The Ideal Child

Children in children’s literature are constructed in two ways: As characters As implied readers

Concepts of what children are or should be are constructed not by peers, but by adults.

The fictional child, both as character and reader are informed by changeable assumptions about the nature and value of children and childhood. Jan van Eyck

Madonna with the Child Reading circa 1435

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What different ideas about children and childhood do these photos bring to your mind?

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An audience defined genre Children’s literature is defined by its readers,

not its writers. Adults are in complete control of its production: writers,

editors, publishers, reviewers, purchasers. It’s always, at some level, concerned with instruction.

The relationship between author and reader should be one of respect, not condescension.

What does “true” children’s literature sound like? “Row, row, row your boat, gently down the stream Throw your teacher overboard and listen to her scream.”

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Our views of childhood change, mesh, and intermingle.

A Confused Mix

I will move chronologically.

New concepts do not replace the old but add to them.

Each new idea builds upon enriches, and confuses our ideas about childhood

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Concepts of childhood

1. Sinful – The Puritans (1550s -1700s)

2. Rational – John Locke (late 17th century)

3. Natural – Jean-Jacques Rousseau (early 18th century)

4. Consumer – John Newberry (early 18th century)

5. Pure – William Blake (early 19th century)

6. Intelligent – Lewis Carroll (mid 19th century)

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1. The Sinful Child

The Puritans (1500’s through 1600’s) Children are born sinful. That sin needs to be purged Children learn through fear. Children should learn to read to study the Bible. Stories of martyrs detailing horrible deaths were

thought especially appropriate for children. Strict learning environment.

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Recommended Reading

Foxe’s Book of Martyrs (1563)

A Token for Children: Being an Exact Account of the Conversion, Holy and Exemplary Lives and Joyful Deaths of Several Young Children (1672),

The protagonists in these books provide models to aspire to. They died slow, gruesome deaths, but were spiritually strong

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The New England Primer (1683-1830)

Sin begins the alphabet

Importance on books and the Bible

Harsh laws of nature

Punishment for those who do wrong

Natural beauty

Corporal punishment for laziness

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Idealistically Virtuous Children Today, books like William

Bennett’s The Children’s Book of Virtues (1998) are extremely popular, especially with religious families.

Children, like those on the cover, are idealistically virtuous.

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2. The Rational Child

John Locke (1632-1704) Some Thoughts Concerning

Education, 1693 The mind of a child is a blank slate. “Tabula

Rasa.” People are born without innate ideas. People are NOT born sinful (Augustine & The

Puritans). People are NOT born with a certain logic

(Cartesian).

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Training children Children need to learn how to

become rational people in order to be good adults in a well-ordered community.

Children need to learn to resist their natural impulses in favor or reason. Curb natural desire.

Locke recommended instruction with delight.Locke recommended moral fables

because of their simple cause-effect relationship.

Reynard the Fox and Aesop’s Fables

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Moral tales are still common Murcus Pfister’s The Rainbow Fish follows Locke’s

idea by presenting a lesson about sharing through a beautifully illustrated book about fish.

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3. The Natural Child

Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1712-1778) French Philosopher & Educational Thinker Emile: or, On Education 1762 Directly challenged Locke’s ideas. It’s most important to developing the pupil’s

character and moral sense. Society corrupts. Children learn best by figuring

things out for themselves – naturally.

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Robinson Crusoe (1726)

Natural Man. “The Noble Savage.” Primitive people are more pure. Children are more pure.

Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe is the best book for children. It provides the best model.

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A Modern Robinson In Maurice Sendak’s Where the Wild Things Are, Max works

out his feelings of anger on his own by traveling to an island of wild things and subduing them.

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4. The Child Consumer

John Newbery (1713-1767) Sometimes thought of as the first publisher of

children's books. He recognized children as a valuable market. He knew middle class parents want to raise their

children well.

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A Little Pretty Pocket-book. (1744)

John Newberry’s first big publishing success for

children. These were packaged with a ball for boys

and a pincushion for girls.

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Children have influence Children’s voices carry weight

in society. Pester Power Newbery flattered children by

appealing directly to them. Children in stories start to

determine their own fate.

