Just wondering

[rabidsamfan]

allisona asked about children's classics and it got me to thinking. What are the books that we think of as "classics" for children? I know they vary from country to country, of course, but there must be some overlap.

Mind you, I'm a children's librarian, so I've got a few ideas. Add some of yours:



Where the Wild Things Are, by Maurice Sendak
Winnie the Pooh, by A.A. Milne
The Hardy Boys series
Follow My Leader, by James Garfield
The Secret Garden, by F.H. Burnett
A Little Princess, ditto
Call It Courage, by Armstrong Sperry
The Cat in the Hat, by Dr. Seuss
Go Dog Go, by P.D. Eastman
Goodnight, Moon, by Margaret Wise Brown
The Tale of Peter Rabbit, by Beatrix Potter
Hans Brinker, or The Silver Skates, by Mary Mapes Dodge
The Swiss Family Robinson, by Johann Wyss
The Children of Green Knowe, by L.M. Boston
Ragged Dick, by Horatio Alger Jr.
Pollyanna, by Elanor H. Porter
Little Women, by Louise May Alcott
Daddy-Long-Legs, by Jean Webster
Understood Betsy, by Dorothy Canfield Fisher
The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, by Mark Twain

Comments

[mmulberry.livejournal.com]

All of Beatrix Potter, not just Peter Rabbit
Anything by Enid Blyton, but especially the Noddy books.
Wind in the Willows - Kenneth Grahame
Rupert
Paddington Bear


.... can you tell my parents are English?

[rabidsamfan.livejournal.com]

Paddington I know. Who wrote Rupert?

[tempest-415.livejournal.com]

Charlotte's Web.
Whinie the Pooh

[semyaza.livejournal.com]

Philippa Pearce. Tom's Midnight Garden.
Astrid Lindgren. the Pippi Longstocking books
Laura Ingalls Wilder. Little House on the Prairie etc
Tove Jansson's Moomin books
Susan Cooper. The Dark is Rising etc
Ursula Le Guin. A Wizard of Earthsea etc
Clive King. Stig of the Dump
Lloyd Alexander's Taran series
Madeleine L'Engle. A Wrinkle in Time
Norton Juster. The Phantom Tollbooth
Anna Sewell. Black Beauty

Stop me before I get carried away. I could go on forever.

[rabidsamfan.livejournal.com]

Ah, but I don't want to stop you. Carry on!

[blackbird-song.livejournal.com]

Anything by Beatrix Potter
"The Railway Children" by E. Nesbitt
"Five Children and It" by E. Nesbitt (Actually, just about anything by her.)
The "Shoes" books by Noel Streatfield (Difficult to get, and shouldn't be.)
The Narnia books, by C.S. Lewis
"The Hobbit" by J.R.R. Tolkien. I don't count LotR as children's literature.
"The Three Musketeers" by Alexandre Dumas (père)
The "Ant and Bee" series
The "Tintin" series
The "Astérix" series
"A Christmas Carol" by Charles Dickens
"Great Expectations" by Charles Dickens
"Oliver Twist" by Charles Dickens (even though it terrified me as a child)
The "Mary Poppins" series by P.L. Travers
Just about anything by Dr. Seuss
"Charlotte's Web" by E.B. White
"Stuart Little" by E.B. White
"Peter Pan" by J.M. Barrie
The "Little House" books by Laura Ingalls Wilder, despite the TV series
"Alice in Wonderland" and "Through the Looking Glass" by Lewis Carroll
Andersen's Fairy Tales
Fairy Tales by the Brothers Grimm


I have many, many more that I could name, but I want to keep this politely manageable!

Catherine

[dreamflower]

I must have been posting my list at the same time you posted yours, LOL! I can't *believe* I forgot the Narnia books! or the Little House books. Or Alice.

