

Like Romeo and Juliet, Noughts & Crosses asks us to watch two young people bear the weight of divisions they did not create. Yet Blackman refuses Shakespeare’s neat reconciliation. There is no golden statue erected in Callum and Sephy’s memory and no feud that is simply resolved through shared grief. The prejudice, inequality and suspicion remain painfully intact throughout the series. Yet Blackman also refuses utter despair. Hope is not presented as the absence of injustice, but as the courage to imagine, and endeavour to create, a different future.

This re-reading of Noughts & Crosses felt different from my first encounter with the novel. As readers change, the questions the novel asks of us, and those we ask of our society, change too. This novel does not offer easy answers, but it continues to challenge assumptions, deepen empathy and remind us that literature can both help us imagine a more just world and equip us to confront the injustices of the one we inhabit.