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Education Programme
The digitised European historical children's book
collection featured on this site is the key resource in the delivery of an education
programme.
The programme is particularly aimed at teachers, students, literary historians and
researchers. It will focus on language, style, illustrations and book production,
examining both similarities and differences between books produced in different European
countries. European folk tales will be looked at in detail comparing style and ethos
between the different European examples.
The purpose of this Education Programme is to provide a starting point for those
wishing to discover European historic children's literature. The programme also includes
lists of currently available resources, including books, journals and web sites. This site
contains a valuable links page that will enable users to access individual collections as
well as bibliographic and educational resources.
This education programme will focus on four main themes:
The study of historical children's literature is growing and involves the work of
universities, libraries, book dealers, and private individuals. We hope that you will find
the CHILDE web site is a value to you in exploring this fascinating field.
Bibliography
The following text and journals have been recommended by the CHILDE partners as an
introductory reading list on the theme of historical children's literature.
Texts
- Avery, Gillian and Briggs, Julia (1989) Children and their books: a celebration of
the work of Iona and Peter Opie, Oxford: Clarendon
- Carpenter, H and Prichard, M (1984) The Oxford companion to
children’s literature, Oxford: Oxford
University Press
- Carpenter, H (1985) Secret gardens: a study of the golden age of children’s
literature, London: Allen and Unwin
- Hunt, Peter (1995) An illustrated history of children’s literature, Oxford:
Oxford University Press
- Hurlimann, Bettina (1967) Three centuries of children’s books in Europe,
Oxford: Oxford University Press (Europaischer Kinderbucher in drei Jahrhunderten,
translated by Brian Alderson)
- Muir, Percy (1969) English Children’s books, London Batsford
- Summerfield, Geoffrey (1984) Fantasy and reason: children’s literature in the
eighteenth century, London: Methuen
Thwaite, Mary (1972) From primer to pleasure in reading: an introduction to the
history of children’s books in England from the invention of printing to 1914…
London: Library Association 2nd edition
Journals
- Bookbird - A Journal of International Children’s Literature; IBBY Nonnenweg 12
Postfach, CH-4003 Basel Switzerland; ISSN 00067377; Published four times per year
- Children’s Books History Society Newsletter;Secretary and joint editor Pat Garrett
, 25 Field Way, Hoddesden, Herts. EN11 0QN; ISSN 0955-4289; Published four times per year
- Children’s Literature Association Quarterly; Children’s Literature
Association, P.O.Box 138, Battle Creek MI 49016 USA; ISSN 0885-042; Published four times
per year
- The Lion and the Unicorn; A critical journal of children’s literature; The John
Hopkins University Press, Journals Division, 2715 North Charles Street, Baltimore, MD
21218-4363 USA; ISSN 0147-2593; Published three times per year
- Marvels and Tales; Journal of Fairy Tale studies; Wayne State University Press, Leonard
N. Simons Building, 4809 Woodward Avenue, Detroit, Michigan 48201 USA; ISSN 1521-4281;
Published twice per year
Papers
Explorations into Children’s Literature; School of Literary and Communication
Studies, Deakin University, 221 Burwood Highway, Burwood Victoria 3125 Australia; ISSN
1034-9243; Published three times per year
Social and Cultural Context
Introduction
Children's literature offers an insight into the condition of childhood in the past, as
well as adult and institutional perspectives on and ideals of childhood. It is important
to recognise that such an insight is partial however as it will depend on the limits of
surviving texts and collections, as well as the cultural and moral constraints facing
writers and artists at the time.
The CHILDE site is predominantly focused on visual imagery from a very small selection
of historical children's books in the collections of the CHILDE project partners. However
by using the search page on this site, in particular the subject and free text elements,
it is possible to begin an exploration of the social and cultural condition of children in
Europe during the eighteenth and nineteenth century.
The following select bibliography, as well as the more extensive links page provides a
valuable starting point for anyone wishing to extend their knowledge of children and
childhood before the twentieth century.
Bibliography
- Avery, Gillian (1975) A study of the heroes and heroines of children’s fiction
1770 1950, London: Hodder and Stoughton
- Butts, Dennis (1992) Stories and society: children’s literature in its social
context, London: Macmillan
- Darton, F J Harvey (1982) Children’s books in England: five centuries of social
life, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press ( 3rd revised edition edited by
Brian Alderson)
- Grylls, David (1978) Guardians and Angels: parents and children in nineteenth century
literature, London: Faber
Possible Practical Actions
Use Web site links, on the links page of this site, to search other web sites containing
more extensive or complete digitised collections, e.g. The Hockliffe Collection - http://www.cta.dmu.ac.uk/projects/Hockliffe.
Make use of any e-mail facilities on these sites to seek further information, to consult
experts, to possibly arrange visits or presentations.
