feeling like a kid

another library book i've enjoyed recently is "feeling like a kid--childhood and children's literature" by jerry griswold. it's really a long essay about what he dubs the five "unique qualities of childhood experience and the ways in which they reappear as frequent themes in children's literature" (from the book jacket). the five qualities are snugness, scariness, smallness, lightness and aliveness. he illustrates these themes with examples and real illustrations (i.e. pictures) from classic children's books. mostly this book made me want to read more children's literature, and to try harder to remember my own childhood experience of these five qualities.

the "smallness" theme brought to mind for me the "brambly hedge" books by jill barklem, which my granny cogdill read to me when i was little. these are beautiful stories for each season, around the lives of mice living "on the other side of the stream, across the field." they have amazingly intricate homes carved inside the trunks of trees, and the illustrations are so captivating because they show a side view, as if the trees are sliced in half.





i know eric smith loves "the wind in the willows" for its evocation of the cozy, small feeling. it's crazy, but i never read it as a child. maybe it will be next week's library book!