The Limits of Celebrations: A Review of Celebrating Children's Books

Despite the increasing attention being paid to children's literature during the last decade, there is still a pervasive and persistent naivete in much of the commentary the field produces—a characteristic way of talking that suggests that everything being said about children's books is being said for the first time. Perhaps this attitude carries over from the nature of the subject matter. Since the literature is full of innocence and wonder, so, it appears, must be the criticism. To become too rigorous, it may implicitly be felt, would be to lose sight of the audience. Celebrating Children's Books (New York: Lothrop, Lee & Shepard, 1981), a Festschrift in honor of Zena Sutherland, edited by Betsy Hearne and Marilyn Kaye, is a case in point. The names of almost all the essayists are familiar. They have made their mark in the field as creative writers, pictorial artists, and editors, and we have come to respect their work. Yet, the collection suffers from the same ailments that afflict much of the criticism available. At worst, the essays are folksy, preachy, and predictable. To be sure, there are some good essays here, but the collection as a whole is disappointing. So much of it has been said before.

There are two possible reasons for this. First, since almost all the contributors are "celebrities," they may have felt that simply to describe their own perceptions and processes was sufficient. Indeed, that may have been what the editors asked them to do. And, to a degree, we are always grateful for artists' reflections on their art. But one senses in some of these essays that the artists are not really recording these observations in good faith. There is a slickness to many of their observations that strikes me as not truly accounting for their talents. Of course they don't need to. But there is the pretense that that is what they are doing. A second reason for the lack of richness in this collection may be that its categories are too familiar. The book is divided into four sections: creating the books, producing the books, understanding the books, and reaching the readers. Perhaps, we have gotten all we are going to get from these broad perspectives for awhile. We would be better off, it seems to me, asking more pointed questions, if we are to arrive at new insights about the nature of the field.

Of the groups of professionals represented here, the novelists, oddly enough, are the most disappointing. Their remarks rely heavily on anecdote, reminiscence, coy rhetorical structures, and simple explanations about the nature of literature. For example, Lloyd Alexander's essay, entitled "The Grammar of Story," is sadly elementary. He observes provocatively enough that "the grammar of story may be the grammar of the human brain" (p. 13), suggesting an awareness of structuralism. Yet, his more detailed explanations imply a reader who has little sense of the rudiments of storytelling. "Plot is not the same as story," he writes. "Plot, say, is the road on which we drive our car. . . . But if plot is the road, story is what we see along the way" (p. 6). This kind of distinction might serve a college freshman in a fiction course, but it adds little to our knowledge about the essential nature of narrative.

Likewise, Paula Fox takes the easy way out. Her essay, 'Some Thoughts on Imagination in Children's Literature." begins with a reflection on the ability of books to awaken the child, to bring him or her "news of the infinitely varied nature of life" (p. 24)—certainly a recognition no one would deny. But for whom is it written? Fox goes on to talk about tract literature, and its evolution into the modern "problem novel," which she calls "junk food"—without naming names. She reminisces about her own fruitful days in the attic with old National Geographics, describing how, "on those attic stairs in an old house that seemed always on the verge of collapse, I began to sense huge possibilities" (p. 31). To be fair, Fox does make some...