A Conversation About Children's Literature
...and a few other things as well...
I was recently interviewed by Brandon Christian Sullivan, a teacher of young children in Knoxville, on children’s literature in general and on the mighty MacGorilla chronicles in particular. Topics both related and unrelated—Shakespeare, Homer, Virgil, the Gospels, imagination and reason, Richard Dawkins, and so forth—were touched upon in passing. I thought it quite a good conversation.
What a delightful conversation! I was very happy to hear that young Patrick’s literary style is very similar to yours. It means that the world will continue to be graced with Harts’ majestic writing long after I am gone.
I couldn’t agree more with your harsh critique of publishing houses’ practice to provide abridged versions of classical literature. My daughter is currently studying the Iliad in school, and since only chapters I, VI, XXII and XXIV are included in the curriculum, I caught her in the act of attempting to read a booklet containing only these particular parts. Needless to say, I persuaded her to read the whole masterpiece. Regretfully, she was the only one in class to do so.
Since you have mentioned several countries that have produced great children's literature (UK, France, Germany), I believe that Sweden should also rank very highly with Astrid Lindgren, Selma Lagerlöf, and even Tove Jansson (she is, of course, Finish, but wrote in Swedish). I lived at the other end of Europe behind the Iron Curtain and I can guarantee that at that time there was hardly a child in my country (at least in the big cities) that hasn’t heard of Pippi Longstocking or Karlsson-on-the-Roof.
I wish you had more time to elaborate on the criticism of George R.R. Martin. I don’t particularly like his prose, but at least he has a talent for worldbuilding and is sufficiently educated in history to create an epic quasi-realistic war narrative within a rich fantasy framework. But then I don’t think the Song of Ice and Fire is his best work. I actually like more some of his short stories and his early novel Dying of the Light. And his children book the Ice Dragon is also not bad.
The name of The Wind in the Willows chapter that you couldn't remember is called Wayfarers All (which happened to be my son's favorite chapter, so it's a mystery to me why this is regularly omitted in abridged versions.)
I love that you mentioned Michael Ende's Neverending Story. Another great story by him is Momo, which I feel has become more and more pertinent as time goes on.
Also, on the topic of gorillas and mysteries in children's literature, I wholeheartedly recommend "The Murderer's Ape" by Jakob Wegelius.