| Od
literatury dla dzieci do literatury dzieciecej. Tematy
- gatunki- konteksty. Wroclawskiego: Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu, 2000 Review by Dorata Milchulka Ryszard Waksmund-a student of Jerzy Cieslikowski-belongs to the most distinguished scholars studying literature for children and youth, which is a relatively new field of research. He has already published extensively. In the last decades the following of his works have appeared: Literature pokoju dzieciecego (Literature of the Children's Room) in 1986, Nie tylko Robinson (Not only Robinson) in 1987, Poezja dla dzieci. Antologia form i tematów (Poetry for Children: an anthology of forms and themes) in 1987 (1st edition) and 1999 (2nd edition) and Gabinet wrózek. Antologia basni francuskiej XVII-XVIII wieku (Fairies' Study: an Anthology of the French Fairy Tale of the 17th and 18th Centuries) in 1998. In 2000 a long awaited compendium of knowledge on children's literature, its development and functions was published, showing what functions children's literature fulfils in the sociologically complex world of adolescents: Od literatury dla dzieci do literatury dzieciecej. Tematy-gatunki-konteksty (From Literature for Children to Children's Literature: Themes, Genres, Contexts). This impressive volume is divided into 9 chapters: Chapter I Od historii dziecinstwa do etnografii dziecinstwa (From a History of Childhood to an Ethnography of childhood) introduces the reader into the cultural contexts of studies on literature for children, Chapters II and III-Podróze w dalekie lata ("Travelling into the Past") and Blahy temat ("Trifle Theme"), respectively-highlight the topos in the structure of the analysed material, doing which the author follows in Cieslikowski's footsteps. The following chapters, Rehabilitacja basni ("Vindicating a Fairy Tale") and Metamorfoza basni ("Metamorphoses of a Fairy Tale") centre on the generic aspects. Chapters VI and VII titled Od wiersza do poematu ("From a Rhyme to a Poem") and Od dramatu dla dzieci do dramatu dzieciecego ("From Drama for Children to Children's Drama") are similarly focused. The penultimate chapter-Od nobilitacji do degradacji ("From Ennoblement to Degradation") manifests a turn in studies on children's literature. Contrary to Cieslikowski, who emphasised the optimistic and idyllic dimension of this literature (e.g. its convergence with the aims of education, which will be dealt with below), Waksmund "Korczak-wise" discusses also texts in which children's lot is sad and tragic (for example, he refers to works by Dickens, Dostoyevsky and Hugo, describes bourgeois literature or Gorky's Childhood). The world presented in texts for children is frequently perceived and evaluated in axiologically pejorative terms . Writing about the interpenetration of motifs, plots and themes from adult literature and children's literature or from folklore and high literature, Waksmund perceives problems of the discourse of (dialogue between) two different scholarly disciplines and fields (e.g. theory of literature and theory of culture). And so meditating upon the "vindication of the fairy tale" and the influence of folklore on children's literature connected therewith, Waksmund points to Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm's Kinder- und Hausmarchen (1812-1822) as a model text treated by Polish scholars as the authoritative source. Then he enumerates a whole series of anthologies by Polish collectors and lovers of folklore, such as Kazimierz Wladyslaw Wójcikowski's Klechdy, starozytne podania i powiesci ludu polskiego i Rusi (Legends, Ancient Stories and Tales of the Peoples of Poland and Ruthenia) from 1837, Karol Balinski's Powiesci ludu spisane z podan (Folk Tales Recorded from Oral Tales) from 1842, Lucjan Siemienski's Podania I legendy polskie, ruskie i litewskie (Polish, Ruthenian and Lithuanian Tales and Legends) from 1845, Roman Zmorski's Podania i basnie ludu na Mazowszu (People's Tales and legends in Mazovia) from 1852 and the most widely read work of this kind: Antoni Józef Glinski's Bajarz polski (The Polish Story-Teller) from 1853. The influence that texts from these collections had on the tale reclaiming its proper place seemed significant, all the more so once-let's remember-"Moralising prose for children, operating with the schematic patterns of a child's trifling trespasses and self-rectification, seemed anachronistic" (165). Waksmund's completely novel enterprise is a study of the drama for children and its evolution towards children's drama. As the scholar's words suggest, attempts at "constructing an evolutionary bridge between the past and the present days" in the sphere of playwriting for children and youth, "are doomed to selectiveness" and "have a fragmentary nature" (302). And yet a study has been produced that constitutes an important part of a synthesis of the history of literature for children in which the scholar describes all the important phenomena connected with the dramatic forms written for children and