Children's literature or juvenile literature includes stories, books, magazines, and poems that are created for children. Modern children's literature is classified in two different ways: genre or the intended age of the reader, from picture books for the very young to young adult fiction .
92-460: Mixed Magics: Four Tales of Chrestomanci is a collection of four fantasy stories by the British author Diana Wynne Jones , first published by Collins in 2000. One was original to the collection, "Stealer of Souls", a novella about half of the book in length; three had been published in the 1980s. It was the fifth book published among seven Chrestomanci books (1977 to 2006) and the only collection in
184-404: A Peter Rabbit doll, making Peter the first licensed character . Michael O. Tunnell and James S. Jacobs, professors of children's literature at Brigham Young University, write, "Potter was the first to use pictures as well as words to tell the story, incorporating coloured illustration with text, page for page." Rudyard Kipling published The Jungle Book in 1894. A major theme in the book
276-712: A courtesy book by the Dutch priest Erasmus . A Pretty and Splendid Maiden's Mirror , an adaptation of a German book for young women, became the first Swedish children's book upon its 1591 publication. Sweden published fables and a children's magazine by 1766. In Italy , Giovanni Francesco Straparola released The Facetious Nights of Straparola in the 1550s. Called the first European storybook to contain fairy-tales, it eventually had 75 separate stories and written for an adult audience. Giulio Cesare Croce also borrowed from some stories children enjoyed for his books. Russia 's earliest children's books, primers , appeared in
368-525: A Land Baby , by Rev. Charles Kingsley (1862), which became extremely popular and remains a classic of British children's literature. In 1883, Carlo Collodi wrote the first Italian fantasy novel, The Adventures of Pinocchio , which was translated many times. In that same year, Emilio Salgari , the man who would become "the adventure writer par excellence for the young in Italy" first published his legendary character Sandokan . In Britain, The Princess and
460-518: A brief period in London, in 1957 the couple returned to Oxford, where they stayed until moving to Bristol in 1976. "He spread his arms and language rolled from him, sonorous, magnificent, and rhythmic.. for years after that, I used to dream regularly that a piece of my bedroom wall slid aside revealing my grandfather declaiming in Welsh, and I knew he was declaiming about my sins. At the bottom of my mind there
552-562: A brightly colored cover that appealed to children—something new in the publishing industry. Known as gift books, these early books became the precursors to the toy books popular in the nineteenth century. Newbery was also adept at marketing this new genre. According to the journal The Lion and the Unicorn , "Newbery's genius was in developing the fairly new product category, children's books, through his frequent advertisements... and his clever ploy of introducing additional titles and products into
644-516: A genre, Robinsonade ), adventure stories written specifically for children began in the nineteenth century. Early examples from British authors include Frederick Marryat 's The Children of the New Forest (1847) and Harriet Martineau 's The Peasant and the Prince (1856). The Victorian era saw the development of the genre, with W. H. G. Kingston , R. M. Ballantyne and G. A. Henty specializing in
736-467: A knowledge of the letters; be taught to read, without perceiving it to be anything but a sport, and play themselves into that which others are whipp'd for." He also suggested that picture books be created for children. In the nineteenth century, a few children's titles became famous as classroom reading texts. Among these were the fables of Aesop and Jean de la Fontaine and Charles Perraults's 1697 Tales of Mother Goose . The popularity of these texts led to
828-489: A moral or religious message. Children's literature has been shaped by religious sources, like Puritan traditions, or by more philosophical and scientific standpoints with the influences of Charles Darwin and John Locke. The late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries are known as the "Golden Age of Children's Literature" because many classic children's books were published then. There is no single or widely used definition of children's literature. It can be broadly defined as
920-655: A movement concerned with reforming both education and literature for children. Its founder, Johann Bernhard Basedow , authored Elementarwerk as a popular textbook for children that included many illustrations by Daniel Chodowiecki . Another follower, Joachim Heinrich Campe , created an adaptation of Robinson Crusoe that went into over 100 printings. He became Germany's "outstanding and most modern" writer for children. According to Hans-Heino Ewers in The International Companion Encyclopedia of Children's Literature , "It can be argued that from this time,
1012-531: A new sophistication to the historical adventure novel. Philip Pullman in the Sally Lockhart novels and Julia Golding in the Cat Royal series have continued the tradition of the historical adventure. An important aspect of British children's literature has been comic books and magazines . Amongst the most popular and longest running comics have been The Beano and The Dandy , both first published in
