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Narrative and violence. (The Writer''s Page).

Article Excerpt
Here in the world of children's literature, we are pretty cozy. Olivia has saved the circus. Eloise still lives at the Plaza. We've made way for ducklings for sixty years, and kept Max's supper hot for forty. The dark has risen and been held back, and worlds have been joined by a subtle knife. Our work is rich and fulfilling and good. I imagine we all feel that we are engaged in a meaningful, valuable enterprise. We like our books and our world of children's literature.

But out there in the rest of the world, things are going to hell. A year after September 11 and the anthrax scare, Washington D.C. and surrounding areas were once again white-knuckled with fear, held at gunpoint by a pair of snipers. I got an e-mail from a friend, saying her Maryland granddaughter's fourth-grade class was having an ice-cream party as a reward because they'd done so well with code blue--total lockdown. In a one-week period I marveled at the following: in my hometown I marched in an antiwar rally and watched a man lean out of a passing van to yell, "Kill them all!" North Korea admitted it has nuclear weapons capability. Chechen rebels...

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