That seems a fair assessment to me. The article starts with:
>It is the work of a writer for children to do the same for the world itself. Children have not yet built wide hinterlands: to them, the world is still opaque and full of necessary bewilderment. Those who write for children have the chance to point them towards beauty that they do not yet know exists
I think this is the kind of metaphysical flight of fancies that are not only useless, but lead astray.
My observation is the opposite: children find beauty everywhere. Beauty is just the natural state of things.
They have not been trained yet to see things from the lens of their own interest, which is the basis for the eye of discrimination.
Things that are good for me are beautiful, things that are bad for me are ugly. Children have yet to learn what is good or bad for them.
Then there are the "rules" of children's books... but these have changed a lot in the last century, and most of what the industry takes for granted nowadays would have seemed absurd and laughable to the great authors whose legacy she claims.
>It is the work of a writer for children to do the same for the world itself. Children have not yet built wide hinterlands: to them, the world is still opaque and full of necessary bewilderment. Those who write for children have the chance to point them towards beauty that they do not yet know exists
I think this is the kind of metaphysical flight of fancies that are not only useless, but lead astray. My observation is the opposite: children find beauty everywhere. Beauty is just the natural state of things. They have not been trained yet to see things from the lens of their own interest, which is the basis for the eye of discrimination. Things that are good for me are beautiful, things that are bad for me are ugly. Children have yet to learn what is good or bad for them.
Then there are the "rules" of children's books... but these have changed a lot in the last century, and most of what the industry takes for granted nowadays would have seemed absurd and laughable to the great authors whose legacy she claims.