Final Exam Review Sheet Questions Flashcards
dont fail
What does the Golden Age of Children’s Literature refer to? (Two key points)
- Childhood itself was understood as a “Golden Age”- childhood as a life stage with positive attributes that should be celebrated
- An era of generic execellence for children’s lit
When was the Golden Age of Children’s Literature? (years and key texts)
- It approximately spans from 1865-1926
- Beginning with Lewis Carroll (Alice in Wonderland) 1865- A.A Milne (Winnie the Pooh) 1926
There are two kinds of Golden Age authors-
“destroyers and arcadians”
What is a Destroyer?
- Attacked social conventions
- Authors such as Carroll and Lear
What is a Arcadian?
- Imagined alternative realms
- Authors such as J.M Barrie and Potter
Significance of the Golden Age and Empire
- M.Daphne Nutzer: Argues that the rise of imperialism is associated with the same time as the golden age of children’s lit (1860-1930)
- Therefore the LONGING FOR EMPIRE or at least national importance is reflected in children’s books of the golden age and of our age
- Nutzer argues that Golden Age authors drew on the PRIVILEGE of nearly borderless British imperial economy
Who was James Kincaid?
Wrote Child Loving: The Erotic Child and Victorian Culture
Main Points of Child Loving: The Erotic Child and Victorian Culture:
- Kincaid: The Golden Age images are essentially erotic because they fetishize the border between childhood and adulthood
- Argues that Golden Age authors were so popular because they tapped into the libidinal energies of thier child and adult readers
The Fetishization of Childhood in Childrens Lit
Festishize: to give excessive or irrational devotion to something or someone
Innocent Child: children are represented as innocent-adult producers and readers of the text often fetishize the image of the innocent child
Innocence is socially constructed
Jacqueline Rose on Fetishizing Childhood
- The Case of Peter Pan
- “Desire functions as a form of investment by the adult in the child”
Kincaid on Fetishizing Childhood:
“The ideology of childhood as an innocent, imaginative “Golden Age” displaces but does not dissolve the Victorian impulse to repeatedly erect and then violate the boundaries between children and adults”
Who was J.M Barrie?
1860-1937
Author of Peter Pan and the Little White Bird
History of J.M Barrie Before Peter Pan
- 13 year old brother died- mother’s favourite child (J.M felt that he could never replace him)
- Became a journalist and moved to London where he met the Llewelyn Davies family in 1897
- Adopted the family’s five sons when their parents died
- Llewelyn Davies five sons became inspiration for Peter Pan
- Peter Pan began as series of stories he told the boys in Kensington gardens from 1897 onwards
List the multiple versions of Peter Pan in order:
1 The Little White Bird- Adult Novel- 1902
2 Peter Pan, Or the Boy Who Wouldn’t Grow Up- Three Act PLay- 1904
3 Peter Pan in Kensington Gardens- Illustrated Children’s Book- 1906
4 Peter and Wendy- Full length novel- 1911
5 Peter Pan- Silent Film Screenplay- 1921
6 Jas Hook a Etin Or the Solitary-1925
7 Blot on Peter Pan 1926
8 Peter Pan, Or the Boy Who Wouldn’t Grow Up- Five Act Play-1928
What do the multiple versions of Peter Pan show?
That it is a highly malleable text that resonates with the culture
Initially proposed titles for Peter Pan:
“The Boy Who Hated Mother’s”, “The Great White Father” and “Fairy”
Peter Pan and Gender
Tradition of pantomime women playing Peter Pan
When Peter Pan is played by women there is more innocence
Shades of sexuality
Example: Cathy Rigby’s eternal playing of Peter Pan parallels the “Never Grow Up”
Significance of the Little White Bird
- First mention of Pan (1902) by Barrie
- Influential because in some versions Chapter 19 is censored and removed
Jacqueline Rose on the Little White Bird
Chapter 19 is censored:
- Behind Peter Pan lies the desire of a man or little boy- this violates not only the innocence of childhood, not just that of children’s fiction but what we like to think of as normal sexuality itself
- Questions whether the White Bird scene is erotically charged or the innocent perspective of an adult in awe at a young child’s beauty
How are picture books a paradox?
We see picture books as childlike, simple-thus not worthy of serious critical attention
- But they require complex, sophisticated assumptions about what pictures do and how readers should respond to them
- can be political and controversial
What does polyphonic mean?
