Holger Kersten -- Survey: Children in American Literature (3) -- English Department -- Flensburg University

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<bR> <div> <B>Periods in the Development</B></div> <div> <FONT SIZE="5" COLOR="#000000" FACE="Arial" ><B>of American Children's Literature </B></FONT><FONT SIZE="4" COLOR="#000000" FACE="Arial" ><B>(page 3)   </B></FONT><A HREF="mt_childlit1.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Holger Kersten Survey: Children in Amer"><U>Previous page</U></A></div> <bR> <div> <IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Wing0a7300a8011800000000.gif" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0" width="24" height="19">Historical situation: by the 1850's the US saw itself as a fully modern nation, embodying individuality, creative energy, and a solid moral core</div> <bR> <div> <IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Wing0a7300a8011800000000.gif" HEIGHT="19" WIDTH="19" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">An expanding market for children's books:</div> <div> <IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Symb075c002a011800000000.gif" HEIGHT="19" WIDTH="19" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">improvements in book printing and binding</div> <div> <IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Symb075c002a011800000000.gif" HEIGHT="19" WIDTH="19" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">improved transportation</div> <div> <IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Symb075c002a011800000000.gif" HEIGHT="19" WIDTH="19" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">cheaper household lighting</div> <div> <IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Symb075c002a011800000000.gif" HEIGHT="19" WIDTH="19" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">higher levels of literacy</div> <div> <IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Symb075c002a011800000000.gif" HEIGHT="19" WIDTH="19" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">family activities: reading aloud</div> <div> <IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Wing0a7300a8011800000000.gif" HEIGHT="19" WIDTH="19" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">Popularity of juvenile periodicals: <I>Youth's Companion</I>, <I>Our Young Folks</I>, <I>Oliver Optic's Magazine</I>, <I>Riverside Magazine for Young People</I>, <I>St. Nicholas</I></div> <div> <IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Wing0a7300a8011800000000.gif" HEIGHT="19" WIDTH="19" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">Childhood in literature attains a more idealized and sanctified position: the child is elevated to a powerful symbolic stature within the culture</div> <div> <IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Wing0a7300a8011800000000.gif" HEIGHT="19" WIDTH="19" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">After 1850: two complementary literary genres provide texts for family and child audiences:</div> <div> <B><IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Symb075c002a011800000000.gif" HEIGHT="19" WIDTH="19" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">Adventure literature</B> (written by male authors, focus on plot and setting)</div> <div> <B><IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Symb075c002a011800000000.gif" HEIGHT="19" WIDTH="19" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">Domestic </B>(or family)<B> fiction</B> (written by women, focus on character development and moral suasion)</div> <div> <IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Wing0a730077011800000000.gif" HEIGHT="19" WIDTH="19" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">both genres share a tradition of didactic instruction inherited from the eighteenth century</div> <div> <IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Wing0a730077011800000000.gif" HEIGHT="19" WIDTH="19" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">entertainment aspect: credible characters and interesting plots</div> <div> <IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Wing0a730077011800000000.gif" HEIGHT="19" WIDTH="19" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">characteristic increasingly defined by middle-class standards: internalize moral code, ingenuity, persistence, practicality, independence</div> <div> <B><IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Wing0a7300a8011800000000.gif" HEIGHT="19" WIDTH="19" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">Domestic fiction</B></div> <div> <IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Symb075c002a011800000000.gif" HEIGHT="19" WIDTH="19" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">privileged the home and family as the best context for character building and moral reformation (as prerequisites for the improvement of the larger society)</div> <div> <IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Symb075c002a011800000000.gif" HEIGHT="19" WIDTH="19" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">women and girls served as the superior moral force, guiding others (usually male) to a reformation of their character through long-suffering devotion, acts of charity, prayer, and tears</div> <div> <IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Symb075c002a011800000000.gif" HEIGHT="19" WIDTH="19" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">embodies a worldview that took children seriously, not as passive characters but as "redeemers" who could transform and "save" their culture</div> <div> <IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Symb075c002a011800000000.gif" HEIGHT="19" WIDTH="19" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">represented by writers such as Susan Warner (1819-1885), Harriet Beecher Stowe (1811-1896), Sarah Chauncy Woolsey (1835-1905), Martha Finley (1828-1909), Louisa May Alcott (1832-1888), and Hariet M. Lothrop (1844-1924)</div> <div> <IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Symb075c002a011800000000.gif" HEIGHT="19" WIDTH="19" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">importance of <B>Susan Warner's </B><I><B>Wide, Wide World</B></I><B>, 1850</B> (enormous sales, 14 printings), created a paradigm</div> <div> <IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Wing0a730077011800000000.gif" HEIGHT="19" WIDTH="19" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">(female) orphan, alone in the world</div> <div> <IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Wing0a730077011800000000.gif" HEIGHT="19" WIDTH="19" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">illness becomes as catalyst for either religious conversion or moral reformation (very good persons often succumb to a fatal illness; inevitable death preceded by long confinement [allows other characters to recognize their own failings])</div> <div> <IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Wing0a730077011800000000.gif" HEIGHT="19" WIDTH="19" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">death of a moral innocent imitates the sanctification of Christ's crucifiction</div> <div> <IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Wing0a730077011800000000.gif" HEIGHT="19" WIDTH="19" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">moral lessons:</div> <div> <IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Symb075c002d011800000000.gif" HEIGHT="19" WIDTH="19" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">acceptance and self-sacrifice increase moral perfection ( ! goal of life)</div> <div> <IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Symb075c002d011800000000.gif" HEIGHT="19" WIDTH="19" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">goodness always endures and surmounts adversity</div> <div> <IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Symb075c002d011800000000.gif" HEIGHT="19" WIDTH="19" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">humility, selflessness