The Words of Poems are Who You were: Contradictions and Continuities in Signs of Childness in Children’s Books
Authors
Pullinger, Debbie
Publication Date
2019-03Journal Title
Children's Literature in Education
ISSN
0045-6713
Publisher
Springer Science and Business Media LLC
Volume
50
Issue
1
Pages
38-46
Language
en
Type
Article
This Version
VoR
Metadata
Show full item recordCitation
Pullinger, D. (2019). The Words of Poems are Who You were: Contradictions and Continuities in Signs of Childness in Children’s Books. Children's Literature in Education, 50 (1), 38-46. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10583-018-9374-6
Abstract
In Hollindale’s Signs of Childness in Children’s Books (1997), the idea that adulthood is continuous with childhood co-exists with the idea that it is forever separated. Far from being self-contradictory, this reflects the complex reality represented within children’s literature. Focusing on the case of children’s poetry, in which the relationship between adult and child is characteristically different from that in other forms, I examine how those relationships may occur differently, what children’s poetry seeks to do in language, and how it relates to the body and to time. From this poetic perspective on what Hollindale describes as the “meaningful continuity between the child and adult self”, I argue that in the absence of the constraints of narrative, with its linear progression and child protagonist, a particular kind of childness becomes evident.
Sponsorship
Leverhulme Trust (RPG-2013-247)
Identifiers
External DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10583-018-9374-6
This record's URL: https://www.repository.cam.ac.uk/handle/1810/288143
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