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Kiddie Lit

7/8/2017

12 Comments

 
Picture
Those of A Certain Age, I think, have memorized the best vacations we ever took; top places we’ve called home,
and favorite jobs of all time.  Foodies like me can even wax nostalgic about the finest meals we’ve had the pleasure
of experiencing.
 
But for other folks, also like me, who grew up around books and can’t imagine our lives without them, there’s another inventory that comes to mind—one that goes back to our very early years. 
 
I’m talking about the children’s books (also called kiddie literature or “kiddie lit” for short) that were read to us by parents and nursery school teachers; as well as the ones we later sat down with on our own, and those that we then passed on to our children and even grandchildren. Given that I got my first library card at five years old, that’s a whole lot of pages to ponder.
 
I was reminded of my very favorite children’s stories a couple of weeks ago, when a librarian chum posted an article last month during Children’s Literature Week. The 14-page piece is courtesy of Atlas Obscura, a web site that bills itself as “the definitive guide to the world’s hidden wonders.”  The site asked its followers to recount those little-known books that have stuck with them, but ones that also hardly anyone else seems to remember.
 
Nine hundred people answered, and from those responses, the editors compiled their favorite two dozen titles.  And, although I think of myself as a big fan—and collector—of kiddie lit, I wasn’t familiar with any of them. 
 
Included are The Summer Birds, about a group of children in rural England who learn to fly one summer; Time Windows, a ghost story involving a little girl and her doll house, and The War Between the Pitiful Teachers and the Splendid Kids, all about a school that’s grimly serious about turning out perfect children, and the eventual rebellion of its students.
 
Clearly, I’ve missed a lot of terrific books.
 
Still, I wished I had seen the original clarion call, because I absolutely would have responded. 
 
But wait.
 
Because I’m the sole proprietor of Girl Clown Dancing, I still get the chance to name my favorites right here, right now.  Happily, I have copies of most of them. And because only one is a book that most don’t know about, I’m hoping that not only are these books still remembered, but that they’re still being read by millions of kids—and adults, too.  
 

  • Me Too is a big, grey-covered picture book published in 1945, and would be my entry into the little-known category.  It’s the enchanting story of a very smart, very curious and very mischievous duckling. “Me Too’s name wasn’t Me Too at all,” the book begins.  “It was Herbert.  But everybody called him Me Too because every time his mother said, ‘I am going to take the older children to the pond,’ he said, “Me too, Me too!” 

  • Then there’s The Little House.  Written in 1942, I still remember, as a very little girl, sitting in an itty-bitty library chair and turning its pages over and over again.  Told exclusively from the house’s point of view, the tiny pink house with big shutters lives a quiet and uneventful life, with birds and flowers and children for company. Still, she wonders what life would be like in the city, which boasts fast moving cars, busy people and twinkling lights.  Eventually, she finds out.  Perhaps this book might also be considered obscure; not even the owner of our town’s indie bookstore was familiar with this title when I placed a special order for it last year.

  • Next up is a book from Dr. Suess, who I like but don’t love… except for Happy Birthday to You.  Coming out in 1959, it’s tells the magical Technicolor tale of one very lucky birthday boy who lives in the land of Katroo. After flying through his bedroom window early one morning, The Great Birthday Bird whisks the child from adventure to adventure over the course of one very long day, including a stop at The Birthday Flower Jungle and the famous Mustard-Off Pools (which I imagined diving into one day myself).  I love this book so much that I’ve bought it for more than a few friends.   

  • Released in 1941, Make Way for Ducklings has been in continuous print since that time, selling more than two million copies.  With its gorgeous charcoal illustrations rendered in sepia tones, the book tells the story of ducks Mr. and Mrs. Mallard (is anyone seeing a theme here?).  After more than a few (mis)adventures, the couple decide to raise their eight little ones—Jack, Kack, Lack, Mack, Nack, Ouack, Pack, and Quack—on an island in the Boston Public Garden.  I bought Ducklings for my daughter before I even brought her home.

