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Children’s Nonfiction and Historical Fiction: Considerations

Children’s Nonfiction and Historical Fiction: Considerations. Meghann Meeusen ENG 170 Lecture. Nonfiction: Common Questions.

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Children’s Nonfiction and Historical Fiction: Considerations

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  1. Children’s Nonfiction and Historical Fiction: Considerations Meghann Meeusen ENG 170 Lecture

  2. Nonfiction: Common Questions Fictional Stories in Nonfiction- What is the boundary between fiction and fact in nonfiction books? Can the presentation of facts be enhanced by the presence of a fictive element?

  3. Nonfiction: Common Questions Simplification and Complexity: When presenting scientific processes, historical events, or life stories to younger readers, how much simplification is acceptable without losing accuracy?

  4. Nonfiction: Common Questions Accuracy and New Research: Is there any such thing as a “classic: work of nonfiction or do works of nonfiction inevitably become dated in light of new research/discovery?

  5. Life Writing Terms • Biography– a story about a person’s life • decision about what part of a person’s life should be revealed or emphasized • Autobiography- story about a person written by that same person • Memoir- similar to autobiography, but cover a segment of life, not its entirety • Diaries- immerse readers in the voice of an individual speaker, usually intended private and published later

  6. Historical Fiction Considerations • Trauma Theory: the interdisciplinary study of trauma and culture, including literary & cultural constructions or representations • Freud: “disaster stories model a range of human relationships to misfortune and keep our defenses exercised. They may function as a reality check even as they frame, and distance us from, horror”

  7. Historical Fiction Considerations • Nostalgia- a wistful or excessively sentimental yearning for return to or of some past period; the Western frontier and medieval England are two common sources of nostalgic reflection in popular culture, perhaps because they give a sense of national or cultural origin • Nationalism- in articulating national identity, there is a tendency to exaggerate difference between groups or and to promote a divisive sense of conflict or competition

  8. Problems with Representing the Past • Fiction Versus History- Rethinking the Writing of History (is history every completely true?) • Use of Primary Sources • Accuracy and Authenticity- the correspondence between recorded history and fictional representation, versus how a literary work fills in the gaps of the historical record and whether the imaginative component of the work are plausible

  9. Problems with Representing the Past • Presentism: the idea that the work depicts an ideology or psychology more characteristic of the present than the past • Artistic Freedom versus Historical Responsibility

  10. Picture Book Biographies A Few More Notable Books

  11. The Watcher: Jane Goodall's Life with the Chimps Hardcover by Jeanette Winter

  12. The Boy Who Loved Math: The Improbable Life of Paul Erdos Hardcover by Deborah Heiligman (Author), LeUyen Pham (Illustrator)

  13. Manfish: A Story of Jacques Cousteau Hardcover by Jennifer Berne (Author), ÉricPuybaret (Illustrator)

  14. The Tree Lady: The True Story of How One Tree-Loving Woman Changed a City Forever Hardcover by H. Joseph Hopkins (Author), Jill McElmurry (Illustrator)

  15. Martin's Big Words: The Life of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Paperback by Doreen Rappaport (Author), Bryan Collier (Illustrator)

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