Reading Sticks and Stones by Jack Zipes was certainly very interesting. To see what Zipes had to say about children’s literature and the publishing field in general was especially interesting. After reading a bit of Zipes’ work, I must say I have a lot more respect for children’s literature. Don’t get me wrong, it’s not like I didn’t respect the works before, but after reading what Zipes had to say, I now know that writing for a child can be difficult. I always figured all you had to do was write a little, and include a lot of colorful pictures and bam; you have a work of art. Well, Zipes brought up a good point, it’s a lot harder then just including words and pictures because you are not only writing for the child, you’re also writing for the parent. You have to be careful of what you say or even draw because a parent might analyze the book before reading it to a child and you don’t want a parent to be upset.
This brings me to my next point. Zipes mentions that the wider audience who reads children’s books aren’t children; they are parents, and college students. I don’t know how accurate that is, but I think it’s a very good point. Look at this class right now, we’re all college students in this class and we’re reading children’s books. Obviously children read children’s books, but I just never really thought that they weren’t the main audience that these books targeted.
The other thing that I found very interesting in Zipes’ book was when he talked about the publishing industry. I never really thought about the publishers of these books, I just figured they were companies and that’s all. But from what I heard in class, something that Professor Kittle mentioned, these publishers are linked to other things. I believe that the example that Professor Kittle used was that a publishing company was linked to a bigger company and that company sold weapons of mass destruction. Again, before reading Zipes’ book and talking about it in class, I never really thought about publishers and publishing companies, they were irrelevant to me. But now, it’s a big deal, its linked to politics. I mean a company who publishes children’s books may also be selling bombs and guns. If that’s not politics then I don’t know what is.
One thing that got me a little puzzled was when Zipes talked about “junk food” as literature. I mean what does he define as junk food? I mean are comic books “junk food”? Zipes might think so but I think comics are wonderful because they capture the imagination of a children (and adults) and a lot of children see comics as something fun and entertaining. So, if something captures the child’s mind, then what’s so wrong about that? What is “junk food” and what isn’t? I personally believe that if something captures a child and allows them to think and wonder, then it’s not “junk food”.
As for the articles that we read about Little Red Riding Hood, well, those were a little disturbing to me. I mean I’ve read different versions of fairy tales, but I never read one of Little Red Riding Hood with so much emphasis on sex. I mean in one of the stories, the wolf asks Red to take off her clothes and go lay next to him. This made me think, are stories now at days being censored a bit? I mean censorship isn’t a bad idea at times. I don’t want my son or daughter reading books with sex and sexual images in it. I don’t know, all this did was made me think about the industry a little more in depth.
Reading Zipes’ book and the different versions of the fairy tales online made me think a lot about how many different interpretations might exist on one thing. Reading Zipes’ book made me think a lot about the publishing field and got me a little paranoid because now I think that these publishers are really all about money and profits, rather then putting out a good piece of work for the children.
