Teaching Period Children's Lit

[Kelly Searsmith, Ph.D.]

When I interviewed for a position teaching children's literature at
Kansas State, around 9 years ago, I remember being unselfconsciously
committed to a literary historical perspective of children's
literature (period orientation on matters of national identity,
acculturation, educational theory, gender identity, and so forth).
During the interview, I remember a dawning awareness that the
interviewers were not necessarily opposed to such a view, but were
much more apparently interested in a contemporary educational take on
children's literature, perhaps out of a social commitment to the
children of our time as well as to the teacher training that such
courses so often provide (Jack Zipes, in his treatments of fairy
tales, has managed to write exceptionally well from both perspectives,
but the latter orientation-education studies--has especially drawn him
to contemporary fairy tales for contemporary children). I found these
competing orientations to be a strain in the world fairy tale course I
taught for the UIUC English Department one year, which, if I rightly
recall, included a segment on Victorian fairy tales. Many of the
students enrolled in the class were education majors. They did gain
something from the multicultural studies appeal of the course, but
tended to resist historicizing discourses, either with reference to
the texts themselves or to fairy tale studies as a critical field.

[Bob]

Kelly,

I'm intrigued by your mention of contemporary fairy tales. I don't get
much further than about 1915 in my study of literature, and would
appreciate some ideas of what contemporary fairy tales look like.

Bob

On Sep 10, 8:27 pm, "Kelly Searsmith, Ph.D." <ksearsm...@gmail.com>
wrote:

[Naomi W]

This is outside the purview of this discussion group, but it also
happens to be a favorite topic! Bob, you could check out the great
website "Sur la Lune," which has extensive bibliographies covering
this very topic. My favorites are by Angela Carter, who retells
Perrault, Terry Pratchett, whose _Witches Abroad_is unfailingly funny,
Francesca Lia Block, Robin McKinley, and Jane Yolen. There are
collections of wonderful fairy tale poetry, such as Wolfgang Meisel's
_Disenchantments_, and Terri Windling and Ellen Datlow produce
retellings every year in their collections of the best fantasy and
horror fiction (with titles such as _Red as Blood_). Tanith Lee has
done a marvellous re-telling of Snow White as a vampire story.

Naomi

[Bob]

On Sep 13, 11:13 am, Naomi W <wood.na...@gmail.com> wrote:
> This is outside the purview of this discussion group, but it also
> happens to be a favorite topic! Bob, you could check out the great
> website "Sur la Lune," which has extensive bibliographies covering
> this very topic. My favorites are by Angela Carter, who retells
> Perrault, Terry Pratchett, whose _Witches Abroad_is unfailingly funny,
> Francesca Lia Block, Robin McKinley, and Jane Yolen. There are
> collections of wonderful fairy tale poetry, such as Wolfgang Meisel's
> _Disenchantments_, and Terri Windling and Ellen Datlow produce
> retellings every year in their collections of the best fantasy and
> horror fiction (with titles such as _Red as Blood_). Tanith Lee has
> done a marvellous re-telling of Snow White as a vampire story.
>
> Naomi
>
> On 10 Sep, 20:21, Bob <robertchamp2...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>
> > Kelly,
>
> > I'm intrigued by your mention of contemporary fairy tales. I don't get
> > much further than about 1915 in my study of literature, and would
> > appreciate some ideas of what contemporary fairy tales look like.
>
> > Bob

Naomi,

Thanks for the tip about the wonderful Sur la Lune site.

It is interesting to see how controversial some children's books have
been in the 20th century. Here is a URL for an article in _The New
Yorker_ about a controversy over the Babar books:

http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2008/09/22/080922fa_fact_gopnik

I know this is a 19th century lit group, but I couldn't resist passing
this along.

Bob