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#17330857609331104-869: A separate category of literature especially in the Victorian era , with some works becoming internationally known, such as Lewis Carroll 's Alice's Adventures in Wonderland (1865) and its sequel Through the Looking-Glass . Another classic of the period is Anna Sewell 's animal novel Black Beauty (1877). At the end of the Victorian era and leading into the Edwardian era, author and illustrator Beatrix Potter published The Tale of Peter Rabbit in 1902. Potter went on to produce 23 children's books and become very wealthy. A pioneer of character merchandising, in 1903 she patented
1196-523: A series of twelve books . The Golden Age of Children's Literature ended with World War I . The period before World War II was much slower in children's publishing. The main exceptions in England were the publications of Winnie-the-Pooh by A. A. Milne in 1926, the first Mary Poppins book by P. L. Travers in 1934, The Hobbit by J. R. R. Tolkien in 1937, and the Arthurian The Sword in
1288-594: A very young celebrity and very rich. She is also the daughter of Christopher Chant's schoolboy friend Oneir, who appeals to the Chrestomanci for assistance when Carol stops at 99 dreams and specialists can find nothing wrong. Carol visits the Chrestomanci in the French Rivera where he and the Castle family are on vacation after "Stealer of Souls". Diana Wynne Jones Diana Wynne Jones (16 August 1934 – 26 March 2011)
1380-515: A wide range of topics including education, natural history, fantasy, mystery, and biblical narratives and is best remembered today for her Noddy , The Famous Five , The Secret Seven , and The Adventure Series . The first of these children's stories, Five on a Treasure Island , was published in 1942. In the 1950s, the book market in Europe began to recover from the effects of the two world wars. An informal literary discussion group associated with
1472-475: Is Eric Chant. The boys alone witness the magical capture of de Witt's soul, which marks his final death in our time. But Eric's handling the lot breaks or modifies the spell, evidently, and a kind of revitalization occurs. Furthermore, at least De Witt retains great power and some capability and initiates a rush toward the present. "Carol Oneir was the world's youngest best-selling dreamer" (the lead). From age seven her dreams had been recorded and sold, making her
1564-646: Is abandonment followed by fostering, as in the life of Mowgli , echoing Kipling's own childhood. In the latter years of the 19th century, precursors of the modern picture book were illustrated books of poems and short stories produced by English illustrators Randolph Caldecott , Walter Crane , and Kate Greenaway . These had a larger proportion of pictures to words than earlier books, and many of their pictures were in colour. Some British artists made their living illustrating novels and children's books, among them Arthur Rackham , Cicely Mary Barker , W. Heath Robinson , Henry J. Ford , John Leech , and George Cruikshank . In
1656-421: Is added and rules for processing are formed solely by one's sensory experiences. A corollary of this doctrine was that the mind of the child was born blank and that it was the duty of the parents to imbue the child with correct notions. Locke himself emphasized the importance of providing children with "easy pleasant books" to develop their minds rather than using force to compel them: "Children may be cozen'd into
1748-409: Is always a flow of spoken language that is not English, rolling in majestic paragraphs and resounding with splendid polysyllables. I listen to it like music when I write." - An excerpt from her autobiography detailing her time at Wales with her grandfather. Jones started writing during the mid-1960s "mostly to keep [her] sanity", when the youngest of her three children was about two years old and
1840-582: Is an adaptation of the myth of Blodeuwedd from the Mabinogion , set in modern Wales – it won Garner the annual Carnegie Medal from the Library Association , recognising the year's best children's book by a British author. Mary Norton wrote The Borrowers (1952), featuring tiny people who borrow from humans. Dodie Smith 's The Hundred and One Dalmatians was published in 1956. Philippa Pearce 's Tom's Midnight Garden (1958) has Tom opening
1932-467: Is an epic trilogy of fantasy novels consisting of Northern Lights (1995, published as The Golden Compass in North America), The Subtle Knife (1997), and The Amber Spyglass (2000). It follows the coming of age of two children, Lyra Belacqua and Will Parry, as they wander through a series of parallel universes. The three novels have won a number of awards, most notably the 2001 Whitbread Book of
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#17330857609332024-412: Is set in a fictional African colony during transition, and what begins as a memo about the problem of how to "mark changeover" ceremonially is misunderstood to be about the threat of a terrorist named Mark Changeover. It is a farce with a large cast of characters, featuring government, police, and army bureaucracies; sex, politics, and news. In 1965, when Rhodesia declared independence unilaterally (one of
