KADUNA STATE UNIVERSITY

FACULTY OF SOCIAL ARTS

DEPARTMENT OF ENGLISH AND DRAMA

COURSE TITLE
Special Author

ASSIGNMENT

Discuss the origin of science.

COURSE CO-ORDINATOR
Prof. A.K. Babajo

COMPILED BY
KASU/18/ENG/1027.

SUBMITTED ON
27TH JANUARY, 2022.
 QUIZ QUESTIONS

Define Children's literature

Origin of Children's Literature

Nature/Characteristics of Children's Literature

Types of Children's literature

Emergence, growth and development of Children's literature in Nigeria

Nigerian children writers

Pioneers of Nigerian children's literature

Later writers

Recent writers

Children's Literature in Northern Nigeria

Since what a literary author writes about is, more often than not, his or her perspective

on life, society and ideology rather than the reality itself, there exists a controversy between

the literary schools of thought in defining the concept of literature in general and what

characteristics it possesses.

This makes it an even harder task to define children ’s literature children's literature as

the fact remains that children's literature, being a new theme that has been introduced into

mainstream literature, has not yet established norms and conventions. Furthermore, this also

makes it open to different speculations and theories that might even be extreme, regardless of

the fact that they were not scientifically proven or well researched.

DEFINITIONS OF CHILDREN'S LITERATURE

A general definition of children’s literature can be summarized as the literature that is aimed at

children in their growing years and is suitable for their stage of mental and psychological

development. This includes written material for children that are not yet interested in adult

literature or do not yet possess adult reading skills (Bika’ee, 2003).

Roger Sale highlights the problematic issue of trying to define and categorize children ’s

literature as follows: ‘Children’s literature is the only literary category that defines an

audience rather than a subject or an author’(cited in Stahl, 1992, p. 12).

Perry Nodelman states:

literature that happens to be read by children. It is a genre, a special kind of

literature with its own distinguishing characteristics. Identifying those

characteristics and defining that genre are the major tasks immediately confronting

serious critics (cited in Gannon, 1992,p. 59).

Eman Bika’ee (2003) believes that Children's literature is the product of literature that is

addressed to children and takes into consideration their characteristics, needs and levels of

development. But although children's literature is simple and straightforward it cannot be

considered a smaller version of adult literature as it has its own characteristics that are related

to the nature of children. Children cannot be considered young adults but rather they differ

from them in both the degree of development and the direction in which they develop. Hence

they have different needs and characteristics that are only inherent in their time span which

will eventually disappear when these children grow up and reach the adulthood phase. In

effect, writers of children's literature must take into consideration the child ’s abilities and

stages of mental, psychological and social developments. Subsequently, this viewpoint

concludes that it is faulty to deduce that adult literature can be transformed to children's

literature by merely simplifying the language by which children are addressed.

Kimberly (2011) "it is understood to refer to the materials written to be read by children and

young people, published by children’s publishers, and stocked and shelved in the children’s

and/or young adult sections of libraries and bookshops".

entertainment of children and young adults” (Library of Congress, 2008, para. 1). 5

ORIGIN OF CHILDREN’S LITERATURE

The evolution of Children's literature has undergone various stages and upheavals which

influenced the direction of the path taken in defining its role and characteristics.

In old times, literature was based on myths that were narrated orally and later progressed to

stories that had influence on maintaining the tribe and preserving culture while bearing in mind

the aim to instil tribalism in children’s nature (Bika’ee, 2003).

Historians agree that Children's literature existed where childhood existed due to it

being part of the child’s daily life, yet no Children's literature documentation is found as it was

not studied or recorded probably because of the conception that Children's literature was

considered part of the everyday duties of the family, grandmother, mother, father etc. As a

result, Children's literature was under the influence of personal or individual judgment and it

became an essential part of inherited stories of culture and society i.e. folk takes and oral

tradition.

Children did not have their own literature as an established field in the sense that

became known in modern times until after the 20 th century. There were factors that paved the

way for Children's literature through those who wrote stories that captured the children ’s

interests and narrated them as tales. Children used to relate to Children's literature orally and it
was only after education was introduced that they started reading Children's literature from

books (Abu Mu’al, 2000).

