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1. Constructing Childhood: The History of Early Childrens Literature and the Place of Fairy Tales English 507
Dr. Karen Roggenkamp
Image: Orbis Sensualium PictureFacsimile of 1672 English Edition
3. Analyze childrens literature in order to . . . Uncover cultures ideal views of childhood
Examine societys concept of self
Interrogate individual authors relationship to broader cultural contexts
Viewed across time, provides insight into our own concepts of childhood and normalcy
Image: Arthur B. Houghton, Mother and Children Reading, 1860
4. What did childhood mean? Key shifts:
Augustinian paradigm (17th Century, Puritans): Children innately corrupt, sinful; animalistic nature (self will) must be constrained; spiritual objectives; instruction through punishment
Educationalist paradigm (18th century; Locke): Childrens minds offer a blank slate (tabula rasa) on which to write; neither good nor evil by nature; intellectual and moral objectives; instruction through logic and reason; literature to instruct and delight
Natural Educationalist paradigm (18th-19th centuries; Rouseau): Children innately pure, wise; childlikeness (self will) must be developed and protected from corrupting social institutions; emotional and moral objectives; instruction through non-directive means
40 years ago: children need to read about harsh realities of life
5. Childrens Lit in Ancient World (roughly 50 BCE / BC - 500 CE / AD) Oral tales heard, not read
Hybrid audiencechildren and adults alike
Aesops Fablesanimal tales with pointed moralsnot just for children
Guide/shape citizenry; entertain
Image: John Ogilby, The Fables of Aesop, 1673-75
6. Middle Ages(500 1500) Low literacyclass-based
Childhood generally ignoredshort and not so sweet
Little adultscf. portraiture
Medieval epics, romances, histories for adults also held childrens interest (e.g. Beowulf, King Arthur, Robin Hood, lives of saints, historical legends, etc.)
7. Medieval Fables(500 1500) Mingle reality with magic, fantasy, enchantment; animal characters
Literature rich with childlike elements (wonder, mystery, fantasy, etc.)
Gesta Romanorum (Deeds of the Romans), late 13th century: moral tales; animal tales; familiar story plots for centuries to come (Boccaccio, Chaucer, Shakespeare)
Image: Early Manuscript, Gesta Romanorum
8. European Renaissance(1500 1650) Printing Press (mid 15th century):
Print books in quantityreduce time, labor, cost
Increased literacy, promoted education, disseminated knowledge and practice of reading
Eventually change nature of childhood, childrens literature, and fairy tales
Image: Replica of early Gutenberg press
9. Bad Boys and Girls: Protestantism, 17th-century Puritans, & Roots of Modern Childhood Ideal of universal literacy
Children products of original sin; prepare for adult religious experience
Instructional books, conduct books
Primers: teach reading, but also turn innately sinful children into spiritual beings
Themes of death, damnation, conversion
Image: From New England Primer, circa 1690
10. A little light bedtime reading . . . Popular reading for Protestant children:
Book of Martyrs (1563), Anti-Catholic account of Bloody Mary
The Day of Doom (1662), poem of damnation of world
Images: Thomas Foxe, Book of Martyrs, 1563; Michael Wigglesworth, The Day of Doom, 1662
11. Children can be Reasonable, too: The Enlightenment (late 17th, 18th centuries): John Locke (1632-1704)
Some Thoughts Concerning Education (1693)
Young mind as tabula rasa (blank slate)
Children not burdened by original sin
Logical beings awaiting proper educationrational writings
Whole new construction of childhooddistinct phase of life
Image: John Locke
12. Romanticism (late 18th, early 19th centuries): Enter Innocence Jean-Jacques Rousseau
Emile (1755)Children should be raised in natural settings, free to imagine
Children naturally innocent, moral The child is the father of the man (Wordsworth)
Books should free childrens imaginations
Romantics influence writers of Golden Age
Image: Jean-Jacques Rousseau
13. Folktales, Fairy Tales, and the New Child Complicated role of fairy tales in literary history of 18th, 19th centuries
Romantic interest in folktalescollect authentic culture
But Enlightenment thinkers disapprovefolk culture too childlike and fantastic
Fairy tales eventually deemed appropriate only for children and the folk (peasant, simple, lower class)
More educated could be intellectually interested in folk culture and the LITERARY tale
14. Key Figures of Literary Fairy Tale Charles Perrault (1628-1703)
Tales from Times Past; or, Tales of Mother Goose (1697)
Retellings & literary renderings of Cinderella, Little Red Riding Hood, Sleeping Beauty, etc.
Some explicitly directed toward children
Image: Histoires ou Contes du temps pass avec des moralitez, 1697
15. Key Figures of Literary Fairy Tale Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm
Nursery and Household Tales (1812-1815) directed explicitly toward children
Clean up folktales; develop Perraults literary fairy tales
Rewrite to fit 19th-century sensibilities and ideas about morality, politics, social class, etc.
Image: Little Brother & Little Sister and Other Tales by the Brothers Grimm, illus. Arthur Rackham, 1917