2116-612: The Chrestomanci series, the Dalemark series, the three Moving Castle novels, Dark Lord of Derkholm , and The Tough Guide to Fantasyland . Jones has been cited as an inspiration and muse for several fantasy and science fiction authors including Philip Pullman , Terry Pratchett , Penelope Lively , Robin McKinley , Dina Rabinovitch , Megan Whalen Turner , J.K. Rowling and Neil Gaiman , with Gaiman describing her as "quite simply
2208-552: The Jennings series by Anthony Buckeridge . Ruth Manning-Sanders 's first collection, A Book of Giants , retells a number of giant stories from around the world. Susan Cooper 's The Dark Is Rising is a five-volume fantasy saga set in England and Wales. Raymond Briggs ' children's picture book The Snowman (1978) has been adapted as an animation, shown every Christmas on British television. The Reverend. W. Awdry and son Christopher 's The Railway Series features Thomas
2300-537: The Mythopoeic Fantasy Award , children's section, in 1996 for The Crown of Dalemark (concluding that series) and in 1999 for Dark Lord of Derkholm ; in four other years she was a finalist for the annual literary award by the Mythopoeic Society . The 1986 novel Howl's Moving Castle was inspired by a boy at a school she was visiting, who asked her to write a book called The Moving Castle. It
2392-615: The World Fantasy Award for Life Achievement in 2007. In August 2014, Google commemorated Jones with a Google Doodle created by Google artist Sophie Diao . Jones was diagnosed with lung cancer in the early summer of 2009. She underwent surgery in July and reported to friends that the procedure had been successful. However, in June 2010 she announced that she would be discontinuing chemotherapy because it only made her feel ill. In mid-2010 she
2484-446: The 1740s, a cluster of London publishers began to produce new books designed to instruct and delight young readers. Thomas Boreman was one. Another was Mary Cooper , whose two-volume Tommy Thumb's Pretty Song Book (1744) is the first known nursery rhyme collection. But the most celebrated of these pioneers is John Newbery , whose first book for the entertainment of children was A Little Pretty Pocket-Book ." Widely considered
2576-707: The 1890s, some of the best known fairy tales from England were compiled in Joseph Jacobs ' English Fairy Tales , including Jack and the Beanstalk , Goldilocks and the Three Bears , The Three Little Pigs , Jack the Giant Killer and Tom Thumb . The Kailyard School of Scottish writers, notably J. M. Barrie , creator of Peter Pan (1904), presented an idealised version of society and brought fantasy and folklore back into fashion. In 1908, Kenneth Grahame wrote
2668-621: The 1930s he began publishing his Swallows and Amazons series of children's books about the school-holiday adventures of children, mostly in the English Lake District and the Norfolk Broads . Many of them involve sailing; fishing and camping are other common subjects. Biggles was a popular series of adventure books for young boys, about James Bigglesworth, a fictional pilot and adventurer , by W. E. Johns . Between 1941 and 1961 there were 60 issues with stories about Biggles, and in
2760-507: The 1930s. British comics in the 20th century evolved from illustrated penny dreadfuls of the Victorian era (featuring Sweeney Todd , Dick Turpin and Varney the Vampire ). First published in the 1830s, according to The Guardian , penny dreadfuls were "Britain's first taste of mass-produced popular culture for the young." Robin Hood featured in a series of penny dreadfuls in 1838 which sparked
2852-478: The 1960s occasional contributors included the BBC astronomer Patrick Moore . Between 1940 and 1947, W. E. Johns contributed sixty stories featuring the female pilot Worrals . Evoking epic themes, Richard Adams 's 1972 survival and adventure novel Watership Down follows a small group of rabbits who escape the destruction of their warren and seek to establish a new home. Geoffrey Trease and Rosemary Sutcliff brought
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2944-482: The 1978 Guardian Children's Fiction Prize , a once-in-a-lifetime award by The Guardian newspaper that is judged by a panel of children's writers. Three times she was a commended runner-up for the Carnegie Medal from the Library Association , recognising the year's best children's book: for Dogsbody (1975), Charmed Life (1977), and the fourth Chrestomanci book The Lives of Christopher Chant (1988). She won
3036-498: The Chaldea story, Ursula Jones said that "other things were coming to light ... She left behind a mass of stuff." In 2013 another book was published posthumously, Vile Visitors. Jones has been nominated for and also won multiple awards for her various works. Children%27s literature Children's literature can be traced to traditional stories like fairy tales , which have only been identified as children's literature since
3128-636: The English faculty at the University of Oxford, were the "Inklings", with the major fantasy novelists C. S. Lewis and J. R. R. Tolkien as its main members. C. S. Lewis published the first installment of The Chronicles of Narnia series in 1950, while Tolkien is best known, in addition to The Hobbit , as the author of The Lord of the Rings (1954). Another writer of fantasy stories is Alan Garner author of Elidor (1965), and The Owl Service (1967). The latter
3220-510: The French literary society, who saw them as only fit for old people and children. In 1658, John Amos Comenius in Bohemia published the informative illustrated Orbis Pictus , for children under six learning to read. It is considered to be the first picture book produced specifically for children. The first Danish children's book was The Child's Mirror by Niels Bredal in 1568, an adaptation of
