The Emergence of Awe in Recent Children's Literature

Abstract

The Emergence of Awe in Recent Children's Literature Joseph O. Milner (bio) All Together Now, by Sue Ellen Bridgers. New York: Bantam Books, 1980. A Gathering of Days, by Joan W. Blos. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1980. How I Hunted the Little Fellows, by Boris Zhitknov. Translated by Djemma Bider. Illustrated by Paul O. Zelinsky. New York: Dodd, Mead & Company, 1979. Ladder of Angels, by Madeleine L'Engle. Illustrated by "Children of the World." New York: Penguin Books, 1980. Words by Heart, by Ouida Sebestyen. Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1979. I have long supported a dichotomous way of understanding children's literature, one that is simplistic but helpful. Books reflect one of two basic views of the human experience: Awe and Wonder, the religious perspective, or Self-reliance and Rationalism, the humanist perspective. The religious writer believes that man is entrusted as the steward of the sentient world, but that he is ultimately dependent on the power of God. Mystery and a sense of the limits of rationality are solidly at the center of this world-view. The historical foundations of its humanistic counterpart lie in the Age of Enlightenment; its present hope is that obstructions to the good life for all can be set aside by the judicious use of mankind's powerful mental paraphernalia and by a gradual move to higher levels of moral consciousness. In such a world-view we are inching ever closer to the full perfection of a utopian state. I have earlier suggested that The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe and Charlotte's Web are near-perfect representatives of these two contending visions of reality. The one sees dependent creatures delivered from an icy death by the awful hand of the Majestic [End Page 169] Aslan; the other explores the beauteous growth of a young shoat to full pighood under the tutelage of the wise and self-giving mentor Charlotte, whose own immortality is achieved in Wilbur's becoming like her in his care for her progeny. Not surprisingly, last year's list of the most admired children's books is dominated by the humanist perspective. These books explicate modern life, offer models of growth, and confront a now-slim list of previously off-limit subjects. Some become so direct and precise in their problem-solving style that they edge perilously close to the realm of pamphlet or guidebook. However, five powerful books emerge whose religious tendencies and artistic elegance make them what Stevens calls "ten-foot poets among inchlings." Each departs from the humanist commonalities and yet uniquely differentiates itself from the other four. This review of these five does not attempt comparisons but rather brief explications of each book's religious depth. The ordering of books is from the most ostensibly to the least self-consciously religious. Madeleine L'Engle's readers will not be surprised to find her illustrated account of the Old Testament, Ladder of Angels, the most directly and unequivocally religious. What seems a bit new is the deftness and clarity with which she sets forth religious neo-orthodoxy within the bounds of the book's two defining elements: the Old Testament and children's art. She draws on both familiar and obscure scriptures to establish a clear theology of God's awfulness and man's fragility. From the beginning she exemplifies what she must see as modern man's greatest sin, Satan's timeless temptation: "You shall be as God." The hubris of man is dramatized in her account of the "clever but not wise" erectors of the tower of Babel. She makes it clear that Noah, the intemperate imbiber, could only fashion his wonderful ark because of his obedience to God. Beyond these famous passages L'Engle selects stories full of mystery and miracle, the very elements which Thomas Jefferson struck from his Bible and which are a scandal to the reasonable, modern mind: Moses' shining veil which radiates God's presence; Jacob's wrestle with the visitant angel at the foot of the ladder; Elijah's fiery ascent in the chariot; Gideon's visit from the Angel of the [End Page 170] Lord; and Daniel's deliverance from the lion's...