as Christian duty</div> <div> <IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Wing0a7300a8011800000000.gif" HEIGHT="19" WIDTH="19" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">Values transmitted in children's literature remain basically unchanged: obedience, respect for elders, truthfulness, trust in God</div> <div> <IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Wing0a7300a8011800000000.gif" HEIGHT="19" WIDTH="19" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">Way of transmission changed: no overt doctrine, goodness is a matter of possessing or developing self-sacrificing behavior</div> <div> <IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Wing0a7300a8011800000000.gif" HEIGHT="19" WIDTH="19" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">Ideas of domesticity and separate-sphere ideology were not monolithic constructs: <B>Lousia May Alcott's fiction </B>(<I>Little Women</I>, 1868) deviated from Warner's pattern</div> <div> <IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Wing0a7300a8011800000000.gif" HEIGHT="19" WIDTH="19" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">not exclusively upright and well-mannered children as protagonists; even female characters misbehave, feel resentment and envy, and disobey authority</div> <div> <IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Symb075c002a011800000000.gif" HEIGHT="19" WIDTH="19" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">but the plot often turns on recognition of the implications of misbehavior; there is a price for selfishness, greed, jealousy</div> <div> <IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Symb075c002a011800000000.gif" HEIGHT="19" WIDTH="19" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">Alcott's teaching is not as didactic as earlier children's literature, but the moral lessons are just as clear</div> <div> <B><IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Wing0a7300a8011800000000.gif" HEIGHT="19" WIDTH="19" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">"Boys' Books"</B></div> <div> <IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Symb075c002a011800000000.gif" HEIGHT="19" WIDTH="19" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">William Taylor Adams ("Oliver Optic," 1822-1897)</div> <div> <I><IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Wing0a730077011800000000.gif" HEIGHT="19" WIDTH="19" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">The Boat Club</I> (1854)</div> <div> <IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Wing0a730077011800000000.gif" HEIGHT="19" WIDTH="19" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">transitionary figure</div> <div> <IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Wing0a730077011800000000.gif" HEIGHT="19" WIDTH="19" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">religious doctrine entirely absent, but Protestant virtues like honesty, friendship, obedience, and trust remained characteristic for the protagonists</div> <div> <IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Wing0a730077011800000000.gif" HEIGHT="19" WIDTH="19" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">plots gradually emphasized adventure over moral instruction</div> <div> <IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Wing0a730077011800000000.gif" HEIGHT="19" WIDTH="19" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">adventures in the world provided self-taught lessons; no older moral guide needed; sometimes the hero did not improve his character at all</div> <div> <IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Symb075c002a011800000000.gif" HEIGHT="19" WIDTH="19" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">Horatio Alger (1832-1899)</div> <div> <I><IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Wing0a730077011800000000.gif" HEIGHT="19" WIDTH="19" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">Ragged Dick</I> (1867); the Ragged Dick Series: <I>Fame and Fortune</I> (1868), <I>Mark the Match Boy</I> (1869),<I> Rough and Ready</I> (1869), <I>Ben the Luggage Boy</I> (1870),<I> Rufus and Rose</I> (1870)</div> <div> <IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Wing0a730077011800000000.gif" HEIGHT="19" WIDTH="19" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">protagonists with superficial faults but with humanitarian values</div> <div> <IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Wing0a730077011800000000.gif" HEIGHT="19" WIDTH="19" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">almost complete absence of parents; children are alone in the big city</div> <div> <IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Wing0a730077011800000000.gif" HEIGHT="19" WIDTH="19" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">character improvement not so much an issue as a movement toward an improved financial situation and the acquisition of respectability ("from rags to riches" theme)</div> <div> <IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Wing0a730077011800000000.gif" HEIGHT="19" WIDTH="19" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">protagonists strive for middle-class acceptance; they conform rather than rebel</div> <div> <IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Wing0a730077011800000000.gif" HEIGHT="19" WIDTH="19" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">achievement: "good boys in a bad environment"</div> <div> <IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Symb075c002d011800000000.gif" HEIGHT="19" WIDTH="19" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">introduced high adventure, suspense, urban settings</div> <div> <IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Symb075c002d011800000000.gif" HEIGHT="19" WIDTH="19" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">disposed of the sentimental, pious child</div> <div> <IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Symb075c002d011800000000.gif" HEIGHT="19" WIDTH="19" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">retained the existing moral configuration of the early nineteenth century </div> <div> <IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Symb075c002a011800000000.gif" HEIGHT="19" WIDTH="19" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">Thomas Bailey Aldrich (1836-1907), <I>The Story of a Bad Boy</I> (1870)</div> <div> <IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Wing0a730077011800000000.gif" HEIGHT="19" WIDTH="19" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">adventuresome, descriptive narrations of rural pleasures, boyhood escapades, interfering adults</div> <div> <IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Wing0a730077011800000000.gif" HEIGHT="19" WIDTH="19" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">autobiographical background</div> <div> <IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Wing0a730077011800000000.gif" HEIGHT="19" WIDTH="19" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">intended to break with the didacticism of earlier children's literature: misbehavior is a normal part of childhood; children do not have to be virtuous to become proper adults</div> <div> <IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Wing0a7300a8011800000000.gif" HEIGHT="19" WIDTH="19" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">Tendency in children's literature as the nineteenth century comes to an end: moral certainty comes under assault, bad boys evade moral choices and downplay their significance</div> <bR> <bR> <div> <U>Source:</U> Gail Schmunk Murray. <I>American Children's Literature and the Construction of Childhood</I> (New York and London: Twayne Publishers, Prentice Hall International, 1998), ch. 3.</div> </td> </tr></table></td></tr></table></body>