Although I read both Dumas and Dickens in grade school, I would not count those as children's books. They were written with adult readers in mind, and in fact when I checked them out of the school library ( I went to a school with all 12 grades) the librarian was reluctant to let me take them, since they were not children's books. She actually called my mom to see if it was all right!

[dreamflower]

The Hobbit by JRR Tolkien
The Wizard of Oz by L. Frank Baum
Five Little Peppers and How They Grew by Margaret Sidney
The Wind in the Willows by Kenneth Grahame
The Merry Adventures of Robin Hood by Howard Pyle
Freckles by Gene Stratton Porter
Podkayne of Mars by Robert Heinlein
The Wierdstone of Brisingamen by Alan Garner
The Little Prince by Antoine de Saint Exupery
Dr. Seuss (every single book)
The Black Cauldron (and the other books in that series) by LLoyd Alexander

And of course all the ones on your list, too!

[lilybaggins.livejournal.com]

I remember The Black Cauldron series!!! They were read to us in the fifth grade---I do believe they are the first fantasy books I ever became addicted to. Read them even before The Hobbit.

[archerlass.livejournal.com]

The Giving Tree

[rabidsamfan.livejournal.com]

Ah, good old Shel Silverstein. His "Where the Sidewalk Ends" is a perennial favorite too.

[elendiari22.livejournal.com]

"Kim" by Rudyard Kipling
"The Jungle Book" ditto
"The Hobbit," by Tolkien
"Howl's Moving Castle," by Diana Wynne Jones
"Inkheart," by Cornelia Funke
The Nancy Drew series
"Ella Enchanted," by Gail Carson Levine
"The Merry Adventures of Robin Hood," by Howard Pyle
"The Sword in the Stone," ditto?
"The Three Musketeers," by Alexandre Dumas
"Peter Pan," by J.M. Barry
"101 Dalmations," ?

That's all I can think of at the moment, but I agree with the rest of the books already listed.

[elendiari22.livejournal.com]

And anything by Roald Dahl.

[elasg.livejournal.com]

A lot of the ones I would have mentioned are already listed, but I would put in a bid for the Marguerite Henry books, of particular favorite are:

Misty of Chincoteague
San Domingo
King of the Wind : The Story of the Godolphin Arabian

I'll have to think back for more.

[rabidsamfan.livejournal.com]

Yay, Marguerite Henry! My new branch has a copy of her "All About Horses" right next to a book by C.W. Anderson.

[semyaza.livejournal.com]

Okay.

Natalie Babbitt. Tuck Everlasting.
Mary Norton. the Borrowers books
Thornton W. Burgess. anything at all
Carlo Collodi. Adventures of Pinocchio
George MacDonald. The Princess and the Goblin; The Princess and Curdie
Rosemary Sutcliff. The Eagle of the Ninth (or anything else)
Edward Eager. Half Magic etc
Walter R. Brooks. the Freddy the Pig series
Elizabeth Goudge. The Little White Horse
Beverley Nichols. The Tree That Sat Down etc
John Masefield. The Box of Delights
Nicholas Stuart Gray. Grimbold's Other World etc
Carol Kendall. The Gammage Cup
Alf Proysen. Little Old Mrs. Pepperpot

[rabidsamfan.livejournal.com]

I can see I'm going to be looking for Gray, Nichols and Proysen...

Have you ever read Rosemary Sutcliff's autobiography? It's fascinating.

[auntiemeesh.livejournal.com]

Make Way for Ducklings by Robert McCloskey
Blueberries for Sal, also by Robert McCloskey
Corduroy by Don Freeman
At the Back of the North Wind by George MacDonald
The Princess and the Goblin by George MacDonald
The Black Stallion series by Walter Farley
The Runaway Bunny by Margaret Wise Brown
The Little Mouse, the Red Ripe Strawberry and the Big Hungry Bear, by Don and Audrey Wood (it's newer but judging by the reaction of every kid I've read it to, it will be a classic)
Anne of Green Gables and the rest of that series by L.M. Montgomery
Are You My Mother? by P.D. Eastman
Eight Cousins by Louisa May Alcott
Old Mother West Wind and other books by Thornton Burgess

So many books, so little shelf space. *sigh*

[rabidsamfan.livejournal.com]

LoL! When you run out of shelf space there's always the floor!