their stage productions throughout centuries, and he also refers to the research of theatre theorists and theatre scholars. Referring to educational theories, Waksmund points to Jan Okon's Dramat i teatr szkolny. Sceny jezuickie XVII wieku (School Drama and Theatre: Jesuit Stages of the 17th century, Wroclaw 1970) , which discusses among others "typical" school celebrations: beginnings and ends of the school year, religious holidays or "other events" (visits of distinguished guests, deaths of patrons, etc.) (302). Further, referring to Anna Nikliborc's Poczatki teatru dzieciecego we Francji (The Beginnings of Children's Theatre in France) (see page 303, footnote 4), he presents 17th-century drama for girls. Drama for girls could appear, Waksmund states, owing to a small experiment which was undertaken in an educational institute for young ladies near Versailles. It was Racine himself that wrote some dramas for this institute, having performed which "adolescent 'actresses' became so vain that they refused to comply with the role of obedient pupils any more..." (303). Undoubtedly, Enlightenment "domestic theatre" also played an important role in the transformation of drama for children. "Domestic theatre" could resemble Jesuit school theatre, especially in bourgeois households. Waksmund points to Maeterlinck as a founder of drama for children and to modernism as the period of unique penetration of fable motifs into playwriting for children" (309). "Among stars and planets magical blue birds loiter…" (quotation in 309). Hence so much of the "poetical aura manifested in stage directions seemingly untranslatable into theatre's language" in Lesmian's fables for children (309). Obviously, the structure of and issues raised in theatre for children could be determined also by the order of the calendar. A lot of texts written for children and "forgotten by literary scholarship" are still alive only on stages of big and small theatres, and the stage adaptations trigger one to reach for the literary originals. One could mention here for example O Janku co psom szyl buty (About Janek Who Made Boots for Dogs) by Slowacki, which still functions "within and outside of the context of Kordian" and which has been adapted for the stage several times ; or, for that matter, Dick Whittington i jego kot. Powiastka z rycinami (Dick Whittington and his Cat. A Tale wit Illustrations), referred to by Waksmund, which in children's reception has survived in the Polish version as a radio play . According to the Longman Dictionary of English Language and Culture, the protagonist of the story, Dick Whittington, lived between 1358 and 1423, and his history has been preserved in the British culture of theatre for children. It is well known and still popular, and it is performed especially during Christmas at schools as a "pantomime" (which is not a classical pantomime), usually accompanied by music, jokes and songs. One should notice that Waksmund devotes a lot of his attention to images of the child and childhood appearing in various contexts and functions in high literature (chapter Blahy temat). He discusses Treny (Laments) by Jan Kochanowski, Death in Venice by Thomas Mann, in which one of the major motifs is an aging artist's fascination with an extraordinarily pretty boy's physiognomy, Invincible by William Faulkner (the motif of friendship between a white boy and a black boy); then he discusses child protagonists of Witkacy's dramas, "who are especially susceptible to the atmosphere of insanity", and deals with childhood as an autobiographical motif in Kantor's spectacle Wielopole, Wielopole. Further, Waksmund presents Orcio from Krasinski's Nie-boska komedia (Un-divine comedy) and enumerates a series of works by Mickiewicz and Slowacki. It should be added that the motif of the child and childhood recurs in high literature frequently in an autobiographical context. For years now it has been expedient to write about literature for children; equally long have we wondered how multidimensionality and multiculturalism of literature for children can be fully grasped. Where is a book for children with its "colourful covers" actually located? Somewhere between art, culture and education-at the crossroads? That is why it is not easy to write about this literature. Recently, discussions embarked upon by literary scholars have aimed, among others, at defining various scholarly perspectives applied to research into books for children; the power of literature for children nowadays is its multifacetedness. A book for children is a kind of literature, a pictorial art (illustrations), pure entertainment, a way of enriching verbal and visual perception of the world, an aid in developing skills of writing and reading, and finally it is a cultural mediator in school education. In recent years many scholars' (e.g. Jack Zipes, Peter Hunt, Maria Nikolajewa, John Stephens, Herbert Kohl, Lee Galdy) intention has been to highlight the unclear status of research into literature for children as well as to