3312-493: The Goblin and its sequel The Princess and Curdie , by George MacDonald , appeared in 1872 and 1883, and the adventure stories Treasure Island and Kidnapped , both by Robert Louis Stevenson , were extremely popular in the 1880s. Rudyard Kipling 's The Jungle Book was first published in 1894, and J. M. Barrie told the story of Peter Pan in the novel Peter and Wendy in 1911. Johanna Spyri 's two-part novel Heidi
3404-582: The Great wrote allegories for children, and during her reign, Nikolai Novikov started the first juvenile magazine in Russia. The modern children's book emerged in mid-18th-century England. A growing polite middle-class and the influence of Lockean theories of childhood innocence combined to create the beginnings of childhood as a concept. In an article for the British Library , professor MO Grenby writes, "in
3496-663: The Grimm brothers also contributed to children's literature through their academic pursuits. As professors, they had a scholarly interest in the stories, striving to preserve them and their variations accurately, recording their sources. A similar project was carried out by the Norwegian scholars Peter Christen Asbjørnsen and Jørgen Moe , who collected Norwegian fairy tales and published them as Norwegian Folktales , often referred to as Asbjørnsen and Moe . By compiling these stories, they preserved Norway's literary heritage and helped create
3588-507: The Norwegian written language. Danish author and poet Hans Christian Andersen traveled through Europe and gathered many well-known fairy tales and created new stories in the fairy tale genre. In Switzerland , Johann David Wyss published The Swiss Family Robinson in 1812, with the aim of teaching children about family values, good husbandry, the uses of the natural world and self-reliance. The book became popular across Europe after it
3680-563: The Stone by T. H. White in 1938. Children's mass paperback books were first released in England in 1940 under the Puffin Books imprint, and their lower prices helped make book buying possible for children during World War II. Enid Blyton 's books have been among the world's bestsellers since the 1930s, selling more than 600 million copies. Blyton's books are still enormously popular and have been translated into almost 90 languages. She wrote on
3772-601: The Tank Engine . Margery Sharp 's series The Rescuers is based on a heroic mouse organisation. The third Children's Laureate Michael Morpurgo published War Horse in 1982. Dick King-Smith 's novels include The Sheep-Pig (1984). Diana Wynne Jones wrote the young adult fantasy novel Howl's Moving Castle in 1986. Anne Fine 's Madame Doubtfire (1987) is based around a family with divorced parents. Anthony Horowitz 's Alex Rider series begins with Stormbreaker (2000). Philip Pullman 's His Dark Materials
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3864-680: The United States. Mark Twain released Tom Sawyer in 1876. In 1880 another bestseller, Uncle Remus: His Songs and His Sayings , a collection of African American folk tales adapted and compiled by Joel Chandler Harris , appeared. In the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, a plethora of children's novels began featuring realistic, non-magical plotlines. Certain titles received international success such as Robert Louis Stevenson's Treasure Island (1883), L. M. Montgomery's Anne of Green Gables (1908), and Louisa May Alcott's Little Women (1869). Literature for children had developed as
3956-782: The Year prize, won by The Amber Spyglass . Northern Lights won the Carnegie Medal for children's fiction in 1995. Neil Gaiman wrote the dark fantasy novella Coraline (2002). His 2008 fantasy, The Graveyard Book , traces the story of a boy who is raised by the supernatural occupants of a graveyard. In 2001, Terry Pratchett received the Carnegie Medal (his first major award) for The Amazing Maurice and His Educated Rodents . Cressida Cowell 's How to Train Your Dragon series were published between 2003 and 2015. J. K. Rowling 's Harry Potter fantasy sequence of seven novels chronicles
4048-603: The adventures of the adolescent wizard Harry Potter . The series began with Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone in 1997 and ended with the seventh and final book Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows in 2007; becoming the best selling book-series in history . The series has been translated into 67 languages, so placing Rowling among the most translated authors in history. While Daniel Defoe wrote Robinson Crusoe in 1719 (spawning so many imitations it defined
4140-665: The alphabet, vowels, consonants, double letters, and syllables before providing a religious rhyme of the alphabet, beginning "In Adam's fall We sinned all...", and continues through the alphabet. It also contained religious maxims, acronyms , spelling help and other educational items, all decorated by woodcuts . In 1634, the Pentamerone from Italy became the first major published collection of European folk tales. Charles Perrault began recording fairy tales in France, publishing his first collection in 1697. They were not well received among