-Picture books are “polyphonic”-they often employ complex codes, styles and textual devices to communicate meaning
Semiotics: What is a sign?
Sign: composed of a signified and a signifier and the relationship between them is arbitrary
Therefore uses assumptions to interpret images
Use semiotics to analyze picture books
Margaret Meek: Picture Books as “Imaginative Looking”
- She argues that picture books make reading for all a distinctive kind of imaginative looking”
- There are pleasures in addition to reading: holding the book, turning the pages, touching, pointing to the pictures, etc.
Perry Nodelman & Mavis Reimer:The Rhythm of Picture Books
- They argue that picture books have a back and forth rhythm
- Readers want to turn the page and find out what happens next- but also when to stop and pay close attention to the images
- A characteristic of picture books is a pattern of delays, counterpointing and contributing to the suspense of the plot
Maria Nikolajeva and Carole Scott- How Picturebooks Work- List 4 Main Ideas
1 Symmetry
2 Enhancement
3 Counterpoint
4 Contradiction
Nikolajeva Scott- How Picturebooks Work- Symmetry
Symmetry: words and images as close as possible to conveying the same information or story, essentially repeating information
Nikolajeva Scott- How Picturebooks Work-Enhancement
Enhancement: Pictures expand upon words or vice versa from minimal enhancement to complementary
Nikolajeva Scott- How Picturebooks Work-Counterpoint
Counterpoint: provide distinct information, effort must be made to make a connection between pictures and words
Nikolajeva Scott- How Picturebooks Work-Contradiction
Contradiction: extreme form of counterpoint-pushes the words and pictures further apart- different things
Nancy Larrick- “The All-White World of Children’s Books”
- 1960s-Her article shows the large number of white characters in children’s books
- POC children not seeing themselves in books
What is weneediversebooks.org
-Organization advocating for diverse children’s lit
What is intertextuality?
Graham Allen: Literary texts contain meaning, reading is the process of extracting meaning from texts
- Texts are built from systems, codes and traditions established by previous texts
- The already established systems, codes and traditions are essential to how we read and interpret any given text
- Reading and interpretation is about tracing those relations
- Literary meaning can never be stabilized by the reader-we are always led to new textual relations
- Ex: Albus Dumbledore and the Wizard Archetype
Harry Archetypes
Familiar:
- Underdog
- Difficult beginnings
- Lost orphan royalty
- Chosen one- but brand new to the world
- Pressure to fulfill prophecy
Otto Rank: The Myth of the Birth of the Hero
Otto Rank argues that hero myths (Oedipus, Moses, Jesus) contain ten basic elements:
1 The boy is royal
2 Difficulties precede the conception
3 The child’s life is threatened when a dream or oracle warns the father (or another royal person) that the boy will be in danger
4 The boy is separated from his parents/ orphaned
5 Boy is exposed- basket
6 Boy is put into water- to kill or to save him
7 Child is rescued by animals or shepherd
8 The baby is suckled or reared by animals or lowly persons
9 Hero is recognized as such- often because of mark or wound
10 Hero reconciles with father (or representative) or exacts revenge upon his father
Fan Fiction vs. Recursive Fiction
- Fanfiction utilizes pre-existing characters and settings from a literary or media text
- Fanfiction is distinguished from other forms of recursive fiction (published fairy tales and retellings) by its unofficial methods of circulation- through zines and online
What is interstitial space?
- Fanfiction is most prevalent in fandoms with lots of interstitial spaces- fans write in the margins or gaps
- Ex: Harry Potter is full of interstitial spaces
- Can create diverse representations for all people
Henry Jenkins and Participatory Culture:
Self-described acafan- someone who identifies as a fan His work concluded that fan culture’s primary demographic is female, white, middle class and implicitly adult
Catherine Tosenberger: Homosexuality at the Online Hogwarts
Many HP fanfiction called slash are homoerotic- article discusses the potential for fans, to experiment with non-heteronormative discourses through the medium of HP fanfiction
What is SLASH fanfiction?
