What does it take to make someone sassy?

I am sure my mother spent many long hours contemplating this question during my teenage years, but I doubt she ever found an answer. The honest answer is that there are many things, but I proudly credit much of the literature and television I read and watched—or perhaps to put it more accurately, consumed—as a child. I read a lot, but in particular I really loved books by Tamora Pierce, the "Harry Potter" series and later the television show "Buffy the Vampire Slayer." I also fully credit them with contributing to my sassiness. When my mother expressed her confusion about my sassy attitude at various points in my life, I also felt confused, mostly because I had no idea how she could have thought I would turn out as anything else.

(Tamora Pierce books, The Song of the Lioness Series, which focuses on Alanna.)

The steps to building a sassy adult go as follows: Find some good role models and then practice. The Tamora Pierce books came during what our middle school librarian affectionately termed the "chicks on horses with swords" phase, which might have been extended in my case given my penchant for books with female leads and my interest in horses. Pierce wrote multiple connected series that all featured very strong female characters, often with special powers or magic. The first of her series I read featured a girl who could communicate with animals using a form of magic; the second series I read featured a girl who lived as a boy in order to become a knight. Neither of these two female heroes were particularly fond of following rules to the letter.

Early favorites were the Harry Potter series. Perhaps it should have been a sign that when I didn’t want to learn how to read, I memorized the first line of the first Harry Potter book so that my parents would think I was reading. Harry himself became a great role model in sassiness, and anyone who doesn’t think Harry is sassy might need a refresher. The movies also provide excellent courses in sass, particularly of the British variety. In the fourth book, "Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire," Harry expresses a strong desire to respond to his uncle’s repeated “So’s…” with “So… what?” Two books later, Harry’s sass has grown, and he doles out quippy responses to his friends. When Ron tells him “Well, you can’t break an Unbreakable Vow…” Harry’s charming response is “I’d worked that much out for myself, funnily enough.” Harry’s sassy narration also provides quality moments such as “A little way to his left, Ernie Macmillan was contemplating his hoop so hard [during an Apparition lesson] that his face had turned pink; it looked as if he was straining to lay a Quaffle-sized egg.”

("Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone," ft. Sassy Harry. Image from Reddit)

The final, extremely solid contribution to my sassy ways was my dad’s decision to introduce me to "Buffy the Vampire Slayer." In many ways, Buffy herself stands for many things I love about girl power and the '90s iteration of young feminism. The entire TV show was jam-packed with sass from pretty much every character, and the unique lingo crafted for the show gave it a very special feeling. A quality example is: “See, this is a school. And we have students and they check out books and then they learn things,” as well as an exchange between Buffy and her mentor, Giles: Giles begins with “If your identity as a slayer is revealed, it could put you and all those around you in grave danger,” to which Buffy responds, “Well, in that case, I won’t wear my button that says ‘I’m a Slayer—Ask Me How.’”

(Season 1 Episode 5, "Never Kill a Boy on the First Date." Gif from MTV)

Most of these things seem sophisticated compared to late-aughts Disney-brand sarcasm, which my parents had little tolerance for. My idols in the ways of being sassy were given good material to work with, and thus so was I. At various points along the way I have made some questionable choices. For example, in seventh grade I sassed the assistant head of my middle school, in high school my friend nicknamed me "Sassquatch" and another high school friend bought me a shirt printed with "Sorry Not Sorry" because I said it so often. Even with these slight bumps, I think I've turned out OK. At the very least, I seem to have learned from some of the sassy best.