Nine years ago, I started teaching a course I called “Harry Potter’s Library: J.K. Rowling, Texts and Contexts.” This coming fall, I’ll be teaching it for the seventh time (eighth, if you count the semester I taught two sections). The course has been so popular that Kansas State University uses it in its promotional materials….
Month: June 2011
Radical Children’s Literature Now!
Many folks who attended Julia Mickenberg’s and my “Radical Children’s Literature Now!” lecture today at the Children’s Literature Association Conference in Roanoke asked: “I didn’t get a handout. Could I have one?” Since we only made 200 copies, here is that handout. (The entire lecture will be on the Children’s Literature Association’s website in the…
Summertime: The Box Set
Happy First Day of Summer! Here’s a “Summertime” box set. I will now take your questions. Q: Are there good “summer” songs omitted from these four mixes? A: Yes, of course there are. I came up with an additional 133 songs that I did not use. Q: Will you assemble more mixes including those songs?…
Crockett Johnson and Ruth Krauss biography: The Text’s in the Mail
An update. Shortly after yesterday’s blog post, my editor said I could go ahead and send it all in. This means either that he (or someone else) will now seek places to cut or that it’s moving ahead to the copy-editing stage. Either way, it’s off my desk until [unknown date]! With a mixture of…
Crockett Johnson and Ruth Krauss: biography outtakes, Part 8
On Monday, I finished the eighth edit of The Purple Crayon and a Hole to Dig: The Lives of Crockett Johnson and Ruth Krauss, and sent it to my editor. I’m really happy with all of the edits I’ve made. I finally understand his advice, and have cut anything that feels purely “completist,” and focused…
Mischief Managed: Harry Potter Bathroom Graffiti
Actual bathroom graffiti advises graffiti artists: “screw all this relationship stuff on the wall. What we should really focus on is Harry Potter because those books are cooler than we’ll ever be.”
Paper Call: MLA, January 3-6, 2013, Boston
Each year the Children’s Literature Assocation is guaranteed one session at the MLA and can submit proposals for up to two more.* If you would like to propose a session topic, by June 17th please send the ChLA/MLA Liaison (Philip Nel: philnel@ksu.edu): (1) a short description of your proposal idea, and, if relevant, (2) the…
Why Meghan Can’t Read
In an op-ed piece that the Wall Street Journal published as an article, Meghan Cox Gurdon criticizes contemporary young adult fiction for its darkness. As she writes, “it is … possible—indeed, likely—that books focusing on pathologies help normalize them and, in the case of self-harm, may even spread their plausibility and likelihood to young people…
Crockett Johnson and Ruth Krauss: biography outtakes, Part 7
The good news. I’m making progress, and — currently up to Chapter 20 (of 28) — have cut far more (already) than I did on the last round of revisions. I have a clearer sense of The Purple Crayon and a Hole to Dig: The Lives of Crockett Johnson and Ruth Krauss (UP Mississippi, June 2012)….