In contemporary times, human sciences developed and research on child psychology

increased. Child literature crystallized and started being addressed in 17 th century Europe

(Kilani, 1998). However Children's literature become a specialized field of its own only after the

separation of child psychology from general psychology in the 30s of the 20 th century, despite

the fact that it was slowly growing since the 17th century (Ba’albaki, 2000).

‘Child literature’ appeared as a specialized term in France in the 17 th century but at that

time, authors of Children's literature used pseudonyms for fear of being demeaned in front of

the general public as acknowledged writers. It was not until Charles Perreaux wrote the

children’s story ‘Mother Goose’ under a pseudonym that the general perception of children's

authors changed. The book was well received and favoured by the public which drove Perreaux

to write another children’s story series but this time using his own real name (Abu Ma ’al, 1998).

It was when Jean Jacque Rousseau took the first steps of studying children as individual

identities that the angle of Children's literature research in France changed into a more serious

form during the 18th century. Later on, books like ‘A Thousand Nights and One’ were translated

into French and the first children’s magazine in the whole world was issued. The stories aimed

to entertain children and expand their imagination.

England followed on France’s steps in Children's literature development and started

translating French stories. Industrialization in the early 19 th century brought about the need for

education so as not to threaten the security of the establishment. Sunday schools were first
used as means of child education then later on progressed to the establishment of a national

day school system which lead to the increase in demand for children ’s school books (Mdallel,

2003).

The Englishman John Newberry, who is considered the father of Children's literature in

England, was the first person in the world to form a children ’s library. He requested that literary

authors write for children and simplify Adult literature, like Robinson Crusoe and Gulliver ’s

travels, according to their childhood stage. The 20 th century witnessed the golden age for

Children's literature as the printing and publishing houses specializing in this field increased.

From there on, children's literature spread to other countries like Germany, Denmark, Italy,

Russia, Bulgaria, America and Japan.

According to Kilani (1998), the aims of Children's literature are one of three, either to

provide entertainment, didactics, or to combine both aims of providing entertainment and

didactics. One view is that Children's literature, whether in the past or present, aims to educate

children and teach them good conduct, for what the role of Children's literature should be is to

help children understand the meaning of life and its repercussions and then help them

understand the relationships present between them and others in the society they live in. The

child should be able to use it as a tool to learn about his or herself and physical surroundings

and environment in addition to social experiences which in turn makes Children's literature not

just a means of entertainment but also a means for acquiring knowledge and presenting human

experiences.
 Thus the main aim for Children's literature is first didactic and not entertainment but

nevertheless, entertainment is needed and must be used in order to establish the link between

the idea the author wants to convey and the child. Therefore, creative writing skills are a

necessity for every Children's literature author to be able to merge both elements and achieve

the required effect. Children's literature must aim to appeal to children through benefit and

entertainment by good plot, characters and artful writing skills and then only after achieving

the entertainment would the author of Children's literature be able to put forward the idea or

concept that he or she wants to convey.

As for the Arab Islamic world, Children's literature is mainly didactic and aims to teach children

to grasp the dichotomy between good and evil (Mdallel, 2003).

CHARACTERISTICS OF CHILDREN'S LITERATURE

1. Simple and straightforward. Not simplistic or choppy or flat without flow and intrigue.

2. Depends on action to maintain interest. Can there be action without action? Are thoughts

action? Are other character's inactions actions? Are external events included in the narration,

comments and other writing techniques action?

3. Has characters that are children. Includes childhood events, actions, happenings. Can it be

children's literature if there aren't children? Or if the main character isn't a child?

4. Expresses a child’s point of view.

periodically.

6. Tends toward fantasy and accepts fanciful ideas without major concern of reality. Wishful

thinking is common.

7. There is a tone of joy and innocence associated with children, agricultural life, closeness to

nature and unquestionably reliable friends.

8. Can have it both ways. Your cake and eat it too. Dangerous world yet nieve innocence

children can roam through it. Dangerous world out there and yet the comforts of home. Grow

up and remain young. Complex yet simple.