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A Child-centered Economy In Dav Pilkey’s The Adventures of Captain Underpants (1997),

children produce goods, buy, and sell them independent of (and in opposition to) adult control.

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5. The Pure & Innocent ChildWilliam Blake (1757-1827) Songs of innocence (1789) Child is symbolic of the best of humanity. Children come from heaven. The child in you needs to be cherished. Children’s purity and innocence gives them a kind of

wisdom. Knowledge of the cruel world forever corrupts this

innocence. It is impossible to reclaim. Also William Wordsworth.

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The boy who never grew up J. M. Barrie’s Peter Pan

1911 He is innocent and heartless. To stay innocent, he has no

memory and he is entirely self-centered.

But he is also represents an object of desire.

Adults attracted to his perpetual childhood more than children.

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Children’s fiction impossible? Rose insists that books written

for children serve adult interests by helping make sure that child readers conceive of themselves in ways that fulfill society’s expectations, and not according to what is necessarily true about childhood

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6. The Intelligent Child

Lewis Carroll (1832-1898)

Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland 1865

Children recognizes and laugh at adult attempts to socialize her

The adult world is strange and curious place, but children can figure things out for themselves.

Children react against societal pressures to conform.

Adults aren’t always right.

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Parody of moralistic poemSir Isaac Watts Lewis CarrollAgainst Idleness and Mischief (industrious)

•How doth the little busy bee•Improve each shining hour,•And gather honey all the day•From every opening flower!

How Doth the Little Crocodile (lazy)

•How doth the little crocodile •Improve his shining tail, •And pour the waters of the Nile•On every golden scale!

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Two more wise kids Tom Sawyer, Mark Twain

The good-bad boy He lies, cheats, and disobeys, and is

universally loved, while at the end, he gets both the gold and the girl.

The Wizard of Oz, L Frank Baum Uncovers the adult fraud The great and mighty Oz is exposed as an

adult fraud by a young girl and her little dog Toto.

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Children subversively powerful Peter disobeys mother. This visual pun from

Peter Rabbit makes fun of the adult human.

Who is on four legs and who is on two?

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An intelligent childIn Beverly Cleary’s Ramona the Pest, Ramona hears her teacher read the story on the first day of kindergarten. She asks,

“How did Mike Mulligan go to the bathroom when he was digging the basement of the town hall?”

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Review

1. Sinful child: Puritans Moralistic literature with predeterimined truth. Reading is good for all children

2. Rational child: Locke Teach with delight Create reasonable, ethical adults

3. Natural Child: Rouseau Children have more agency since they learn on

their own. Society corrupts, also confuses.

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Review, continued

4. Child Consumer: Newbery Children can enjoy and want (buy) books. Children have economic and social power.

5. Pure Child: Blake Children are models of purity and goodness Childhood serves adult objectives.

6. Intelligent Child: Carroll Opens door to vast array of children’s stories. Society corrupts, also confuses.

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Conclusion

Society’s conception of childhood continues to change and adapt, and its these ideas as confused as they sometimes may be, that form the basis for constructing child characters and readers in children’s literature.

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The (First) Golden Age of Children’s Literature From Alice and to Pooh (1924-1928) Idealized the child as fanciful and free Children can best learn how to be good

through an appeal to the imagination rather than through asserting rules of behavior

Liberation from didacticism, these texts broke the rules for children’s writing by blurring traditional rules of right and wrong

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Why the golden age

Books cheaper, less precious Smaller families Universal education for both genders Good authors Advances in printing technology a pleasurable alternatives to the "dull

reality"

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Nonsense! Foolishness! Power of nonsense. Some books give readers credit for

being able to discern what is appropriate and inappropriate.

Understanding nonsense as nonsense is a fundamental critical skill. We can laugh at foolishness without

imitating it. The best books examine the

boundaries.

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Common situations for children in literature

Trying to fit inRamona the Pest (1968)By Beverly Cleary

Escaping dangerPeter Rabbit (1902)By Beatrix Potter

Fighting for justiceCharlotte’s Web (1952)By E. B. White

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