initiate a dialogue between aesthetics, literary scholarship and pedagogy in interpretation of texts for children and youth. Waksmund's book inscribes itself excellently in the ongoing debate. In sections which introduce the issues discussed ( "From History of Childhood to Ethnography of Childhood"), the scholar refers to the works of folklore scholars, ethnographers, anthropologists, theoreticians of culture, sociologists and psychologists. Of course a prominent position in this survey is occupied by the French historian Philippe Aries and his L'Enfant et la vie familalie sou l'ancien regime (Paris 1960), which analyses the concept and category of "childhood" in the socio-cultural perspectives of adults-children relations (the text is also available in Polish translation by M. Ochab titled Historia dziecinstwa: dziecko i rodzina w dawnych czasach, 1995). In the later part of this chapter, Waksmund enumerates volumes which discuss the issues of family feelings, such as History of family by Jean Louis Flandrin and History of maternal love by Elizabeth Badinter. Waksmund carefully outlines the principles following which he categorises the issues he studies: themes, genres, contexts, which makes his massive volume a lucid, thought-provoking and extremely erudite work. It provides the reader not only with intellectual satisfaction (it presents several branches of literary scholarship: genology, philosophical theories: enlightenment rationalism and empiricism, culture and folklore, social sciences and psychological approaches: social and developmental psychology), but also with aesthetic satisfaction. As far as aesthetics is concerned Waksmund presents the issues of iconography in books for children, renderings of children in painting, music, photography, he describes film adaptations of literature for children and "children's brutal themes" in Andrzej Mleczko's drawings (Swiat dziecka-The World of a Child-1977), where "cruelty and thoughtlessness of adults compete with inquisitiveness and ruthlessness of their offspring" (159). Waksmund points also to the ludic aspect of some of the texts he interprets. The ludic appeal is especially well described in the chapter "From History of Childhood to Ethnography of Childhood" in which Waksmund includes nearly all genres of traditional folklore for children specified by Kolberg-not only games and entertainments, but also songs ("There Was an Old Granny…", "Black Ram…", "And Where is This Short Jan…"), alphabet (school) rhymes, in which imitations of sounds produced by animals appear, jocular proverbs, sayings ("He climbed a pear tree and picked parsley"-rhyming in Polish), nicknames rhyming with proper names ("Fik, mik, Dominik"), proverbial warnings ("Who gives and takes away winds up in hell"-rhyming in Polish). It could seem that an analysis of similar texts, whose function is clearly didactic, should highlight their functioning in the school environment. And the issue of education reappears again, which Waksmund suggests, but which he does not fully develop as it is not the aim of his publication. It is a pity that Waksmund's book does not emphasise the educational aspect more. The last chapter titled Niepokonany dydaktyzm ("Undefeated Didacticism") signals a perspective of research into models of education. The scholar however approaches the issues of bringing up children and literary education at school with caution. He identifies "school" genres, such as alphabet rhymes (for example those discussed by Oskar Kolberg) and fables, and he devotes a lot of attention to instructive tales and similar texts: "Undoubtedly the supremacy of an instructive tale as a model genre constituted a barrier for the development of fiction for children, as it influenced nearly all literary genres, saturating them with a moralizing tendency so much that the aesthetic aspects, not to mention the ludic ones, were frequently marginalized" (392). Waksmund writes about school also in the context of reflections on Jesuit drama. It seems, however, that he never does more than "mention" it. Writing about bringing children up in a general sense, he frequently and quite rightly accentuates the role of education at home (private tutors). Waksmund's book proposes a specific canon of "timeless" texts (in the world literature: The Little Prince, Children form Bullerbyn, Peter Pan, Alice in Wonderland, the Mumins series, etc; in Polish literature texts by Jachowicz, poems for children written by Brzechwa and Tuwim) and such texts of popular culture as films, comic strip books, computer games, advertisements, songs, TV programmes, i.e. all the elements of audio-visual culture which have dominated modern times in children's perception. "At the turn of the 19th century new tendencies in psychology and educational sciences developed which stimulated a change of literature for children, which started to depart from the autocratic model of the Biedermeier type, which saw the adults as absolutely superior to children. Literature for children turned then in the