International Journal of Language & Literature

Children´s Literature and Taboo Topics. Approaches to Kitty Crowther´S Work
Rosa Tabernero Sala, Virginia Calvo Valios

Abstract
This paper explores the work of Kitty Crowther, one of the authors who has managed over the last few years to create her own world in which the topics traditionally considered as difficult for the child reader, such as: solitude, death, absence, mourning, identity and sexism, arise in a natural way, emerging from her own conception of the reader. In this sense, Astrid Lindgren and Beatrix Potter have constituted inexcusable references in her work. This study is based on Nodelman (2008), Salisbury and Styles (2012), Nikolajeva (2014), Kümmerling-Meibauer (2015), Antoine-Andersen (2016) in order to analyze Kitty Crowther´s work. Through analysis of her books we discover an innovative way of dealing with the more difficult topics of children´s literature. The empathy with which the author presents topics such as death, loneliness, sexism or filial relationships emphasizes the idea of the illustrated literature´s conception as a meeting space, where the creator expresses their stories through their own emotions and talks with the reader with honesty. This implies the need to deal with life with its lights and shadows in a conception of children´s literary discourse very similar to that of Maurice Sendak.

Full Text: PDF      DOI: 10.15640/ijll.v5n2a13