Children's Literature Collections: Approaches to Research (Critical Approaches to Children's Literature)

This Book Provides Scholars, Both National And International, With A Basis For Advanced Research In Children's Literature In Collections. Examining Books For Children Published Across Five Centuries, Gathered From The Collections In Dublin, This Unique Volume Advances Causes In Collecting, Librarianship, Education, And Children's Literature Studies More Generally. It Facilitates Processes Of Discovery And Recovery That Present Various Pathways For Researchers With Diverse Interests In Children's Books To Engage With Collections. From Book Histories, Through Bookselling, Information On Collectors, And Histories Of Education To Close Text Analyses, It Is Evident That There Are Various Approaches To Researching Collections. In This Volume, Three Dominant Approaches Emerge: History And Canonicity, Author And Text, Ideals And Institutions. Through Its Focus On Varied Materials, From Fiction To Textbooks, This Volume Illuminates How Cities Can Articulate A Vision Of Children's Literature Through Particular Collections And Institutional Practices. Keith O'sullivan And Pádraic Whyte, Editors. Includes Bibliographical References And Index. Front Matter....Pages i-x Introduction....Pages 1-11 Front Matter....Pages 13-13 Instruction with Delight: Evidence of Children as Readers in Eighteenth-Century Ireland from the Collections of Dublin City Library and Archive....Pages 15-31 Irish Children’s Books 1696‒1810: Importation, Exportation and the Beginnings of Irish Children’s Literature....Pages 33-51 The Great Famine in Irish History Textbooks, 1900–1971....Pages 53-69 The Development of the Irish Immigrant Experience in Irish-American Children’s Literature 1850‒1900....Pages 71-87 Front Matter....Pages 89-89 Time and the Child: The Case of Maria Edgeworth’s Early Lessons ....Pages 91-105 Picking Grandmamma’s Pockets ....Pages 107-124 From Superstition to Enchantment: The Evolution of T. Crofton Croker’s Fairy Legends and Traditions of the South of Ireland ....Pages 125-144 ‘Firing for the Hearth’: Storytelling, Landscape and Padraic Colum’s The Big Tree of Bunlahy ....Pages 145-161 Front Matter....Pages 163-163 Kildare Place Society and the Beginnings of Formal Education in Ireland....Pages 165-182 Homespun Books: Creating an Irish National Children’s Literature....Pages 183-201 The Puffin Story Books Phenomenon: Popularization, Canonization and Fantasy, 1941‒1979....Pages 203-220 Picturing Possibilities in Children’s Book Collections....Pages 221-240 Back Matter....Pages 241-261