The Mythology of the Animal Farm in Children's Literature

Download or read book The Mythology of the Animal Farm in Children's Literature written by Stacy E. Hoult-Saros and published by Lexington Books. This book was released on 2016-07-21 with total page 193 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Mythology of the Animal Farm in Children’s Literature: Over the Fence analyzes the ways in which myths about farmed animals’ lives are perpetuated in children’s materials. Specifically, this book investigates the use of five recurring thematic devices in about eighty books for young children published during the past five decades. The close readings of texts and images draw on a wide range of fields, including animal theory, psychoanalytic and Marxian literary criticism, child development theory, histories of farming and domestication, and postcolonial theory. In spite of the underlying seriousness of the project, the material lends itself to humorous and not overly heavy-handed explications that provide insight into the complex workings of a literary genre based on the covering up of real animal lives.