4232-713: The best writer for children of her generation". Her work has been nominated for several awards. She was twice a finalist for the Hugo Award , nominated fourteen times for the Locus Award , seven times for the Mythopoeic Award (which she won twice), twice for a British Fantasy Award (won in 1999), and twice for a World Fantasy Award , which she won in 2007. Jones was born in London, the daughter of Marjorie (née Jackson) and Richard Aneurin Jones, both of whom were teachers. When war
4324-504: The body of his children's books." Professor Grenby writes, "Newbery has become known as the 'father of children's literature' chiefly because he was able to show that publishing children's books could be a commercial success." The improvement in the quality of books for children and the diversity of topics he published helped make Newbery the leading producer of children's books in his time. He published his own books as well as those by authors such as Samuel Johnson and Oliver Goldsmith ;
4416-1000: The body of written works and accompanying illustrations produced in order to entertain or instruct young people. The genre encompasses a wide range of works, including acknowledged classics of world literature , picture books and easy-to-read stories written exclusively for children, and fairy tales , lullabies , fables , folk songs , and other primarily orally transmitted materials or more specifically defined as fiction , non-fiction , poetry , or drama intended for and used by children and young people. One writer on children's literature defines it as "all books written for children, excluding works such as comic books , joke books, cartoon books , and non-fiction works that are not intended to be read from front to back, such as dictionaries, encyclopedias, and other reference materials". However, others would argue that children's comics should also be included: "Children's Literature studies has traditionally treated comics fitfully and superficially despite
4508-552: The booklets as well. Johanna Bradley says, in From Chapbooks to Plum Cake , that chapbooks kept imaginative stories from being lost to readers under the strict Puritan influence of the time. Hornbooks also appeared in England during this time, teaching children basic information such as the alphabet and the Lord's Prayer . These were brought from England to the American colonies in
4600-543: The car he steals is not only too complicated to learn quickly, but he mistakes its wonders for magic powers greater than his own. It has a young girl and a big dog in the back seat, too. The Castle resident Cat Chant and the younger visitor Tonino Montana —the protagonists of Charmed Life and Magicians of Caprona — visit the retired Chrestomanci Gabriel de Witt ( Lives of Christopher Chant , Conrad's Fate ). In old age De Witt has recently lost several remaining lives, perhaps under magical assault. The decrepit enchanter confirms
4692-734: The children's classic The Wind in the Willows and the Scouts founder Robert Baden-Powell 's first book, Scouting for Boys , was published. Inspiration for Frances Hodgson Burnett 's novel The Secret Garden (1910) was the Great Maytham Hall Garden in Kent. While fighting in the trenches for the British Army in World War I, Hugh Lofting created the character of Doctor Dolittle , who appears in
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#17330857609334784-490: The concept of childhood , that a separate genre of children's literature began to emerge, with its own divisions, expectations, and canon . The earliest of these books were educational books, books on conduct, and simple ABCs—often decorated with animals, plants, and anthropomorphic letters. In 1962, French historian Philippe Ariès argues in his book Centuries of Childhood that the modern concept of childhood only emerged in recent times. He explains that children were in
4876-457: The concept of childhood began to emerge in Europe. Adults saw children as separate beings, innocent and in need of protection and training by the adults around them. The English philosopher John Locke developed his theory of the tabula rasa in his 1690 An Essay Concerning Human Understanding . In Locke's philosophy, tabula rasa was the theory that the (human) mind is at birth a "blank slate" without rules for processing data, and that data
4968-527: The content (the weird adventures of a young girl in a fantasy land), but also the origin of the tales as both are dedicated and given to a daughter of the author's friends. The shift to a modern genre of children's literature occurred in the mid-19th century; didacticism of a previous age began to make way for more humorous, child-oriented books, more attuned to the child's imagination. The availability of children's literature greatly increased as well, as paper and printing became widely available and affordable,
5060-437: The creation of a number of nineteenth-century fantasy and fairy tales for children which featured magic objects and talking animals. Another influence on this shift in attitudes came from Puritanism , which stressed the importance of individual salvation. Puritans were concerned with the spiritual welfare of their children, and there was a large growth in the publication of "good godly books" aimed squarely at children. Some of
5152-474: The eighteenth century, and songs, part of a wider oral tradition , which adults shared with children before publishing existed. The development of early children's literature, before printing was invented, is difficult to trace. Even after printing became widespread, many classic "children's" tales were originally created for adults and later adapted for a younger audience. Since the fifteenth century much literature has been aimed specifically at children, often with
