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Mrs Tiggy-Winkle by Beatrix Potter Analysis
Beatrix Potter wrote Mrs. Tiggy-Winkle specifically to appeal to girls. She thought that Lucie’s feminine garb, with its emphasis on the lost clothing items (o, calamity!), would appeal to girls especially. Even today, authors and publishers are creating children’s books for the gender binary* e.g. this book will appeal to boys because X; this will […]
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Rabbits and Hares in Art and Storytelling
Rabbits are strongly associated with babies and early childhood. They appear often in stories and art for children. But what about hares?
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The Tale of Timmy Tiptoes by Beatrix Potter Analysis
Beatrix Potter was already popular by the time she published The Tale of Timmy Tiptoes (1911). The introduction to our 110th anniversary copy says the tale was created specifically to appeal to a new, American audience, with the inclusion of chipmunks. Unfortunately, Beatrix had never seen a chipmunk in real life. She must have relied […]
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The Tale of Mr Tod by Beatrix Potter Analysis
The Tale of Mr. Tod by Beatrix Potter (1912) is a child-in-jeopardy crime thriller. See my post on thrillers and also my post on secrets and scams.
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The Tale of Ginger and Pickles by Beatrix Potter Analysis
The Tale of Ginger and Pickles by Beatrix Potter is a story of utopian, idealised capitalism, first published 1909. This is how we’d all like capitalism to work — small local businesses provide goods and services; those friends providing the best goods and services win out, those ill-suited to small business find other, more suitable […]
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Pig the Winner by Aaron Blabey Analysis
Pig The Winner, written and illustrated by Aaron Blabey, is another picture book in the widely-loved Pig The Pug series. I suspect these will become Australian classics in the same way the Hairy Maclary books became New Zealand classics. I pick and choose when it comes to Aaron Blabey books. Pig The Fibber, which felt […]
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The Murders In The Rue Morgue by Edgar Allan Poe Analysis
“The Murders In The Rue Morgue” by Edgar Allan Poe (1841) is thought to be the first modern detective story. (Well, Oedipus is sometimes considered the first one on record.) For me there is little interesting about this story, except for its influence on the crime genre. That in itself makes it worth reading. As […]
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The Cat Returns Storytelling Notes
The Cat Returns is a 2002 feature-length anime about a teenage girl who is transported against her will into a feline fantasy world after saving a cat’s life. Writer Aoi Hiiragi also wrote the script for Whisper of the Heart. This is a sort of sequel to that, where the main character writes this story. In written […]
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Goldilocks and The Three Bears Fairy Tale Analysis
This month I wrote a post on Teaching Kids How To Structure A Story. Today I continue with a selection of mentor texts to help kids see how it works. Let’s look closely at a classic fairytale, Goldilocks and the Three Bears. Years later, at Goldilocks’ house. pic.twitter.com/PEa3WhhYZm — Dick King-Smith HQ (@DickKingSmith) July 19, 2020 snow white broke […]
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Frog Went A Courtin by John Langstaff Analysis
This month I wrote a post on Teaching Kids How To Structure A Story. Today I continue with a selection of mentor texts to help kids see how it works. Let’s look closely at Frog Went A-Courtin, a Scottish folk song from the 1500s, which was turned into an iconic picture book for children written by John […]
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Birds In Children’s Literature
Birds occupy a special place in children’s stories, as they do in the Bible, in folklore and in fairytales. Are they good or are they evil? No other creature has so successfully been both, equally. If you’re writing a children’s story, you can do what you like with birds. Whereas dogs as companions in children’s […]
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Chicken Little, Cassandra and Modern Horror
Chicken Little (mostly America) is also known as Chicken Licken or Henny Penny (mostly Britain). I hope the current generation of children don’t grow up thinking the 2005 animated movie version of Chicken Little has much to do with earlier versions of this story. The movie log line sounds okay on paper: “After ruining his […]
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Anthropomorphism vs. Personification
Anthropomorphism is the attribution of human-like characteristics, feelings, and behaviours to non-human characters such as animals, Gods, and supernatural creatures. Anthropomorphism is a similar literary device to personification.
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The Three Little Pigs Illustrated by Leonard Leslie Brooke Fairy Tale Analysis
The Three Little Pigs is one of the handful of classic tales audiences are expected to know. Pigs are handy characters: They can be adorable or they can be evil. You can strip them butt naked and let the reader revel in their uncanny resemblance to humans. Or, you can dress them in jumpers and they’re […]
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Thidwick The Big-Hearted Moose by Dr Seuss Analysis
Theo Geisel had a thing for antlers. In the mid-nineteen thirties, Theodor Geisel was a fledgling author and artist, operating as an illustrator for New York advertisement agencies. His father, superintendent of parks in Springfield, Mass., from time to time sent him antlers, expenditures and horns from deceased zoo animals. Geisel stored them in a […]