- The term slash arose from the Star Trek fandom in the 1970s and refers to the slash the seperates a work of fanfiction primary characters
- Mostly homosexual romance
- Slash can consist of “canonical” relationships (those that exist in the original text) and “non-canonical” slash stories that build upon a subtext that fans claim is present in the canon (Draco/Harry)
Jenkins on Slash:
Jenkins: Genre conventions create highly romantic relationships of male-male friendships even as they seek to wall of those feelings from erotic contact between man”
-Slash permits the movement from male homosocial desire to a direct expression of homoerotic passion
The History of Y.A Literature vs Children’s Lit
- YA lit is an early/mid 20th century phenomenon
- Does not have as long of history as children’s lit
- YA lit is currently experiencing explosive growth
How is the Rise of YA linked to historical events?
- The early 20th century study of adolescence
- Post WWII: invention of teenagrs
- The American Library Association’s creation of YA Services Division
What is the majority buyer age group for books meant for readers 12-17?
- 55% of buyers who read books meant for 12-17 years old are 18 or older
- The largest buyer segment was 30-44 years- 28% of total sales
Main Ideas of Hall’s Adolescence
- Hall identified adolescence as a distinct life stage with own set of defining characteristics
- Used notion of recapitulation: child development mirrors the evolution of human race- from savages to civilization
- Adolescence is a time of sturm und drang- storm and stress
- Approx 12-18 years old
- Parallels the romantic view of childhood
What is the Teenage Bill of Rights (NY Times, 1945)
Ten point charter framed to meet the problems of growing youth
What were the first YA books?
- Helen Boylston- Sue Barton, Student Nurse (1936)
- Maureen Daly- 17th Summer (1942) - unusual first person narration
- Both were successful, publishers began actively marketing to YA
Havighurst: Developmental Theory
Theory of Development Tasks- 1948-53- if teenagers are to successfully climb the ladder of personal development they must complete 7 life tasks
1 Achieve new and more mature relations with age mates of both sexes
2 Achieve masculine or feminine roles
3 Accept physiques and use bodies effectively
4 Achieve emotional independence of parents
5 prepare for marriage and family life
6 Prepare for economic careers
7 Acquire a set of values and ethical system as a guide to behaviour
What is a main critique of early YA Novels?
- Early YA novels show experiences of middle and upper class kids living in a small, all-white town
- Maia W: 1968: Critiques YA authors who keep going back to their own childhood dumb stories of proms, broken friendships, phony conflicts etc
George Woods NY Times
Calls for different topics in YA- one looks for modernity, boldness, realism, address dilemmas of today’s teenagers, handle more serious subjects: narcotics, addiction, illegitimacy, alcoholism, pregnancy, discrimination, retardation
What is a YA Problem Novel?
- Focus on protagonists who must confront and overcome social issues and obstacles
- Ex: S.E Hinton- the outsiders- written by the author when she was 15-16 years old
- Transformed the landscape of YA lit, MARKS SHIFT FROM ROMANCE TO REALISM
Critique of Problem Novels
- Ex: Go Ask Alice- Anonymous (Sparks)
- Critique- focus is not on the richness of settings or complexities of characters but rather on the relentless barrage of social issues
What are the terms usually associated with Children’s Lit and YA?
Realism and authenticity
A Snowy Day:What is unique about the reader’s perspective?
- Readers are positioned behind Peter- we are able to see Peter’s excitement with snow and we are able to see the snow
- We are sharing in Peter with his wonder
What do the colors in a Snowy Day signify?
The bright colors signify and communicate happiness, enthusiasm
-Contrasts: ex: the vibrant red contrasted to the white snow
How were the illustrations in a Snowy Day developed?
The illustrations were developed through a paper cutout style
What structure does A Snowy Day follow?
Perry Nodelman- alot of children’s lit follows the structure: home away home
Roger Lancelyn Green: The Golden Age:
- Green: The Golden Age authors realized that children were not just underdeveloped adults; childhood is a life-stage with positive attributes that should be cleebrated not squelched
- Green: saw children as naturally inhabiting a kind of neverland-a realm of imagination cut off from civlization
- Green: suddenly children were not being written down to anymore but written up
Who were the Key Authors of the Golden Age?
-usually British fairy tales, fantasy, nonsense verse, reflections of British middle/upper class childhood
Humphrey Carpenter, Secret Gardens: Ideas about the Golden Age
- The Golden Age was not a newly discovered country but a utopia created by adults who wanted to critique society
- Arcadians and Destroyers
What permits the endurance of Peter Pan?
- It gets translated and retranslated for every age-like fairy tales
- Assumptions and mysteries surrounding Barrie’s persona life have dramatically shaped contemporary readings of and interest in the tale
