Print for Children

Course Description

Children have been a major audience for print throughout history, and this course will introduce participants to Western children’s print, visual, and material culture and that of China. The course will draw on the rich resources of historical illustrated books, manuscripts, artwork, ephemera, and multimedia artifacts of the Cotsen Children’s Library at Princeton. Attention will be paid to the classic literary genres such as fairy tales, alphabets, and moveable books, but we will also examine diverse materials including propaganda and advertising targeting young people, information books, educational pastimes, and transnational books. The approach will be contextual, teaching students how to identify rare materials for children and situate them within cultural, historical and literary continuums for the purposes of collecting, cataloging, and research.

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Advance Reading List

Required Reading

Alderson, Brian. “The Making of Children’s Books.” Chapter. In The Cambridge Companion to Children’s Literature, edited by M. O. Grenby and Andrea Immel, 35-54. Cambridge Companions to Literature. Cambridge University Press, 2009.

Immel, Andrea and Emer O’Sullivan. “Sameness and Difference in Children’s Literature: An Introduction.” Chapter. In Imagining Sameness and Difference in Children’s Literature from the Enlightenment to the Present Day, edited by Andrea Immel and Emer O’Sullivan. 1-25. Palgrave Macmillan, 2017.

Shefrin, Jill. “Education and Children’s Books before 1830.” Submitted Chapter Under Review. In The Cambridge History of Children’s Literature in English. Volume 1. Origins to 1830, edited by Eugene Giddens, Zoe Jaques, and Louise Joy. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, forthcoming.

Stevenson, Deborah. “Classics and Canons.” Chapter. In The Cambridge Companion to Children’s Literature, edited by M. O. Grenby and Andrea Immel, 108-123. Cambridge Companions to Literature. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2009.

As well as these three items available on Google Docs, please browse at least one of the following exhibition catalogs before you arrive:

Alderson, Brian and Felix de Marez Oyens. Be Merry and Wise: Origins of Children’s Book Publishing in England, 1650-1850. The Pierpont Morgan Library; The Bibliographical Society of America; The British Library; Oak Knoll Press, 2006.

Johnson, Elizabeth. For Your Amusement and Instruction: The Elisabeth Ball Collection of Historical Children’s Materials. The Lilly Library, Indiana University, 1987. [Available to view at the Indiana University Digital Library website]

Kinchin, Juliet, and Aidan O’Connor. Century of the Child: Growing by Design, 1900-2000. New York: Museum of Modern Art, 2012.

Loker, Chris. One Hundred Books Famous in Children’s Literature. Edited by Jill Shefrin. New York: The Grolier Club, 2014.

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Course Evaluations

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Course History