  • I’m hardly adverse to chapter books either, which is where Mary Poppins, first published in 1933, and the Doctor Doolittle series come in.  For those who know Poppins only through the movie and play, it’s worth noting that the original nanny character was anything but saccharine sweet.  She’s much more dimensional and much more human: while her magical powers are very much in play, Poppins’ behavior toward her charges (Jane and Michael Banks, then later, twins John and Barbara) could sometimes be downright mean.  Also, I learned one of my first big words from the first book: perambulator, better known today as a baby stroller.

  • The initial Doctor Dolittle book came out in 1920; 11 more followed, with the final one released in 1952.  All penned by Hugh Lofting, the stories about a physician who shuns human patients in favor of animals (he can talk to them!) made their premiere in Lofting’s illustrated letters to his own children.  They were literally written from the trenches of World War I when actual news, the author later said, was either too horrible or too dull. I don’t know that I got to every single book, but I did read every one my town library had on the shelf.
 
That’s it for now, but frankly, I could list a dozen more kiddie lit favorites and still be far from finished.  If you haven’t read a grand children’s book lately, the list above—if this girl clown does say so herself—is A Very Good Start.
 
Please tell me about your favorite children’s books.  I look forward to your comments and stories!
 
P.S. The entire Atlas Obscura article is here, at www.atlasobscura.com/articles/obscure-childrens-books-reader-responses
 

12 Comments
Pam Thomas
7/8/2017 12:39:39 pm

Make Way for Ducklings is at the top of my list. It resonated strongly with me as a child! As an older child, I loved the mystery series, like Trixie Belden and Nancy Drew. My own kids loved The Boxcar Children and I loved reading those along with them!

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Hilary
7/8/2017 01:15:12 pm

Yes, the illustrations in Ducklings are so gorgeous! Katie's godmot-her (who is way younger than me) loved Nancy Drew as a child and gave Katie a starter set, but sadly, it didn't take hold. The Boxcar Children sounds VERY familiar; I'll have to look that one up. But, I may be confusing it with The Borrowers, a very popular book when I was a kid. : )

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kerri
7/8/2017 02:10:16 pm

For some reason Tales of the Hodja is coming to mind, which I see is still on Amazon, and gets 4 1/2 stars. Harry the Dirty Dog, Magilla Gorilla, anything Richard Scarry... those are the books I remember loving as a kid. As for being a mom reading to her kid, I loved reading the If you Give a Pig a Pancake series, and the Boynton books. There was also a book about a little girl getting immersed in a Van Gogh painting, and I wish I could remember the name, but I loved that it was introducing Cass to the fine arts.

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Hilary
7/8/2017 03:24:46 pm

I've never heard of the first book... but yes, I **love** the Harry the Dirty Dog books. That was one I discovered around the same time as The Little House--and I have a book here at home with several of those stories, in one volume. Katie's first dad also got her a Harry the Dirty Dog book, one story, which I still have. The "Give" books, I think, started with If You Give a Mouse a Cookie. I love those books, too. So many wonderful ones to choose/think about!

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Susan Jordan
7/8/2017 04:38:58 pm