5244-412: The end of Charmed Life and no more than a few years after The Magicians of Caprona , if the fourth story is that late. Four of the six novels are also set during the tenure of Christopher Chant, who is Chrestomanci in five of the seven books and is often called Chrestomanci as a personal name. A two-paragraph untitled note from the author follows the title page (US edition). Among other things it gives
5336-583: The family lived in a house owned by an Oxford college. Besides the children, she felt harried by the crises of adults in the household: a sick husband, a mother-in-law, a sister, and a friend with daughter. Her first book was a novel for adults published by Macmillan in 1970, entitled Changeover . It originated as the British Empire was divesting colonies; she recalled in 2004 that it had "seemed like every month, we would hear that yet another small island or tiny country had been granted independence." Changeover
5428-455: The first "English masterpiece written for children" and as a founding book in the development of fantasy literature, its publication opened the "First Golden Age" of children's literature in Britain and Europe that continued until the early 1900s. The fairy-tale absurdity of Wonderland has solid historical ground as a satire of the serious problems of the Victorian era. Lewis Carroll is ironic about
5520-405: The first modern children's book, A Little Pretty Pocket-Book was the first children's publication aimed at giving enjoyment to children, containing a mixture of rhymes, picture stories and games for pleasure. Newbery believed that play was a better enticement to children's good behavior than physical discipline, and the child was to record his or her behaviour daily. The book was child–sized with
5612-463: The garden door at night and entering into a different age. William Golding 's 1954 novel Lord of the Flies focuses on a group of British boys stranded on an uninhabited island and their disastrous attempt to govern themselves. Roald Dahl wrote children's fantasy novels which were often inspired from experiences from his childhood, with often unexpected endings, and unsentimental, dark humour. Dahl
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#17330857609335704-536: The history of European children's literature was largely written in Germany." The Brothers Grimm preserved and published the traditional tales told in Germany . They were so popular in their home country that modern, realistic children's literature began to be looked down on there. This dislike of non-traditional stories continued there until the beginning of the next century. In addition to their collection of stories,
5796-404: The hours pass, they discover that the old man has intercepted the souls of seven former Chrestomancis upon their decease and eagerly awaits that of Gabriel de Witt. Furthermore, he plans to take the soul of Eric Chant, the nine-lived boy enchanter. Incorporating nine of them will make him the most powerful of all, he says; somehow it will "give me the world". But he doesn't know which of the two boys
5888-417: The importance of comics as a global phenomenon associated with children". The International Companion Encyclopedia of Children's Literature notes that "the boundaries of genre... are not fixed but blurred". Sometimes, no agreement can be reached about whether a given work is best categorized as literature for adults or children. Some works defy easy categorization. J. K. Rowling 's Harry Potter series
5980-457: The last colonies and not tiny), "I felt as if the book were coming true as I wrote it." The Harry Potter books are frequently compared to the works of Diana Wynne Jones. Many of her earlier children's books were out of print in recent years, but have now been re-issued for the young audience whose interest in fantasy and reading was spurred by Harry Potter . Jones's works are also compared to those of Robin McKinley and Neil Gaiman . She
6072-413: The late sixteenth century. An early example is ABC-Book , an alphabet book published by Ivan Fyodorov in 1571. The first picture book published in Russia, Karion Istomin 's The Illustrated Primer , appeared in 1694. Peter the Great 's interest in modernizing his country through Westernization helped Western children's literature dominate the field through the eighteenth century. Catherine
6164-755: The latter may have written The History of Little Goody Two-Shoes , Newbery's most popular book. Another philosopher who influenced the development of children's literature was Jean-Jacques Rousseau , who argued that children should be allowed to develop naturally and joyously. His idea of appealing to a children's natural interests took hold among writers for children. Popular examples included Thomas Day 's The History of Sandford and Merton , four volumes that embody Rousseau's theories. Furthermore, Maria and Richard Lovell Edgeworth 's Practical Education : The History of Harry and Lucy (1780) urged children to teach themselves. Rousseau's ideas also had great influence in Germany, especially on German Philanthropism ,
6256-489: The literary critic) and Ursula (later an actress and a children's writer) spent a childhood left chiefly to their own devices. After attending Friends' School, Saffron Walden , she studied English at St Anne's College, Oxford , where she attended lectures by both C. S. Lewis and J. R. R. Tolkien before graduating in 1956. In the same year she married John Burrow , a prominent scholar of medieval literature , with whom she had three sons, Richard, Michael and Colin. After
