The different things we learn

[oursin]

I've already posted to trennels apropos of Lucy Mangan's piece on Antonia Forest as part of her continuing series in the Guardian Family section on children's books.

On another childhood favourite, Hilary Mantel is scathing about what she perceives as the deleterious effects of What Katy Did, though I do rather wonder how foundational the notion of

Comments

[tree_and_leaf]

I'm afraid HM's dissing of Little Women makes it hard for me to take her criticism of WKD seriously, which is probably a prejudiced, knee-jerk reaction, but...

I can see that Cousin Helen's message might have resonated with the 'recommended attitude to suffering. You didn't avoid it, but "offered it up"' of her Catholic upbringing at completely unconscious levels.I think that's possibly just it - as far as I can remember, the message I took from Cousin Helen's advice was that if you're in a bad situation, you try to make the best of it, rather than moping. And even looking at the novel now, while I recognise the nineteenth century tropes of Morally Improving Suffering, the bit I'm dubious about is more the 'crossing boundaries brings on its own punishment' aspect (though there was also, IIRC, an implicit criticism of Aunt Izzy for not explaining why the swing was out of bounds, and it's as much an indictment of overly-authoritarian parenting as it is of childish rebellion

[nineveh_uk]

an implicit criticism of Aunt Izzy for not explaining why the swing was out of bounds

"No you're not," said Aunt Izzie, in a positive tone, "the swing is not to be used till to-morrow. Remember that, children. Not till to-morrow. And not then, unless I give you leave."

This was unwise of Aunt Izzie. She would better have explained farther. The truth was, that Alexander, in putting up the swing, had cracked one of the staples which fastened it to the roof. He meant to get a new one in the course of the day, and, meantime, he had cautioned Miss Carr to let no one use the swing, because it really was not safe. If she had told this to the children, all would have been right; but Aunt Izzie's theory was, that young people must obey their elders without explanation.

**

Pretty explicit, I think! (Though we are later told that if the children learn the right way to approach Aunt Izzie she too is pretty decent.)

[tree_and_leaf]

*heh*

Yes, pretty explicit indeed/

[oursin]

Nor is it the nauseating Elsie books by Martha Finlay.

[jonquil]

I'm sorry the Monnas only got a paragraph, not enough to help me decide whether to read it. (And the focus on linen as somehow More Uplifting than brocades seems silly to me. They're both articles of clothing, and many of the surviving examples of linen, not surprisingly, belonged to the nobility -- expensive clothes are preservable and collectable, unlike, historically, the clothes of the middle classes.)

" That was the era during which shirts and chemises at last emerged from a long dark age wherein they had been despised wrappers to protect unwashable outer clothes of wool or silk from the sweat, grease and worse generated by human flesh: shrouds for the living. "

Um, no. The reason Arnold concentrates on the Renaissance is that those are the first surviving linens and Arnold, as a reconstructionist, focuses on surviving clothes. This: " Until the 1440s, linen was visible, at least in art, only as headswathing...," is absolute rubbish; there are surviving sketches of braies (men's underpants) and chemises in the margins of

[gillo]

You forgot to mention the gold-plated dish it's on. I lust after that book.

[gillo]

I lust after the Janet Arnold with a passion that might unhinge me quite. The other one looks most interesting too.

I disagreed with Mantel about the
Katy books - yes, they offer a certain normative vision of womanhood, but they also allow for independence of mind and rather more vigorous action than is permitted to many female characters, especially of that period. I also passionately wanted to
be Jo March because she made a life of her own - I didn't really understand the pulp fiction writing or the boring German husband when I was eight.