An Ambivalent Revolution

In Criticism, Theory and Children's Literature, Peter Hunt observes that "the last ten [years] have seen a revolution in critical thinking in universities, which has, paradoxically, thrust children's books and their critics into the limelight" (6). One such critic and his book is Perry Nodelman and The Pleasures of Children's Literature. His aims are twofold: "to provide adults with contexts and strategies of comprehension" that will enable them to understand and enjoy children's literature, and to show that "children too can be taught—and would benefit from—these contexts and strategies" (1). Perhaps most important of Nodelman's objectives is his courageous insistence that we "defy" (4) his opinions and become resistant readers. Indeed, Nodelman states that "to facilitate your dialogue with my ideas and opinions, I have included short 'Explorations' throughout the book. . . . They are meant to help you think actively about the issues and ideas" (4).

In his opening chapters, Nodelman offers the reader traditional contexts and strategies: childhood is a recent invention (20); the Puritans influenced children and children's literature (23). These conventional ideas call forth an equally conventional list of names—Locke, Newbery, Rousseau, Harvey Darton, Piaget—past scholars who, in Louis Althusser's words, interpellate students of children's literature, inculcating them with a certain "know how" that ensures the circulation and reproduction through schools and in society of the traditional ideas we have about children's literature. Once past this familiar roll call, though, Nodelman introduces two radically new contexts: popular culture and contemporary critical theory, both of which will ensure the circulation and reproduction among students and teachers of a revolutionary set of ideas about children's literature, one that empowers students to dissent. Making a significant break from traditional anthologies of children's literature—those by Sutherland, Norton, Russell, and Lukens, for example—Nodelman argues that "the context in which children look at picture books and read novels includes not only their dealings with parents, teachers, and other adults who might make some of the assumptions outlined in Chapter 4; . . . it also includes their encounters with video games, Barbie dolls, and Saturday morning cartoons. Toys, TV shows, and movies intended for children are the most immediate background of many children's responses to literature" (43). Many contemporary critics would agree with Nodelman's argument that, because these "products of popular culture have a powerful influence on children's expectations and attitudes . . . they deserve particular attention" (43). Thus, chapter 5, "Children's Literature in the Context of Popular Culture," includes brief essays on such subjects as "The Culture of Childhood" (43-45) and "TV, Movies, and the Literary Education of Children" (55-56). Within these sections are even shorter pieces in which Nodelman simply raises an issue. In "Toys and Games: Their Effect on Children's Enjoyment of Literature," for instance, Nodelman examines in one paragraph the narrative elements in video games (47), a controversial aspect of the relation between children's literature and popular culture.

Though brief, these sections will surely stimulate discussion. Nodelman includes a brief assessment of the Disney controversy in "Disney Films: An Appraisal" (53-55), bringing together the different points of view of such children's literature critics as Frances Clarke Sayers, Jill May, and Lucy Rollin. He swiftly summarizes their positions, an important task for the beginning student who might not be aware of the Disney corporation's influence on children's literature specifically and popular culture generally. Unfortunately, Nodelman makes little effort to build on the Marxist framework he invokes at the beginning of this chapter in a section called "Ideology and Hegemony" (43-44). The anthologizing of theoretical contexts for understanding popular culture, particularly those that emphasize ideology and hegemony, are important; it is a shame to see them treated so briefly.

Still, using Nodelman's "Explorations," a teacher who wishes to resist the reduction of what Eagleton calls the "complex into the simple" (619) should be able to initiate further discussions about the infantilization of bourgeois culture ideologically implicit in the Disneyfication of children's literature...