6348-513: The mid-seventeenth century. The first such book was a catechism for children, written in verse by the Puritan John Cotton . Known as Spiritual Milk for Boston Babes , it was published in 1646, appearing both in England and Boston . Another early book, The New England Primer , was in print by 1691 and used in schools for 100 years. The primer begins with "The young Infant's or Child's morning Prayer" and evening prayer. It then shows
6440-535: The most popular works were by James Janeway , but the most enduring book from this movement, still read today, especially in modernised versions, is The Pilgrim's Progress (1678) by John Bunyan . Chapbooks , pocket-sized pamphlets that were often folded instead of being stitched, were published in Britain; illustrated by woodblock printing , these inexpensive booklets reprinted popular ballads , historical re-tellings, and folk tales. Though not specifically published for children at this time, young people enjoyed
6532-500: The novel won the annual Phoenix Award from the Children's Literature Association , recognising the best children's book published twenty years earlier that did not win a major award (named for mythical bird phoenix to suggest the book's rise from obscurity). Fire and Hemlock had been the 2005 Phoenix runner-up. It is a novel based on Scottish ballads, and was a Mythopoeic Fantasy finalist in its own time. Archer's Goon (1984)
6624-410: The opening of Children's Literature: A Reader's History from Aesop to Harry Potter , says, "This book presents a history of what children have heard and read.... The history I write of is a history of reception ." Early children's literature consisted of spoken stories, songs, and poems, used to educate, instruct, and entertain children. It was only in the eighteenth century, with the development of
6716-514: The past not considered as greatly different from adults and were not given significantly different treatment. As evidence for this position, he notes that, apart from instructional and didactic texts for children written by clerics like the Venerable Bede and Ælfric of Eynsham , there was a lack of any genuine literature aimed specifically at children before the 18th century. Other scholars have qualified this viewpoint by noting that there
6808-410: The population grew and literacy rates improved. Tom Brown's School Days by Thomas Hughes appeared in 1857, and is considered to be the founding book in the school story tradition. However, it was Lewis Carroll 's fantasy, Alice's Adventures in Wonderland , published in 1865 in England, that signaled the change in writing style for children to an imaginative and empathetic one. Regarded as
6900-435: The prim and all-out regulated life of the "golden" Victorian century. One other noteworthy publication was Mark Twain 's book Tom Sawyer (1876), which was one of the first "boy books", intended for children but enjoyed by both children and adults alike. These were classified as such for the themes they contained, consisting of fighting and work. Another important book of that decade was The Water-Babies, A Fairy Tale for
6992-467: The production of adventure fiction for boys. This inspired writers who normally catered to adult audiences to write for children, a notable example being Robert Louis Stevenson 's classic pirate story Treasure Island (1883). In the years after the First World War, writers such as Arthur Ransome developed the adventure genre by setting the adventure in Britain rather than distant countries. In
7084-403: The pronunciation guide "KREST-OH-MAN-SEE". WW does not know how to earn a living without magic and tries stealing a car but soon finds himself fleeing the law on foot. He manages to steal the money to buy transfer to another world where his modest powers do operate —but one more like ours, with greater reliance on machinery and less on magic than 12A. There he finds technology bewildering. Indeed,
7176-423: The railway station by horse-drawn hackney , the boys are kidnapped; the trip is a long one, their intellect dulls, they are delivered to a small old man who describes them as "two apprentices from the poorhouse". His house is laden with magic and includes an evident magician's workshop they must clean. In their muddle, the boys cannot clearly identify themselves, fortunately, or recognize Master Spiderman's name. As
7268-460: The series. In the UK, the four novels that had been published at that time were reissued at the same time (May 2000) in a five-volume matching set with cover illustrations by Paul Slater that incorporate 'The Worlds of Chrestomanci' arranged in a circle. All four stories are set during the time Eric Cat Chant ( Charmed Life , The Pinhoe Egg ) is a boy in the care of Christopher Chant as Chrestomanci, after
7360-411: The unusual nature of Tonino's magic before his penultimate life visibly departs, leaving him entirely mortal. Before resting he warns Cat (and the Chrestomanci indirectly) that he is sure of the attack and the assailant's identity: Neville Spiderman, the "most ingenious" of the evil enchanters and the last of the great ones, from the time of the first Chrestomanci about two hundred years ago. Returning to