CATEGORIES OF CHILDREN'S LITERATURE

Short Stories

A short story is a kind of children’s literature. Story here means account of past events or

account of imaginary events. Short stories may be found in special collection but may appear

from time to time in periodicals. Since they are short, stories of this kind are usually somewhat

restricted in their scope, number of characters, etc. Short stories have the great practical

advantage of being more manageable. A story can often be read to a class at a single sitting or

studied as a single assignment whether in or out of classroom. The short story, also be
experienced simultaneously by the whole class, which often makes discussion easier and invites

comparison and imitation. To the child reading means listening to stories acted as well as

reading by oneself.You will note that whenever we talk of children's literature we are thinking

of children in Elementary/Primary schools within the age range of 6-14 years as well as those in

junior secondary schools. The range of what stories to write and the themes are limitless.

Children love school stories, family stories, stories' of adventure which are meant to entertain

and amuse, instruct, teach morals, history, geography and problems solving.

Folk Tales

Folk tales refer to popular stories handed down orally from past generation. Folk tales give

children a sense of security as they find that they belong to the life of the different

environments that they have to adapt to. Parents tell children these folk stories at home, and

then when they go to school, the teacher tells them too. The children go to a new class and the

stories are repeated or read or at least talked about. If the stories should feature in the life of

the first year of their junior school, they will ease children's transfer from the infants and

develop confidence between them and the new teacher.The child's first experience of the story

will be through an adult who tells or reads and shows him pictures. Later he will find himself

able to join in parts of the story, to tell parts or all of it himself, perhaps to act it or write about

it; and often the greatest thrill comes when he finds that he can read the story for himself in his

own book. The story of how the child comes to posses a traditional tale through, perhaps, three

years of nursery and infant days may well reflect the history of his whole development as a

person during that time.Children's tastes may move from the very simple rustic tale like ‘Jack
and the Boan stalk' to the more literary work of Walter de la Mare, Oscar Wilde and Arabian

Nights. Folktales like grants, monsters and wicked step mothers for example, can become the

source of a rather stereotyped vicarious horror, while a story like 'Beauty and the Beast’, which

presents the horror figure ambivalently, can start a much needed vein of new sympathy.

Between the ages of eight/nine and eleven years, allegorical stories of the type of pilgrim's

progress, kind of the Golden River, and The soldier and Death -often tales of moral struggle,

following the structure of an arduous journey -can take hold on the imagination of children.

Myths and Legends

Myths mean person or thing, etc that is imaginary, fictions or invented. It refers to unreal story,

handed down from olden times, especially concepts or beliefs about the early history of a race,

explanations of natural events, such as the seasons. A mythical story is usually an illustration of

the origins of life and death and the fundamental pattern of nature. The stories of Persephone,

Prometheus and Loki, for example, are metical. Persephone was the daughter of zeus, who

allowed her to spend six months of the year on earth and six months in the underworld, a

symbol of the buying of the seed in the ground and the growth of the corn. Prometheus made

mankind out of clay and when zeus in his anger deprived them of fire, Prometheus stole fire

from heaven for them and taught them many arts. If myths embody beliefs about life and the

nature of mankind, then legends usually tell of the shaping of a nation through the exploits of

its heroes. Legends are often quasi-historical and their characters, their actions and the

environment in which they live and struggle are fully realized. The action is rooted in
recognizable human behaviour, although this may be transcended from time the time by magic

and superhuman powers.Myths are more abstract than most kinds of stories that the child will

meet. Their characters tend to be more unworldly, and the action is often less firmly rooted in

the circumstances of a particular environment. For this reason they may seem remote from the

child, but they will appeal to some children at a level beyond concrete understanding and are

well worth telling to any age group. The dividing line between myth and legend is blurred for

two main reasons. First, both kinds of stories express reflect and communicate a picture of the

human condition held more or less in common in the minds of men. Second, myths pervade all

language and literature, including legend. In other words, many stories will have a mythological

centre, or their heroes will give rise to a myth, the embodiment of a system of values and

attitudes to life. For example, Ulysses becomes an archetypal figure giving rise to the myth of

cunning, man's resourcefulness and perseverance in the face of adversity.Legendary stories as

those of Robin Hood can be told, suitably scaled to junior school children of any age, but they

can normally be explored more successfully in the sustained and coherent way that makes for

deepening understanding, with children between the ages of nine and twelve. Legends will

provide children with endless material for their own creative work.