Compare historical children's illustrations from this site with equivalent modern images
of social and cultural issues, such as gender roles, poverty, rural and urban life.
Compare illustrations on this site under the same theme from different European
countries, e.g. schools/education, employment, costume.
Jonathan Swift's Gulliver's Travels appears in the CHILDE collection in English, Dutch,
French and German translations, evidence of its truly international character.
Consequently, it provides rich material for examining issues of travel; xenophobia;
racism; sameness; difference etc. The images and extracts from the text - available on the
Internet - allow students to explore their own reactions to people coming into their
society from outside as tourists, immigrants, refugees etc.
Historical literature in Europe and the dramatic arts
Introduction
The changes affecting the social and cultural environment have a ripple effect on the
fantasy world of children, anytime, anywhere. This web site allows us to show to
today’s children, anywhere in the world, the images that have lived in the dreams of
children in different places and in different times.
To observe the reaction of today’s children to the images created in the past for
their peers and to images representing very different worlds and cultures would indeed be
interesting.
Using images to prompt dramatisation
By following their imagination and the emotions triggered by the images shown
on the site, the children would develop in turn an independent tale, completely separated
from the original. Then, it will be the educator’s task to prompt the dramatisation
of the story and compare it later on with the story that the image wanted to describe.
Examples:
Ducoudray,
Gustave, Cent récits d’histoire de France, Knights joust at a tournament
Hölder,
Luise, Kleine Weltschichte von den ältesten bis auf die neuesten Zeiten, The boy leads
the other two children in playing games with the pole, Two dogs stand at the leaders feet.
Weisse,
Christian Felix, Der Kinderfreund: ein Wochenblatt. 10. Theil, The giant is put on show,
and is examined and stared at by the dwarves.
Using images to analyse historical representations of theatre
From a different point of view, the Web site would be useful in order to analyse with
the children how illustrators in different times represented theatre, as a place and
scenic action, and to observe together the analogies and the differences compared to
today.
Examples:
Punch’s
Opera, Punch hits Judy over the head with the stick
Brun,
Élisabeth, Les roses de la sagesse:ou morale et plaisir, Women and children watch a
puppet shadow theatre
Gellert,
Christian Fürchtegott, Sämmtliche Fabeln und Erzählungen: in drei Büchern, The
auditorium and stage of a theatre. The wealthy sit in a box, the poorer audience in the
stalls, all await the performance.
Weisse, Christian Felix,
Der Kinderfreunf: ein Wochenblatt. 8 Theil, Theatre scene: children pretend to be a ghost,
other children follow it, whilst one is scared.
European Folk and Fairy
Tales
Fairy tales are prose narratives, passed on either orally
or in writing, in which the terms of reality are suspended and make-belief is seen as a
matter of fact. Animals that talk and magical objects, fantasy journeys and miraculous
transformations, punishment of evil and reward of the virtuous are among the typical
elements recurring again and again.
Research work differentiates between folk tales and
literary fairy tales. Whereas in the case of the former the author or narrator, date and
place of origin and reason for their creation are often unknown and the tales have been
changed repeatedly in the course of tradition, literary fairy tales can be traced back to
definite authors who make more or less liberal use of the narrative form as well as of the
characters and requisites of the folk tale genre.
It is however impossible to make a clear distinction
because the collectors of folk tales, the brothers Grimm (Germany), Per Christen
Asbjörnsen (Norway), Alexander Afanasjev (Russia), Joseph Jacobs (Ireland) and many
others rendered the tales they had recorded largely in a highly literary and stylised
form. The conventional view, therefore, of the folk tale being an anonymous collective
creation of ‘the people’ has become untenable. On the contrary, all known folk
tales relate back to literary sources or are the product of intensive reworking.
The European folk and fairy tales take their cues from a
globally dispersed wealth of motifs and happenings which are then specifically
re-formulated in the national literatures of the individual European countries. Early
records exist particularly of Italian (Straparola, Le piacevoli notti, 1550-53) and French
collections (Perrault, Histoires ou contes du temps passé (Stories and Fairy Tales of the
Past), 1697). The Romantic movement of the 19th century generated not only a
multitude of fairy tale fiction and collections but created, through the Fairy and Folk
Tales of the brothers Grimm, a stylistic model which has since been applied universally to
the European folk tale.
Bottigheimer, Ruth: Fairy Tales and Folk Tales. In: Hunt,
Peter (ed.): International Companion Encyclopedia of Children’s Literature.
London/New York: Routledge 1996, 152-165
Klotz, Volker: Das europäische Kunstmärchen (The European
Literary Fairy Tale). Stuttgart: Metzler 1985
Lüthi, Max: Das europäische Kunstmärchen. Form und Wesen
(The European Literary Fairy Tale. Form and Essence). Tübingen: Francke 1992 (9th
edition)
Perrot, Jean (ed.): Tricentenaire Charles Perrault. Les
grands contes du XVIIe siècle et leur fortune littéraire (The Tricentenary of Charles
Perrault. The Great Fairy Tales of the 17th Century and their Literary Wealth).
