- English
- ePUB (mobile friendly)
- Available on iOS & Android
About this book
The definitive book-length study of the great classics of American children's literature, now updated for a new century.
Outstanding Book of the Year Award, Children's Literature Association
Often called the Golden Age of Children's Books, the years stretching from the Civil War to World War I were a remarkable epoch in juvenile literature, an era when the best authors on both sides of the Atlantic wrote some of their finest work primarily for children. In Audacious Kids, Jerry Griswold provides a groundbreaking and lucid study of twelve of these classic American children's tales, including such time-honored stories as Little Women, Tom Sawyer, The Secret Garden, and The Wizard of Oz.
Griswold's most remarkable insight is that, fundamentally, these twelve books all tell essentially the same story: a child is orphaned, makes a journey, is adopted and harassed by adults, and eventually triumphs over them and comes into his or her own. Griswold, a leading figure in the study of children's literature, also reveals that these tales emphasize motifs that are distinctly American, such as positive thinking, concern with health, and the concealment of sex and violence, and he shows how these secular parables replaced religion with psychology and preached gospels of emotional self-control and optimism.
In this revised edition, which is aimed at students, scholars, and general readers, Griswold has updated the text throughout and added a new preface, introduction, and select bibliography.
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Information
Table of contents
- Cover Page
- Title Page
- Copyright Page
- Dedication
- Contents
- Preface 2014
- Preface to the First Edition
- Introduction 2014: A History of American Childrenās Literature
- Introduction to the First Edition: Fundamental Similarities among Twelve American Childrenās Books
- Part One Oedipal Patterns
- Part Two Manuals of Republicanism
- Part Three The Theater of Feelings
- Part Four The Gospel of Optimism
- Afterword to the First Edition
- Notes
- Select Bibliography
- Index