Children's Classics (For Adults Too!)
Or pass them along to a young reader. WSIR #26
(Adults - this newsletter is for you! And not just because my under-8 readership is quite low! But if the very thought of children’s classics is not for you, I understand and will have plenty of prime-time content for you in the future. Here are some mature book suggestions for you, in the meantime, or browse the archive.)
In a world where circumstances of birth can define your destiny, I place my family’s love of books and reading amongst the very greatest strokes of fortune. I’m serious about this - I think it has immeasurably contributed not just to my life joy (a meaningful thing) but also to any educational or professional success I might have had, to my ability to imagine, to my love of solitary time, to empathy. Also to my ability to spell most words except “embarrassing” and “millennial,” both of which I have to look up every. single. time.
Reading runs strong in my family. My grandmother? A librarian. My great aunt gifted me books every year. My brother reads constantly. Both of my parents and step-parents read all the time and for the most part did not begrudge me my incessant reading as a child (did they wish I would not read at the dinner table? Yes. Did they question my love of Sweet Valley High and The Babysitter’s Club books? Regularly, yes. Was the adult Sweet Valley High book more terrible than you even might anticipate? Reader - a thousand times, yes.)
So while I was that kid reading all the adult mysteries and romances and novels much too early, I also fell in love with some children’s classics that I own to this day. In honor of Mother’s Day (in the US), of parents, and just of childhood in general, I wanted to share some of my favorite classics from childhood (and some that I read first as an adult. I’m not ashamed! What’s our motto? READ WHAT YOU LOVE, period.)
The key to these books is that they never talk down to children, the situations are not all black-and-white, they have layers that unfold as the reader ages. In the same way that watching a Pixar movie in middle-age can be incredibly moving and resonant, I 100% champion reading some of these as an adult, whether you have kids or you don’t - they’re all delightful. And pass them along to the kids in your lives! Enjoy!
Reminder: we’ve already talked about A Tree Grows in Brooklyn in the YA for Adults post, but it certainly would belong here as well. Let me know your die-hard children’s classics in the comments!
The Anne of Green Gables series must obviously be at the top of the list - I can’t imagine Anne would countenance otherwise. We first meet plucky, red-headed orphan Anne when she is adopted by a middle-aged brother and sister on Prince Edward Island, Canada, and over the course of six books we follow Anne’s hijinks, growth, loves, losses, etc until she is a adult parent of her own. Funny, philosophical, heartfelt - there are a lot of great literary young woman role models but Anne must be at the top of the list. The first book was published in 1908 and every word of it still sings for me. I’m going to say my favorite is Anne of Windy Poplars but I welcome counterarguments.
Cheaper by the Dozen is another oldie (pub. 1948) but oh-so-goodie (along with its sequel, Belles On Their Toes.) This is the “true” story of two efficiency experts and their TWELVE children, written by two of the Gilbreth children. It’s incredibly entertaining, often hilarious, and a fascinating slice of early 20th century Americana in an extremely unconventional family. Chaaaarming!
Y’all, this author wrote both A Little Princess and The Secret Garden which makes her, like, the Dolly Parton of children’s literature. Can you even imagine writing two such masterpieces? You can’t. Anyway, of the two I favored A Little Princess, which is about a young girl in a boarding school who has to cope when misfortune befalls her. Young Sara Crewe is the model of imagination and resilience. Beautiful.
Confession for those who read this far: I have never read Little Women. Do I have to?
For a fun witch-and-wizard story with presumably no problematic politics, check out the Howl’s Moving Castle series, in which young woman Sophie is cursed into the form of an old woman and must clash with the Wizard Howl, the Witch of the Waste, and all manner of magical situations. The delight of this series is its complete fantasy world-building married with the no-nonsense approach of its human characters.
Lastly, I very much enjoyed the tongue-in-cheek, grumpily mysterious, dismissively sarcastic, surprisingly literary, and darkly funny tone of the A Series of Unfortunate Events books which, of course, I only read as an adult. The three Baudelaire orphans are taken in by their dangerous relative and, well, it gets worse from there. If you’re unfamiliar, the first line tells you everything you need to know: “If you are interested in happy endings, you would be better off reading some other book.” And again, like many Pixar movies, there are endless allusions that only adult readers will appreciate.
You can find it here!
Final notes from the author, that are I guess different from the above notes from said same author:
No. There’s been no Shakespeare progress. Re-entry to society is hard, folks, and it turns out that all my anxious brain wants to do is read fantasy books, a genre which I have never read in my adult life.
You’re doing a great job being you.
All links as always are to Bookshop.org, which supports independent bookstores. Or consider shopping directly from indie bookstores - some of my favorites are Nantucket Bookworks, Politics & Prose and Unabridged Books! LMK any other great indie bookstores - I’m all ears!
THANK YOU for keeping my library queue full of awesomeness! And I can never say enough good things about The Last Bookstore - another fab indie. https://www.lastbookstorela.com/