I still have pretty much all my childhood books, even back to early childhood, where you can see my crayon marks in some of them. They're precious to me. The first thing I wanted to mention after that was that I'm very familiar with The Little House! It was well-known at my elementary school and daycare center, and a favorite. It reminds me in one way of Harry, The Dirty Dog", in that the child reader gets to see a transformation occur. With The Little House, it's the home's surroundings, and with the other, Harry transforms from a white dog with black spots to a black dog with white spots! Another book kind of fascinating to my young imagination was Harold and The Purple Crayon. It captivated me to think a little kid could invent a new world to walk into just by drawing it. I loved Dr. Seuss (you should see my old copy of Green Eggs and Ham), and I think I loved P.D. Eastman even more. Are You My Mother?, A Fish Out of Water, Go, Dog. Go!, Put Me in The Zoo, and several others come to mind. I can't remember now who wrote The King, The Mice, and The Cheese, but it was another early favorite I wish I had owned. I also liked one about brother-and-sister twins named Don and Donna. They had red hair and freckles, and the only way you could tell them apart was that Donna had a ponytail. One day, Don got sick or hurt, and couldn't play baseball. Rather than let the team down, Donna put her hair in the cap and impersonated Don. She played just as well, but when she was found out to be a girl, they kicked her off from playing, but let her keep score instead or something. I think it was called Don and Donna at Bat, and written before girls were alliwed to play Little League. I loved The Whales Go By, and You Will Go to The Moon, among others. I still have my early-childhood copy of Gateway to Storyland, along with my later Trixie Belden books, which I was allowed to get a new copy of every time we visited the Navy base down on Terminal Island, and which I devoured. They're a remarkable series just for the vocabulary alone (I tested at a 12th-grade reading level in 6th grade, probably in part because of Trixie, whose life circumstances I wanted!). These last few years, I've had my own reading club of sorts with a friend, many times going back and reading those children's books we missed in childhood. There's nothing like reading a book as a child, though; it captures your imagination like it never will again.

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Hilary Grant
7/8/2017 05:29:10 pm

I read the Harold and The Purple Crayon books as a child, too, and got paperback copies when my daughter was small. There are a few... including Harold going into space *and* joining a circus! Glad to hear that The Little House was popular w/ your generation as well. Re: Don and Donna at Bat, a FB Friend broke that barrier years ago: Jenny McFulle went to court in Marin County for not being able to play Little League--and won. Years later, I used to live next door to her mom! :)

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Jim Nolt
7/9/2017 10:48:43 am

For Christmas (1951) my kindergarten teacher gave me a copy of "David's Silver Dollar" by Elizabeth Squires. My mom read it to me at bedtime... I continued to read it... and then I read it to Lisa twenty years later. I still have it... still read it.

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Hilary Grant
7/9/2017 10:58:38 am

Lovely, and I'm assuming the book is long out of print, but available online at the right price. :) I believe that some of the very best kiddie lit was written in the 1940s and '50s! And I never even touched on Mother Goose or Aesop's Fables.

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leslie spoon
7/9/2017 04:27:27 pm

Hilary I really loved "Pippi Longstocking". She was a child but lived in her own house. Then there was "Luis of Guadalajara". The story was about his life in Mexico. It was very well written. I also loved fairy tales. When I got older I read the real Grimm`s Fairy Tales and I could not get over how violent and gory they were. I did like Dr. Suess because the stories were so crazy.

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Hilary
7/9/2017 04:54:01 pm

I remember the long pigtails that Pippi Longstocking had... and wasn't she also able to fly? Or at least had some magic powers? And yes, the original fairy tales were not exactly child oriented... to say the least! But I loved reading Mother Goose nursery rhymes to Katie when she was very little; I have a few oversized books of Mother Goose in my kiddie lit collection, too.

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kimberly fonturbel
7/10/2017 03:32:58 pm

I love children's books to pieces! "Goodnight Moon" is above my fireplace meticulously framed. I display children's book as art in my home using the library. Richard Scarry's illustrations make me feel happy. Marina and I randomly ask & answer: "do you like my hat?" "No, I do not" from Go Dog Go. My favorite "remember turning the pages over and over when I was little" books are: "Come Over to My House" by Suess's alternate name Theo Le Sieg, Sammy the Seal, danny and the dinosaur by Syd Hoff and Summer by Alice Low-with happy happy Illustrations by Roy Mckie.

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Hilary
7/10/2017 06:54:11 pm

You've brought up a great point: children's books as art! In fact, the annual Caldecott Medal is awarded to the best illustrated children's book of the year. Make Way for Ducklings won, and so did The Little House. There's also the Newbery Award, for best written children's book. The Voyages of Doctor Doolittle won in 1923; and another of my faves as a kid, King of the Wind, got the prize in 1949. As a major horse lover, I'm sure you know this latter book!

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    Hilary Roberts Grant

    Journalist, editor, filmmaker, foodie--and a clown! 
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