Here’s a very interesting article by Jennie Yabroff from the Washington Post:
Why are there so few girls in children’s books?
The main characters — whether they’re human, animal, a snowplow or a crayon — are almost always male.
First, the central character in more published children’s literature is male. Like the movie biz, girls (it’s kiddie lit, remember) are necessary for some semblance of reality but they are generally not the lead character (the hero) and they are not paid as much as the boys.
Continue reading “Why So Few Girls In Children’s Books”
There has been a bit of a kerfuffle over the cover art chosen by Penguin to illustrate the Roald Dahl novel, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. The two main objections: it is upsetting and inappropriate for a chldren’s book and it is not representative of the contents of the book. Most commentators concluded that they would never give the book to a child. Despite the common use of children as a shield covering the adult person’s inability to accept the problematic facts of life, let’s look at the cover, in fact the covers of the entire Penguin re-release of the works of Roald Dahl, and let’s consider the works themselves.
A Celebration of Reading 