direction of the paidocentric model, in which the child and its world occupies the centre of society and culture" (21), writes Waksmund, a fervent upholder of paidocentrism. The concept first becomes for him a key to understanding many problems connected with the reception of literature written for children, i.e. inspired (conditioned) by the adult way of thinking, and then a catalyst in discussing the transition to children's literature, in which the scholar concentrates on the text structures conditioned by a specific type of children's imagination: a child's way of thinking, its magical reception of the world, children's folklore. Very rightly then Waksmund pays attention to Freud, the founder of psychoanalysis, for whom a child's psychology became the key to understanding an adult's behaviours. Let us mention once again the role of Stanislaw Jachowicz's texts in Polish language education and notice that he scored the respectable third place in the ranking of the texts most frequently discussed in the Galician school in the period of autonomy (Adam Mickiewicz and Wincenty Pol scoring first and second, respectively) . Waksmund refers in fact to the author of Bajki i powiesci (Fables and tales) in chapter Od wiersza dla dzieci do wiersza dzieciecego (From a poem for children to children's poem); however writing about the bourgeoisie upbringing ideals and didactic-moralising character of Jachowicz's poems, he again does not discuss the issues of an educational model. It should be emphasised, though, that it was the school that worked out, defined and specified evaluation, function and reception of literature for children from the mid-19th century to the end of the 20th century. The process of text/book circulation among children had its sources in education and its various models. It was at school that literary texts intended for reading were selected, sequenced, ordered in quasi-canons of obligatory school readings, high classical literature being in the process frequently adapted (not rarely abridged and simplified) for the school use and adjusted to schoolchildren's perceptual abilities. For years now a debate has been going on concerning the character, role, function and reception of literature for children. A new aspect-school reading circulation-has gradually received more and more attention. The research into theory of social communication suggests that the educational dimension of literature reception (mainly literature for children) counts as the fifth aspect, beside signalled earlier circulation of high literature, folklore texts, popular literature (the "third" as defined by Anna Martuszewska) and children's literature (the "fourth" as discussed by Jerzy Cieslikowski). Informative and scholarly solid description of discourse in which various scientific perspectives participate, presented by Waksmund, could be usefully supplemented with a more thorough depiction of the school reading circulation. In the period of debates on the "modern" upbringing of children and their literary education at various school levels, there is still a lot of space for complementing "canonical" list of obligatory school readings, including literature for children and youth, which create a literary-critical and educational pretext for revising their role in the contemporary readerly world. If the 20th century was called "the century of a child"-as Waksmund writes, referring to the title of a book by Ellen Key (a Swedish writer and women's movement activist), which is dedicated to among others "parents who believe that in the new century they will create a new man" (quotation in page 23)-it is worthwhile to emphasise that describing society at the beginning of the 20th century, the writer had in mind the importance of such educational institutions as schools and libraries. Let's mention also Books, children, adults, a frequently republished work by Paul Hazard, which highlights the role of school. As one can see, the pedagogical aspect appeared in research into literature for children very early, and the issues of upbringing and instruction dominated in the texts discussed at school and outside it as early as in the 19th century (e.g. "reader theory" in the Galician school of the autonomy period or series of tales published in the 19th century for "the people and youth"). For whoever reads Waksmund's book it would be rewarding to have a look at a text by Mickiewicz analysed by Mieczyslaw Inglot: O Kaledzie, królu jednorocznym (About Kaled, a one-year king), called also "an Eastern fable", which appeared in Galician handbooks titled Pusta wyspa (An empty island) . It could appear an interesting context for interpretive considerations undertaken by Waksmund in his analysis of Janusz Korczak's Król Macius na wyspie bezludnej (King Macius on the desert island). Waksmund's
description of prose by Ignacy Chodzko, and first of
all his analysis of Domek mojego dziadka from Obrazki
litewskie (My grandfather's little house from Lithuanian
pictures), also lacks references to Inglot's article
