Are Children's Books Today too Obvious?

I can not help but wonder if some children's books are trying too hard to get a point across.  Are authors guilty of emphasizing the objective rather than just telling a great story in which the young reader can discover the 'lesson' for themselves?  Albert Einstein said, "When I examine myself and my methods of thought, I come to the conclusion that the gift of fantasy has meant more to me than any talent for abstract positive thinking."  Perhaps we need to trust the ability of children to discover the message for themselves, even when they are very young.  As Einstein said, "If you want your children to be intelligent, read them fairy tales.  If you want them to be more intelligent, read them more fairy tales."  

A drawing by one of my favorite illustrators, Scott Gustafson, whose illustrations from nursery rhymes to Peter Pan are in my collection

Children are good observers of the world around them, and they may see more clearly than we realize.  Or, as G.K. Chesterton said, "Fairy tales do not tell children the dragons exist.  Children already know that dragons exist.  Fairy tales tell children the dragons can be killed."  As one author suggested, by allowing children to read fairy tales or other age-appropriate books in a safe environment, they can learn that bad things happen to everyone.  Sharing fairy tales with them when they are young, and continuing to provide them with age-appropriate books as they learn to read will avoid leaving them unrepaired for anything requiring the reason and courage found in those stories.

Even very young children can learn from Fairy Tales, not just about the basics of stories, like characters and the setting, but also the plot and how the story evolves.  When they are older, they will have a grounding in the structure of storytelling.  These early stories will also stoke their imaginations and   arouse curiosity about what can be discovered in books.  They will learn about heroes and villains, as well as moral lessons about right and wrong.

Recently, I discovered the following:  "The more a child reads, the likelier they are able to understand the emotions of others."  That quote was followed by the sad statistic that "80% of US families did not buy or read a book last year."  (Quoted statistics from 2022.)  When a child (or an adult) reads, the characters become real to them.  Stories share the emotions, the disappointments, the hurt of the characters, in a way that allows the reader to experience the emotions of the characters, something they cannot always understand about real life feelings of others. 

In very early times people gathered to listen to storytellers, and children listened with adults to stories of all sorts of tales of talking animals, elves, fairies and imaginary events.  Fairy tales are the descendants of those stories, and as parents read fairy tales to their children, they continue the tradition of hearing these stories in the safety of their parents' protection.  Many scholars view this as a continuation of the experience that helps children work through anxieties that they are too young to express.

By reducing that tradition, or eliminating it entirely, we miss the opportunity to allow children the gradual learning of those lessons found in fairy tales.  Perhaps, by waiting too late to read to them, they never develop the habit of reading for themselves.  If we wait too late, and they are given books that seem to lecture, the lessons will never be learned.

I began by quoting from some early commentators, so I will close by quoting from a popular author of today.  "If you are protected from dark things," said Neil Gaiman, "then you have no protection of, knowledge of, or understanding of dark things when they show up."  

I hope there are some ideas gathered in this blog to encourage the importance of reading to children early, including dusting off the old fairy tales you may have ignored too long.