Paris: in press editions 1998
Rölleke, Heinz: Die Märchen der Brüder Grimm. Quellen
und Studien (The Fairy Tales of the Brothers Grimm. Sources and Studies). Trier:
Wissenschaftlicher Verlag 2000
Soriano, Marc: Les Contes de Perrault (The Fairy Tales of
Perrault). Paris: Gallimard 1969
Opie, I. and Opie P.: The Classic Fairy Tales. Oxford:
University Press 1974
Zipes Jack: The Oxford Companion to Fairy Tales. Oxford:
University Press 2000
General information:
www.maerchenlexikon.de
www.internet-maerchen.de
19th Century German stories:
http://www.fln.vcu.edu/menu.html
Folk Tale and Fairy Tale Cyber Dictionary:
http://www.op97.k12.il.us/instruct/ftcyber/
Fairy tale studies (linkcollection)
http://www.langlab.wayne.edu/MarvelsHome/Marvels_Tales.html
Grimm Brothers’ Home Page:
http://www.pitt.edu/~dash/grimm.html
- Possible practical actions
Fairy tales have not always been as valued as they are
today. Until well into the 19th century they were the subject of fierce debates
and were classified by their critics as trivial literature promoting superstition and
subverting reality. After the fairy tale had been incorporated into the school syllabus
and used as an educational discipline the pendulum swung in the opposite direction to such
an extent that, towards the end of the 20th century, this form of literature
has been greatly in demand for dream analysis and psychotherapy, moral education and
solving existential crises. Caution is, however, called for, particularly for the sake of
these marvellous, traditional stories themselves which should, first and foremost, be
taken for what they are: splendidly narrated stories, rich in imagery and associations,
appealing to the very young listeners and readers as well as finding resonance with an
adult audience.
As such, fairy tales offer multiple reference points for
didactic purposes, not only for school teaching but also for parent-child communication in
the home. The literary educationalist Kaspar Spinner has formulated four principles to be
observed:
1. The fairy tales reside first and foremost in the
imagination and should be allowed to blossom there […]
2. The fairy tale enables people to cope with problems of
everyday life under the protection of a symbolic guise. We should see this as an
opportunity and not enforce a revealing dialogue! […]
3. The fairy tale takes on a particular significance in
inter-cultural teaching because of its unifying, inter-textual references and its reserved
realistic form […]
4. The proactive engagement with fairy tales, that is
re-developing, rewriting and re-inventing them, colouring them, playing with them and
setting them to music, is, justifiably, considered to be the most important educational
work with fairy tales today. This should, however, not lead us into getting lost in pure
activism and into taking creativity as a dispensation for thought.
Kaspar Spinner: Märchendidaktik heute. In: Märchen in
Erziehung und Unterrricht heute (Fairy Tale Didactic Today. In: Fairy Tales in Education
and Teaching) Kristin Wardetzky and Helga Zitzisperger (eds.). Rheine, Europäische
Märchengesellschaft 1997, 62/63
Illustrations from old (and new) books of fairy tale add
another, visual dimension to the narratives or reading texts: the pictures accompanying
the fairy tales tell their own variant version of the action. In this way different
meanings and interpretations are disclosed which can make comparison a highly fascinating
process.
Moreover, the illustrations offer a wealth of complementary
material in their detail and content. This means, not least, that the illustrations can
give further and more pointed evidence of contemporary, national-cultural phenomena of the
European countries in which they were created than the texts themselves.
- Websites offering ideas and material for practical
work with fairy tales
CLWG Children’s Literature Web Guide
http://www.acs.ucalgary.ca/~dkbrown/index.html
Fairy Tale and Folk Tale Cyber Dictionary
http://www.op97.k12.il.us/instruct/ftcyber/
Doucette Library of Teaching Resources
http://www.ucalgary.ca/~tflander/
Marvels and tales
http://www.langlab.wayne.edu/MarvelsHome/Marvels_Tales.html
The Reader’s Corner, European Style Fairy Tales
http://www.autopen.com/euro.fairy.shtml
- Material for individual fairy tales
Cinderella Stories
http://www.acs.ucalgary.ca/~dkbrown/cinderella.html
The Beauty and the Beast home
http://disintegrator.net:8080/beauty/
Little Red Riding Hood Project home page
http://www-dept.usm.edu/~engdept/lrrh/lrrhhome.htm
Vandergrift’s special interest page (Snow White)
http://www.scils.rutgers.edu/~kvander/
Please note that the following section of the Education
Programme is under review and will posted on the site shortly:
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