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The family stories of the late 1930s through the early 1960s depict some of the strongest, warmest
family relationships in contemporary realistic fiction for
children.
The actions of the characters suggest that:
a. security is gained when family members work together;
b. each member has responsibility to other members;
c. Consideration for others is desirable; and
d. family unity and loyalty can overcome hard times and peer conflicts.
Early 1960s, many changes have taken place in the characterizations of the American family in realistic fiction.
The Authors in the 1970s,1980s, and 1990s often focused on need to overcome family disturbances.
Some issues related to Children and their
Families
Death of one or both parents Foster families Single-parent Families Children of Unmarried females The disruptions caused by
divorce and remarriage Child Abuse
Authors of realistic fiction may show a strong need
for family unity and a desire to keep at least some of the members
together.
Authors of realistic stories about family disturbances
use several literary techniques to create credible plots and characters. Often,
they look at painful and potentially destructive
situations and feelings that are common in society today.
The characterization may portray the vulnerability of the characters, create sympathy for them, and
describe how they handle jolting disruptions and
personal discoveries that affect their lives.
In realistic stories about family life, the antagonists may be a family member or an outside
force.
Death of a parent Divorce Moving to a new location
Beverly Cleary’s Strider
Uses a series of diary entries to reveal changes in character
By caring for abandoned dog, fourteen-year-old Leigh Boots finally learns to accept his parents’ divorce and gains self-confidence.
Libby Hathorn’s Thunderwith
Also uses a dog to help her heroine, Lara, gain strength and the ability to respond to her father’s new family.
Carol Lea Benjamin’s The Wicked Stepdog
Twelve-year-old Lou is afraid of losing her father’s love when he presents her with a new stepmother and a new “stepdog”.
Single-parent families children portrays such families more often and sometimes more
candidly than did most realistic fiction in the past.
A family’s struggle to survive without one parent is popular
in contemporary realistic fiction.
Authors may suggest that the experience strengthens the children in the family or that
the experience causes so many difficulties that the children
find coping impossible.
Jenny Davis’s Good-Bye and
Keep Cold
Begins with death and
continues with adjustments to a
single –parent family.
Numerous contemporary realistic fiction novels explore themes related
to both the need for strong family loyalty during times of severe
emotional strain and the person-versus-society conflict that results
when children fear the possible actions of people in social service.
Paula Fox’s The
Moonlight Man
Catherine realizes that it is sometimes very difficult to love someone, but we may still love someone if we dislike him.
Many of the stories written about single-parent families
develop themes in which children become stronger as they make discoveries about themselves and the adults in
their lives.
The Moonlight
Man
Some protagonists learn to accept the foibles of separated fathers or mothers and even grow closer to their parents.
According to Eva-Maria Metcalf and Michael J. Meyer (1992), child abuse referrals in society are increasing rapidly.
In children's literature, the adult world may provide cruel experiences rather than happy and secure environments for development.
Children may need to overcome emotional
problems, to develop or recover self-esteem, and to identify their roles in their
widening world.
As children grow older, they may feel self-conscious about
their changing bodies and developing sexuality.
Such books also let children know that they are not alone, that other children experience the
same problems and overcome them.
Peer relationships involve many of the joys and sorrows with
which children become familiar in family life, but peer
relationships also expand understandings of other people
and the world in ways that familiar family ties cannot.
Jane Cutler’s
Rats! Developed a
humorous sibling relationships
Jason, a fourth grader
Edward, a first grader
Cynthia Voigt’s Bad Girls
Uses the setting of a fifth-grade classroom and focuses attention on the behaviors of two girls who become best friends.
Authors often develop conflict in stories about interpersonal
relationships by using person-against-self or person-against-
person conflicts.
Authors enable readers to:
a. to identify inner conflicts;b. to understand why the characters
have the conflicts;c. how the characters handle the
conflicts; andd. what things enable resolution of the
conflicts.
The conflicts that authors identify and the ways in which the characters overcome these conflicts usually communicate
unifying themes about interpersonal relationships.
E. L. Konigsburg’s Jennifer, Hecate, MacBeth, William McKinley and Me,
Elizabeth
Konigsburg encourages understanding of Elizabeth’s inner conflict & need for a friend by emphasizing her shyness.
Janet Taylor Lisle’s
Afternoon of the Elves
Developed the consequences of being different, having unusual responsibilities, and needing friendship and understanding.
Barbara Park’s The Kid in the Red Jacket• Explores the
problems faced by a fifth-grade boy when he moves to a different city.
Paula Danziger’s
Amber Brown Is Not a Crayon
• Explores adjustments when a third-grade girl’s best friend moves.
Authors who write about physical maturity often describe embarrassing
physical characteristics and explore ways in which the characters, friends, and
family members respond to the characteristics.
Person-against-person conflicts include peer
victimization of a main character, with the story told from the viewpoint of either
the victimized child or a child who is part of the peer
group.
Some problems have simplistic or humorous resolutions, while other resolutions are complex
and express the extreme sensitivity of children who are experiencing changes in their
bodies & increased self-consciousness about their
appearance as they grow up.
Judy Blume’s Are You There God? Its
Me, Margaret
• Explores a young girl’s sexuality.
• Eleven-year-old Margaret has many questions about the physical changes occurring in her body.
Books that develop plots around emotional maturity-and physical maturity as well-differ in several
important ways from the realistic fiction.
