Toggle Main Menu Toggle Search

Open Access padlockePrints

Children’s and juvenile literature

Lookup NU author(s): Professor Matthew GrenbyORCiD

Downloads

Full text for this publication is not currently held within this repository. Alternative links are provided below where available.


Abstract

© Oxford University Press 2015. This chapter examines children’s and juvenile literature. Many pre-Victorian children did not encounter children’s fiction at all. A substantial number, of course, were largely disconnected from literary culture by indigence or illiteracy. However, lots of those young people who did consume books continued to use material designed primarily for adults. What confuses the matter is that the distinction could be very blurred between literature for adults and literature for ‘young gentlemen and ladies’. What would now be called ‘crossover’ works were common: titles originally aimed at adults that were quickly appropriated by or for young readers. By 1820, the novel for children was establishing itself as a distinct entity, but had not quite disconnected itself from the mainstream. Children’s fiction was still shadowing the novel for adults, imitating its genres, and sharing its concerns.


Publication metadata

Author(s): Grenby MO

Editor(s): Peter Garside and Karen O'Brien

Publication type: Book Chapter

Publication status: Published

Book Title: The Oxford History of the Novel in English: Volume 2: English and British Fiction 1750-1820

Year: 2015

Pages: 495-512

Print publication date: 01/01/2015

Online publication date: 01/06/2018

Acceptance date: 01/01/1900

Publisher: Oxford University Press

Place Published: Oxford

URL: https://doi.org/10.1093/oso/9780199574803.003.0027

DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780199574803.003.0027

Library holdings: Search Newcastle University Library for this item

ISBN: 9780199574803


Share