Only Connect: Readings on Children's Literature

Egoff, Sheila, Gordon Stubbs, Ralph Ashley, and Wendy Sutton. Only Connect: Readings on Children's Literature. Toronto: Oxford University Press, 1996.

I spent some time with the Fantasy Section (Part III) of this recent Canadian classic, enjoying some different but complementary points of view on the topic from some of the best in Children's fantasy writing.

As a writer, Jane Yolen underscores the importance of research to the creation of a believable fantasy world. This includes both factual information-finding about fantastical traditions and creatures (what are the difference between Eastern and Western dragons, for instance?), as well as a cultivation of close attention to the behaviour of things in the real world with the aim of giving credibility to fantastical things in a created world. I also found her discussion of "voice" fascinating - how the choosing a vatic/prophetic/oracular voice (Wizard of Earthsea) creates a different story than one told in the schoolboy voice (Narnia), or the voice of the fool (Alice in Wonderland, Phantom Tollbooth).

Perry Nodelman challenges the idea that fantasy worlds are essentailly (or exhaustively) symbolic representations of the everyday world. He suggests that we "do not enjoy fantasies because the psychological or moral meaning." Like Yolen, he also focuses on the role of the narrator (as well as control of tone) in establishing credibility within the story. Nodelman outlines the complex relationship between the writer, the narrator (who must accept matter-of-factly the strange nature of this world whether or not it is new), the ideal implied reader (who also is familiar with the fantasy world), and the real reader (who pretends to be familiar with the unfamiliar, but who also is aware of being different). I am intrigued by this sentence: "We experience the pleasure of its otherness by pretending to not be different from it." The complex series of relationships, he suggests, is part of what contributes to the reader finding pleasure in a "conciousness of otherness."

I also liked Nodelman's assertion that the narrator "should be focused on the story, not on the world in which it occurs nor on its meaning." For me, as a sometimes-fantasy-lover, this is a big factor in whether I enjoy a fantasy or not. I don't have a lot of patience for endless description of a world or its rules if it doesn't contribute to the story. Nodelman's point helps me clarify my particular taste within this genre. I don't think, however, that this is true for all fantasy readers - I know many people who adore the very part of fantasy novels that bore me.

Tamora Pierce (and oh, how I love her) calls fantasy "a literature of possibilities" and of empowerment. She points out what seems to me to be an identifying feature of fantasy stories: the fact that "in fantasy, those normally perceived of as unimportant are vital players." I also liked that she didn't dismiss the very real value of escapism.

Chet Rayne had a very different approach to fantasy, looking at how children's imiginative and fantastical writing - more so than science fact books - helps create the "habits of mind" so crucial for scientific exploration and inquiry. Rayne see fantasy as part of the literature that supports creativity, voracious observation, and and understanding of rules and variation in rules. How lovely to think about scientific theory as a kind of fantasy - that which we cannot often see, sometimes cannot prove, and which has its own set of internal logic and rules.

Oh for a pile of good books and a deck near the ocean in the sun and a breeze off the water and a good sunhat and comfortable chair and a week without any responsibilities. Or a month, or... I can just about taste it.