7452-431: Was a British novelist, poet, academic, literary critic, and short story writer. She principally wrote fantasy and speculative fiction novels for children and young adults . Although usually described as fantasy, some of her work also incorporates science fiction themes and elements of realism . Jones's work often explores themes of time travel and parallel or multiple universes. Some of her better-known works are
7544-448: Was a literature designed to convey the values, attitudes, and information necessary for children within their cultures, such as the Play of Daniel from the twelfth century. Pre-modern children's literature, therefore, tended to be of a didactic and moralistic nature, with the purpose of conveying conduct -related, educational and religious lessons. During the seventeenth century,
7636-411: Was a runner-up for that year's Horn Book Award . It was adapted for television in 1992. One Jones fansite believes it to be "the only tv adaptation (so far) of one of Diana's books". Jones's book on clichés in fantasy fiction, The Tough Guide To Fantasyland (nonfiction), has a cult following among writers and critics, despite initially being difficult to find due to an erratic printing history. It
7728-719: Was announced, shortly after her fifth birthday, she was evacuated to Pontarddulais in Wales where her grandfather was a minister at a chapel. She did not live long in Wales due to a family dispute, and thereafter moved several times, including periods in the Lake District , in York , and back to London. In 1943 her family finally settled in Thaxted, Essex , where her parents worked running an educational conference centre. There, Jones and her two younger sisters Isobel (later Professor Isobel Armstrong ,
7820-417: Was friends with both McKinley and Gaiman, and Jones and Gaiman were fans of each other's work; she dedicated her 1993 novel Hexwood to him after something he said in conversation inspired a key part of the plot. Gaiman had already dedicated his 1991 four-part comic book mini-series The Books of Magic to "four witches", of whom Jones was one. For Charmed Life , the first Chrestomanci novel, Jones won
7912-422: Was halfway through a new book with plans for another to follow. She died on 26 March 2011 from the disease. She was surrounded by her husband, three sons, and five grandchildren as she was cremated at Canford Cemetery. The story in progress when she became too ill to write, The Islands of Chaldea , was completed by her sister Ursula Jones in 2014. Interviewed by The Guardian in June 2013 after she finished
8004-1001: Was inspired to write Charlie and the Chocolate Factory (1964), featuring the eccentric chocolatier Willy Wonka , having grown up near two chocolate makers in England who often tried to steal trade secrets by sending spies into the other's factory. His other works include James and the Giant Peach (1961), Fantastic Mr. Fox (1970), The BFG (1982), The Witches (1983), and Matilda (1988). Starting in 1958, Michael Bond published more than twenty humorous stories about Paddington Bear . Boarding schools in literature are centred on older pre-adolescent and adolescent school life, and are most commonly set in English boarding schools . Popular school stories from this period include Ronald Searle 's comic St Trinian's (1949–1953) and his illustrations for Geoffrey Willans 's Molesworth series, Jill Murphy 's The Worst Witch , and
8096-565: Was published first by Greenwillow in the U.S., where it was a runner-up for the annual Boston Globe–Horn Book Award in children's fiction. In 2004, Hayao Miyazaki made the Japanese-language animated movie Howl's Moving Castle , which was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Animated Feature . A version dubbed in English was released in the UK and US in 2005, with the voice of Howl performed by Christian Bale . Next year Jones and
8188-567: Was published in Switzerland in 1880 and 1881. In the US, children's publishing entered a period of growth after the American Civil War in 1865. Boys' book writer Oliver Optic published over 100 books. In 1868, the "epoch-making" Little Women , the fictionalized autobiography of Louisa May Alcott , was published. This " coming of age " story established the genre of realistic family books in
8280-451: Was reissued in the UK, and has been reissued in the United States in 2006 by Firebird Books . The Firebird edition has additional material and a completely new design, including a new map . The British Fantasy Society recognised her significant impact on fantasy with its Karl Edward Wagner Award in 1999. She received an honorary D.Litt from the University of Bristol in July 2006 and
8372-497: Was translated into French by Isabelle de Montolieu . E. T. A. Hoffmann 's tale " The Nutcracker and the Mouse King " was published in 1816 in a German collection of stories for children, Kinder-Märchen . It is the first modern short story to introduce bizarre, odd and grotesque elements in children's literature and thereby anticipates Lewis Carroll's tale, Alice's Adventures in Wonderland . There are not only parallels concerning
8464-410: Was written and marketed for children, but it is also popular among adults. The series' extreme popularity led The New York Times to create a separate bestseller list for children's books. Despite the widespread association of children's literature with picture books, spoken narratives existed before printing , and the root of many children's tales go back to ancient storytellers. Seth Lerer , in
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