Idylla staropolskiego domu (The idyll of an Old-Polish
house), which presents the mechanisms of adapting this
texts for the school curriculum. It was done in a tendentious
way, and in the 19th-century education it consolidated
the traditionalist concepts . Our literary scholars' reflections on the issue are rather poorly represented in educational journals ("Polonistyka", "Warsztaty Polonistyczne"); and more voluminous publications either appeared earlier, in the 80's-e.g. Alicja Baluch's Poezja wspólczesna w szkole podstawowej (Contemporary Poetry in Primary Schools), 1984-or approach the issue one-sidedly, i.e. from the perspective of a literature for children scholar, e.g. Jerzy Cieslikowski's Wielka zabawa (Great Game) or Literatura i podkultura dziecieca (Children's Lliterature and Subculture), Joanna Papuzinska's Inicjacje literackie. Problemy pierwszych kontaktów dziecka z ksiazka (Literary Initiations: a child's first contact with the book) or Dziecko w swiecie emocji literackich (Child in the World of Literary Emotions); or works by folklore scholars Dorota Simonides and Jolanta Lugowska. These publications are examples of excellent literary scholarship, yet what we are still in need of is a book which would discuss the reception of literature for children in an interdisciplinary way (i.e. one which would show how literature for children functions from the point of view of a literary scholar, a folklore scholar, an anthropologist, a sociologist and a psychologist) and would include the aspect of education. Also I couldn't find in Waksmund's book any remarks about Wladyslaw Belza's Katechizm polskiego dziecka (The Polish Child's Catechism), a text popular in the 19th century both in school and outside its walls. Belza's text was called by Inglot "a little poem about a little Pole": Because
even for a while Inglot states that Belza's poem was classified as a so-called birthday text, a genre popular in old-Polish domestic literature. "Texts for an occasion" of this kind were significant in the school education of the time. They consisted of the following parts: 1) praise of parents and ancestors, 2) expression of hope for the offspring's decent life, 3) congratulations on and joy at the child's birth, 4) a prayer to God for prosperity (also that of the motherland) and for a model, good life. Such writings helped develop the reading competence of a young addressee. Another important educational aspect of Belza's poem could be the convention of questions and answers characteristic of this kind of text . Belza's poem quite clearly corresponds to Mickiewicz's famous Do Matki Polki (To Polish Mother) and echoes simultaneously "such popular Romantic motifs as 'Exoriare…' (inc. "Let an avenger rise form our bones…") It should be remembered that Polish literature for children was for ages permeated with history, patriotism, politics and ideology. Notwithstanding the above objections, it should be emphasised that Ryszard Waksmund's book occupies an important place among the world studies on literature for children . It is a synthesising compendium, which will undoubtedly become a classical reference book. The volume reviewed here shows various ways of approaching literature for children and the number of texts discussed and referred to in it can become a starting point of further works which will make it possible for the scholar to create a new complete bibliography of literature for children from its beginnings till the present moment. Waksmund's enormous erudition and intellectual maturity make From Literature forChildren to Children's Literature accessible to anyone interested in literature for the youngest at various levels of scholarly and cultural reception of the text: not only literary scholars, but also literary comparatists will find it illuminating since the book manifests a skill to combine the European (and world) research trends with discussion on the history of Polish literature. The
presentation of Waksmund's book can be aptly completed
with an appropriate passage from the work itself: "The
future will show to what extent the invasion of mass
culture with its audio-visual component will overcome
the particular didactic aims of the present time and
make children's literature into not only inter-generational
but also supra-national and universal value. It seems
that it is also under the influence of children's literature
and sub-culture that adults in consumer societies become
increasingly infantile…" (423). To round up,
I'll refer to a passage from Eugeniusz Czaplejewicz's
Pragmatyka, dialog, historia (Pragmatics, dialogue,
history) that Waksmund quotes: "The epoch of Questions
is coming to an end and an epoch of Seeking the answers
is approaching. Literature for children and youth would
then become-jocularly speaking-a frontier of an all-literary
attack changing essentially the character and model
of literature and the world as well as it would become
a source of inspiration, a pattern to follow in a sense"
(422). Dorata Milchulka |