Children's Literature: A Reader's History from Aesop to Harry Potter

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Review
"A wonderful book, with remarkable temporal breadth in its vision of the children's tradition. Highly effective as a work of synthesis, yet with many, many moments of originality and surprise, even for expert readers. Anyone engaged (whether as scholar, educator, even `simply' as parent) with the psychic life of children will have much to learn from Lerer's account."-Katie Trumpener, Yale University (Katie Trumpener 20071227)

"A dazzling cornucopia of erudition and originality on a subject of grave concern in twenty-first century U.S. education and culture. Every page of Seth Lerer's brilliant book reminds us of the supreme and enduring value of childhood reading. This volume deserves the attention of all who care about the shaping of lives-educators on all levels, policy makers, psychologists, and parents, as well as scholars. Lerer writes that children''s literature is meant `docere et delectare' (to instruct and to delight), and this is precisely what he himself has done in this fascinating book."-Ellen Handler Spitz, University of Maryland, author of Inside Picture Books (Ellen Handler Spitz 20071227)

"A breathtakingly powerful and complex history of children's literature that energizes rather than depletes. Lerer gives us the facts, but he also weaves experiences and stories into an account that moves in registers ranging from the ecstatic to the elegiac. An ideal guide for students new to the field of children's literature as well as for scholars familiar with the territory."-Maria Tatar, Harvard University (Maria Tatar 20080515)

"Seth Lerer's Children's Literature: A Reader's History from Aesop to Harry Potter is unique in its method, depth, and breadth. Lerer's comprehensive knowledge of ancient and medieval literature serves him well, for he has a singular understanding of how vernacular literature originated and informed literature for children and adults and how children's literature informed the construction of both childhood and adult readers. It is a joy to read his study because one can sense a serious and sensitive mind at work, seeking to chart a new path through the history of children's literature. Lerer mixes his personal reading experience with an astute scholarly appreciation of literary reception, and the result is an original study that will contribute to a greater awareness of the profundity of children's literature."-Jack Zipes, University of Minnesota (Jack Zipes 20080511)

"Lerer has accomplished something magical. Unlike the many handbooks to children's literature that synopsize, evaluate, or otherwise guide adults in the selection of materials for children, this work presents a true critical history of the genre. . . . Scholarly, erudite, and all but exhaustive, it is also entertaining and accessible. Lerer takes his subject seriously without making it dull."-Library Journal (starred review) (Library Journal )

"Lerer's Olympian survey . . . swells and ebbs like a symphony."-Michael Sims, Washington Post Book World (Michael Sims Washington Post Book World )

Product Description
Ever since children have learned to read, there has been children’s literature. Its history is inseparable from the history of childhood, as children are indelibly molded by the tales they hear and read—stories they will one day share with their own sons and daughters.
Children’s Literature charts the makings of the Western literary imagination from Aesop’s fables to Mother Goose, from Alice's Adventures in Wonderland to Peter Pan, from Where the Wild Things Are to Harry Potter. Seth Lerer here explores the iconic books, ancient and contemporary alike, that have forged a lifelong love of literature in young readers during their formative years. Along the way, Lerer also looks at the changing environments of family life and human growth, schooling and scholarship, and publishing and politics in which children found themselves changed by the books they read. This ambitious work appraises a broad trajectory of influences—including Shakespeare’s plays, John Locke’s theories of education, Darwin’s On the Origin of Species, and the Puritan tradition—which have each shaped children’s literature through the ages as well.  
The only single-volume work to capture the rich and diverse history of children’s literature in its full panorama, this extraordinary book reveals why J. R. R. Tolkien, Dr. Seuss, Laura Ingalls Wilder, Shel Silverstein, and many others, despite their divergent styles and subject matter, have all resonated with generations of readers. Children’s Literature is an exhilarating quest across centuries, continents, and genres to discover how, and why, we first fall in love with the written word.  (20070919)

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