Oscar Wilde never danced as a hobby, but he was keen on featuring dancers in his literary works. His fairy-tale collections provide detailed depictions of dancing, ranging from classic ballroom dance to strange, uncanny kinds. The motif of dancing in Wilde's stories conveys the idea of estrangement in a double sense: referring to the divisions in…

This article explores child-authored texts, both real and fictional, and the adult discourse surrounding or commenting on such texts. It focuses on the example of young Marcel's writing in Proust's "In Search of Lost Time," and on the critical commentary on the juvenilia of child authors of the nineteenth and early twentieth century. I…

The impetus for the incredible variety found in the modern literary dragon is commonly seen to stem from the creative genius of either E. Nesbit or Kenneth Grahame. However, examination of dragon stories in the late nineteenth century shows that several different authors, on both sides of the Atlantic, were producing similar stories at about the…

The dolls' house as children's plaything is anything but simple. Inasmuch as the dolls' house may be the reproduction of domestic ideals on a minute scale and an educational model prompting girls to become good housewives, this article argues that it is also a means and space to express imagination, creativity, and agency. Including a short…

This paper considers how "knowledge" of China was presented for Victorian and Edwardian children in "The Boy's Own Paper" ("BOP") between 1879 and 1914. It considers how genre affects the representation of China in the "BOP" by comparing travel narratives and adventure stories. First, it focuses on…

"Elsie Dinsmore," the first book in a late 19th century children's series, is unique because it had not been adapted, just reprinted, until 1999. It is also unique in the setting, the mythic Southern plantation life of the 1850s. The 1999 edition ameliorated what is now recognized as racist language based on the images of the minstrelsy tradition,…

Asserts that Sunday School magazines are significant in the history of children's reading because they were the most easily accessible literature for children in many English-speaking countries during the nineteenth century. Examines content and themes in two such magazines, "The Children's Friend" and "The Child's Companion and…

Relates why nineteenth century fantasy writers shied away from the use of dragons in their stories and rejoices over the return and happy transformation of this mythical beast in children's literature. (HOD)

Examines issues about the representation of children in art during the 18th and 19th centuries: (1) main representations during this period; (2) principal influences affecting the construction of these images; and (3) whether the verbal and visual arts conceptualize childhood in similar or different ways. Looks at three influences on writers and…

Reviews literature from the first quarter of the nineteenth-century Victorian period. Examines how several Victorian novelists constructed new kinds of heroic stories, combining moral instruction with dynamic storytelling for their young audience. (MG)

Examines three recent books on Louisa May Alcott: (1) "A Hunger for Home: Louisa May Alcott and Little Women" by Sarah Elbert, (2) "The Promise of Destiny: Children and Women in the Short Stories of Louisa May Alcott" by Joy Marsella, and (3) "Louisa May Alcott" by Ruth MacDonald. (HOD)

Notes that F.H. Anstey's children's novel "Vice Versa" is unusual for its day (1882) because it attacks Victorian fathers and insensitive boarding school teachers, and points out how cruel children can be to one another when maintaining their own power structures. (JC)