The Child in British Literature Literary Constructions of Childhood, Medieval to Contemporary

'A sustained investigation of the representation and construction of childhood in literature across the centuries is long overdue, but here at last is a carefully assembled volume that comprehensively covers the subject. The impressive selection of essays, of consistently high quality, takes us from medieval literature, through the early modern and Victorian periods, to Elizabeth Bowen, Virginia Woolf and Iain McEwan. Many major landmark texts are discussed both works of literature and the key contextualising works by Locke, Rousseau, Freud and others. But the reader will find much that's surprising here too: neglected titles, forgotten authors, new contexts. Taken together the essays gathered here will challenge many of our assumptions about the place of childhood in culture and the ways in which this has or hasn't shifted over time. We will certainly no longer be able to believe that the child has not been an important and continuous theme throughout all of English Literature.' - Matthew Grenby, Reader in Children's Literature, Newcastle University, UK

'Gavin is to be congratulated on editing such a coherent volume, which successfully tracks bigger shifts in literature as well as society's construction of childhood, while each essay nevertheless retains its individual focus and nuance.' - Merridee L. Bailey, University of Adelaide, Australia