[semyaza.livejournal.com]

Margery Sharp. Miss Bianca
Jean and Laurent de Brunhoff. the Babar books
Tomi Ungerer. Crictor
Noel Streatfield. Ballet Shoes
Anthony Buckeridge. Jennings Goes to School etc
Kate Douglas Wiggin. Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm

[rabidsamfan.livejournal.com]

Don't know Buckeridge, but the others are familiar. Thanks!

[auricle.livejournal.com]

Black Beauty
Little Princess
Secret Garden
Anything by Rhoald Dalh (ugh, I know I misspelled his name).
Dr. Suess books
The Hobbit

[rabidsamfan.livejournal.com]

Roald Dahl... you have to learn how to spell these things when you're a librarian, *wink*. But if you think his stuff is all for kids I suggest you go looking for his short stories. *brrr*

[suspect-terrain.livejournal.com]

To be more specific about Dr. Suess books (besides The Cat in the Hat: Green Eggs and Ham

a couple others that haven't been listed (I agree with lots of the lists posted so far!):

Julie of the Wolves, by Jean Craighead George
Island of the Blue Dolphins, by Scott O'Dell

I've got The Wind in the Willows sitting on the living room floor. I'm thinking of reading it aloud to a child; I never actually read it when I was given it as a gift when I was nine. I'm surprised it's not on other lists -- did other people have the experience of being told it was a classic and not reading it?

[rabidsamfan.livejournal.com]

Ah, yes, survival stories. I rather like those!

[widgeon7.livejournal.com]

Kidnapped by RL Stevenson
From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler, by EL Konigsburg
The Giver by Lois Lowry
The Borrowers series, by Mary Norton (I think)
Masquerade by Kit Williams
The Yearling by MK Rawlings
Little Bear series by FM Fox

[rabidsamfan.livejournal.com]

Hmm. I'm not sure I've seen the Kit Williams book, but I'll go look.

[i-o-r-h-a-e-l.livejournal.com]

As someone who grew up in Enid Blyton's shadow, I still think she's the best!

[rabidsamfan.livejournal.com]

Isn't it marvelous how books reach across cultures?

[lilybaggins.livejournal.com]

I just think of my favorite books as a child . . . or some I wish I'd read . . .

The Black Stallion series by Walter Farley
Where the Sidewalk Ends by Shel Silverstein
The Giving Tree
The Velveteen Rabbit
Charlotte's Web
101 Dalmations
Old Yeller---this one has GOT to be up there as a classic!!! :)
All of the Ramona books by Beverly Cleary
The Hobbit
Anything by Dr. Suess, which I see above . . .
The Little House series by Laura Ingalls Wilder
Anne of Green Gables
Grimm's Book of Fairy Tales (not really kid reading at all . . . I was a strange child)

[rabidsamfan.livejournal.com]

Yay, Old Yeller! (Although to tell the truth, as a kid I liked "Savage Sam" even better.)

[hildigard-brown.livejournal.com]

National Velvet by Enid Bagnold
Heidi by Johanna Spyri
The Black Stallion Series & Island Stallion Series by Walter Farley
Black Beauty by Anna Sewell
Misty of Chincoteague & King of the Wind by Marguerite Henry
Hans Brinker by Mary Mapes Dodge
A Wrinkle in Time, Wind in the Door & Swiftly Tilting Planet by Madeline L'Engle
Island of the Blue Dolphins by Scott O'Dell
The Adventures of Tom Sawyer & Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain
The Wizard of Oz by L. Frank Baum
Peter Pan by J.M. Barrie

[rabidsamfan.livejournal.com]

Ooh, nice list. I can tell you liked horse stories. Did you ever read "Afraid to Ride" by Anderson?