Lois Lowry’s
Anastasia Krupnik
• A ten-year-old begins to be the center of attention and her jealousy when she is able to place her family’s new baby on her list of loves instead of her list of hates.
Phyllis Reynolds Naylor’s Alice in
Rapture, Sort Of
• The main character face emotional changes caused by boy-girl relationships.
In Reluctantly Alice, she causes difficulties when she decides that it is her responsibility to advise her father and her older brother on their love lives.
In All But Alice, she continues her meddling into her father’s and brother’s lives and decides that she needs to become involve in female relationships.
Barbara O’Connor’s
Beethoven In Paradise
• Martin, a twelve-year-old protagonist faces problems because he loves music.
Confrontations with dangers in nature, society,
or oneself require and, ideally, develop strength
of character in young people and adults.
Authors may develop forceful natural or social settings as antagonists in
stories, clarifiers of conflicts, or means of developing desired
moods.
Careful word selection, imagery, and rhythm
patterns can heighten the emotional impact and
credibility of adventures outside the realms of experience of most
readers.
Authors of survival literature usually rely on consistent point of
view-often first-person or limited
omniscient.
George’s Julie of the Wolves
• A thirteen-year-old girl lost in the arctic tundra develops a friendship with wolves.
Scott O’Dell’s Island of the Blue Dolphins
• Karana, a young Indian girl, survives years alone on a Pacific Island.
• “I will tell you about my Island.”
• “I was afraid.”• “Should she go back
& face loneliness or go on & face probable disaster?”
Gary Paulsen’s Hatchet
• Carefully documents Brian’s problem solving approach.
• Encourage readers to understand both the gravity & consequences of many of the problems.
Several authors of realistic fiction portray
the problems of overcoming poverty, gang
violence, and living without the security of
strong, supportive family members.
Virginia Hamilton’s The Planet of Junior Brown
• about friendship, loyalty, and learning to live together.
Myer’s Somewhere
in the Darkness
• A story in which a boy learns about the harsh realities of life when he accompanies his convict father on a search for truth and respect.
Karen Barbour’s Mr. Bow
Tie
• The story of two children who befriend a homeless man and reunite him with his own family.
In the person-against-society conflicts of this survival
literature, the protagonists are usually innocent children
and the antagonists are terrorist groups, oppressive military governments, and
mass violence.
James Watson’s Talking in Whispers A survival story in which the main character is hunted by the security forces of a South American government that denies basic human rights.
Rafik Schami’s A Hand Full
of Stars
• A teenager who wants to be a journalist within this suppressed society.
A Hand Full of Stars means:
“The Hand is the hand of Uncle Salim, always there to
guide the narrator; in the saddest moments, it points the way out of despair. Like the stars that illuminate the dark night sky, the Stars in the hand stand for hope.”
Differences in cause of conflict, resolution of conflict, and depth of
emotional involvement are apparent in books of
realistic fiction about death.
Healing takes time, memories are worth retaining, and family
members can help each other in times of
sadness.
Constance C. Greene’s
Beat the Turtle Drum
• A girl’s reactions to her sister’s accidental death by describing the warm relationship between ten-year-old Joss and her twelve-year-old sister, Kate.
Stereotypical views of males and females,
people with disabilities, and the elderly are
becoming less prevalent than they
once where in children’s literature.
Publishers are becoming sensitive to
the need for literature that does
not portray either sex stereotypes.
Changes in the roles of females:
Contains more girls who are distinct individuals
Girls may be brave, they maybe tomboys, & they maybe unorthodox
Mothers different roles in recent:
They work outside the home They may even have jobs more
demanding than those of their husbands
Children’s realistic fiction is becoming increasingly
sensitive to the importance of overcoming
cruel or condescending stereotypes.
Judy Blume’s Blubber
• Shows how peer cruelty to someone who is physically different can have negative consequences for all concerned.
Mary Sage (1977) recommends the following criteria when evaluating
books:
1. The author should deal with the physical, practical, and emotional manifestations of the disabling condition accurately but not didactically.
2. Other characters in the story should behave realistically as they relate to the individual with disabilities.
3. The story should provide honest & workable information about disabling conditions & the potential of individuals with disabilities.
Writers of such literature often express
the hope that their stories will encourage
positive attitudes toward individuals with
physical disabilities.
Julia Cunningham
’s Burnish Me Bright
• A mute boy encounters prejudice, misunderstanding, fear, & even hostility.
Ellen Howard’s
Edith Herself
• The girl, Edith, faces her own fears and the ignorance of others who do not understand her epileptic seizures.
The children concluded that:
1. Some elderly people lead boring, lonely lives where nothing changes;
2. Grandparents in books look older than their own grandparents;
3. The elderly do not work, have fun, or do anything exciting;
4. Young people are mean to elderly people;5. Book characters do not want to listen or talk to
elderly;6. Some elderly people are mean, crabby, overly
tidy, fussy, & unfair;7. The elderly like to remember the good old days
or dream of better times; and8. There are few happy books about the elderly.
Some authors of contemporary realistic
fiction are exploring the problems related to old
age with greater sensitivity than authors
expressed in books of the past.
Gail Radley’s
The Golden Days
• Explores both the unhappy emotions & the unwanted feelings of a boy living with foster parents & of an elderly woman living in a nursing home.