EMERGENCE, GROWTH AND DEVELOPMENT OF CHILDREN'S LITERATURE IN

NIGERIA

The beginning of written Nigerian children’s literature, according to Virginia W. Dike of the

Department of Library and Information Science, University of Nigeria, Nsukka, coincided with
the attainment of independence in 1960. She observed that though a few titles, like Cyprian

Ekwensi’s Drummer Boy and The Passport of Mallam Ilia, were written some years earlier, they

were not published until 1960. Dike further observed that the development of children’s

literature was motivated by the felt need for a literature that would more adequately reflect

indigenous views and realities. “It was also stimulated by the rapid expansion of education and

the resulting need and market for supplementary reading materials.”

The early titles, which concentrated on supplementary readers for the pre-adolescent age

group in senior primary and junior secondary schools, were produced by the African Readers

Library of the African Universities Press which, according to Dike, came out with 34 titles

between 1962 and 1988. Other series that came up later were the Nelson Rapid Readers

(1965), Longman’s Palm Library for Younger Readers (1968), Oxford University Press’

Adventures in Africa (1968) and Evans Africa Library (1976). New indigenous publishing houses,

like Onibonoje, also produced titles for children.

Development in children’s literature was boosted particularly in the 1970s and 1980s when

Macmillan’s Winners Series brought out its first title in 1978, followed by others, such as the

University Press Limited’s Rainbow Series.

These early works, according to Dike, were mainly based on adventure stories in which the hero

or heroes, especially boys, fell into danger and helped bring criminals to book. Examples are

Achebe’s Chike and the River, and Ekwensi’s Juju Rock. Some had school stories as their

subject-matter, with the young hero succeeding in gaining admission into school (eg, Eze Goes
to School, by Nzekwu and Crowder) and boarding school children playing their usual pranks (eg,

Tales out of School by Nwankwo).

It should be noted that women writers like Christee Ajayi, Remi Adediji, Teresa Meniro and

Mabel Segun played a prominent role in the promotion of children’s literature in Nigeria. Each

of them produced over 10 books in this genre.

It was indeed an exciting time for children’s literature as it was for adult literature. According to

Fayose, who compiled a bibliography of children’s books published in Nigeria since 1960 for the

Nigerian Book Development Council, by 1986 there were over three hundred titles, many of

which were prose fiction.

Unfortunately, the economy, which had been relatively good since the oil boom of the 1970s,

declined from the mid-1980s, affecting the production of the genre in the same manner it

affected adult literature. Presently, only few publishing houses in Nigeria like the Lantern Books

division of Literamed, publish series of fiction for children and youth. Today, such books are

mostly published in Britain. They include Heinemann’s Junior African Writers Series (JAWS) and

Heartbeat Series, which began in the 1990s. Though the titles are by Africans, including

Nigerians, and set in Africa, they are scarcely available to the African and Nigerian youths for

which they are intended to changes.

LIST OF SKME NIGERIAN CHILDREN'S LITERATURE WRITERS

Chinua Achebe
Christie Ade Ajayi

Remi Adedeji, Kofoworola Ademola

Audrey Ajose

Teresa Oyibo Ameh

Philip Begho

Cyprian Ekwensi

Buchi Emecheta

Nani Boi

Martina Nwakoby

Taiwo Odubiyi

Joseph Folahan Odunjo

Nnedi Okorafor

Kola Onadipe

Pauline Uwakweh

Ifeoma Onyefulu

Mabel Segun

Rosina Umelo.
 REFERENCES

Alan Davies (1973). Literature for Children. Oxford: The Open

University Press. 16

Ian Davis (1973). Literature for Children. Oxford: The Open University Press.

Chidi Ikonne, et al (1992). (eds) Children and Literature in Africa. Calabar. Heinemann

Educational Books (Nigeria), Plc.

16