[serai1.livejournal.com]

Others have posted most of the books I'd name. A few others:

The Phantom Tollbooth - Norton Juster
The Glass Slipper - Eleanor Farjeon
Bambi - Felix Salten
Edward Lear's nonsense books
The Good Master and The Singing Tree - Kate Seredy
The Oz books - Frank Baum
The Little Prince - Antoine de St. Exupery
The Gnu and the Guru Go Behind the Beyond - Peggy Clifford
One Hundred and One Dalmatians - Dodie Smith
Anything by the D'Aulaires, especially their Book of Greek Myths
Paddle-to-the-Sea - Holling C. Holling
Where the Sidewalk Ends and The ABZ Book - Shel Silverstein
Anything by Mercer Mayer or Leo & Diane Dillon
The Pied Piper of Hamlin

[rabidsamfan.livejournal.com]

I have to loof for the Gnu... My favorite Seredy book is "The Chestry Oak", have you read it?

[grimnir1.livejournal.com]

Momo - Michael Ende
The Neverending Story - Michael Ende
Jim Knopf - Michael Ende
The Robber Hotzenplotz - Ottfried Preussler
The Little Prince - Antoine de Saint Exupery
Michel of Lönneberga - Astrid Lindgren
Children of Bullerbü - Astrid Lindgren
Emil and the Detectives - Erich Kästner
Das doppelte Lottchen - Erich Kästner (didn't find an English title)
Petit Nicolas - Sempé / Goscinny
Inkheart - Cornelia Funke
Andersen Fairy Tales
Brother Grimm Fairy Tales

[rabidsamfan.livejournal.com]

Ooooh, lots of titles for me to go looking for! (even though I recognize most of the authors!) Thanks!

[siouxieq.livejournal.com]

Just to put an Australian slant on the list

The Magic Pudding - Norman Lindsay
Snugglepot and Cuddlepie - May Gibbs
Seven Little Australians - Ethel Turner

also poetry collections of Banjo Patterson and Henry Lawson

Alice in Wonderland - Lewis Carroll

(all favourites before the age of 12 - I became allergic to reading after that, until 16)

[rabidsamfan.livejournal.com]

The only one I know of those is The Magic Pudding. Time to get reading, then!

[azur-infinie.livejournal.com]

Most of the ones I'd name have already been mentioned, but others that immediately spring to mind are:

The Silver Sword by Ian Serraillier
The Animals of Farthing Wood series by Colin Dann
Watership Down
The Famous Five books by Enid Blyton (and anything else by her :))

[rabidsamfan.livejournal.com]

Hmm. Don't know the Dann books. *makes notes*

[lbilover.livejournal.com]

One I haven't seen mentioned:
My Side of the Mountain by Jean Craighead George

[rabidsamfan.livejournal.com]

*dances* Oh, that was one of my all time favorites! And still is!

[claudia603.livejournal.com]

I so love Where the Wild Things Are...I do a project with my wee ones at the beginning of the year with that story (it's a way of teaching beginning, middle, end of stories). I'm sure I have a whole list of them myself, but my mind is fried and tired right now.

One of my all time favorites is Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day, as well as Swimmy and others by that author (that I am blanking on right now, d'oh!) I also adore the Beverly Cleary books about Ramona (my first graders adored the books in that series).

I just glanced down and saw you got lots of suggestions! :-D

[rabidsamfan.livejournal.com]

Ah, yes, Alexander... I do love that story.

[ansostuff.livejournal.com]

If you want some Norwegian classics to your list how about these:

"Kardemomme by" (Caredmon city) and "Hakkebakkeskogen" (Woodpecker`s forest) by Torbjørn Egner. Excellent litterature for children. :)

[rabidsamfan.livejournal.com]

Oooh, I wonder if they've ever been translated into English? My Norwegian is so rusty...