Critical Thinking with the Hive Mind

[bondgwendabond]

(X-posted at my Real Blog.)

I'm about to start semester the third in the MFA in Writing for Children and Young Adults at the fabulous Vermont College of Fine Arts (a program I highly recommend). Anyway, the third semester is when you do your critical thesis and I'm putting together the reading list for the bibliography of mine, attempting to get a

Comments

[snurri]

The Attolia books are kinda obvious. BUT YOU SAID THAT WAS OK.

[bondgwendabond]

It is totally okay!

[sarah_prineas]

They are the most obvious! But also the most best!!

[bondgwendabond]

You are fabulous!

[bondgwendabond]

Doubly fabulous!

[_stranger_here]

Depending on how you define political:

Octavia Butler's Kindred
MT Anderson's The Astonishing Life of Octavian Nothing

[buymeaclue]

Do you consider Kindred to be YA?

(Not trying to pick a fight; just curious.)

[_stranger_here]

Whatever. I first read it because it was on my high school syllabus.

[buymeaclue]

Sorry.

[rosefox]

Do you only want intentional political overtones? A Little Princess is rife with class politics, but they go entirely unexamined within the work itself.

[bondgwendabond]

I'm definitely looking at intentional works including politics (though the success and clarity of the politics can be up for grabs)... You're absolutely right though, that there's an obviously fabulous thesis on unintentional colonial-and-so-much-more politics in children's lit just sitting there.

[rosefox]

In that case, I think janni's got pretty much everything I would rec, other than The Pushcart War, and whether you count that as fantasy is debatable. (It's an alternate history, sort of, but with no obviously genre elements.)

[bondgwendabond]

I haven't read it, so I'll give it a look just in case. Thx!

[rosefiend]

Elizabeth Wein's books (starting with The Winter Prince) blend the story of King Arthur with 6th century Ethiopia. They seem to be highly political.

[bondgwendabond]

Thanks much!