Abstract
Then a knowing smile broke across his crooked brow. He came to my desk and inquired, hoarsely, I thought, Well, is it sex or violence? In fact, the students were engrossed in antique adolescent literature. Mary was fighting tears over Elizabeth Wetherell's The Wide, Wide World (1850), the story of a girl caught between the slums and a bad-humored aunt. Jed smiled slyly at the quaintness of F.R. Goulding's Robert and Harold; or, The Young Marooners on the Florida Coast (1853). Maria Susanna Cummins' The Lamplighter (1854) held two girls spellbound in the back row. Who could help but worry about a poor waif rescued by a lamplighter (but, ah, destined to marry a wealthy man)? John Trowbridge's Cudjo's Cave (1864) had my slowest reader, Mason, flipping pages with the best of them. These books are hardly common fare in either school or public libraries. It is easy, though, over a period of months to assemble an interesting classroom collection of antique adolescent books. Browse, first, in used book shops. Usually for a dollar or two you can come away with a few dogeared treasures printed between 1850 and 1930 or so. Next plan a personal trip or even a class outing to a major university library. There you may quite legally make photocopies of interesting old books.
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