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Critical connections: professional reading.

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Mingshui Cai Multicultural Literature for Children and Young Adults 201 pp. Greenwood 10/02 ISBN 0-313-31244-3 64.95

In nine chapters, Cai looks at central issues concerning the definition, critical evaluation, and educational practices of multicultural literature. He sustains the single argument that multicultural books make a difference in the lives of all child readers and have the unique potential to transform social relations. The first section of the book tries to pin down an operating definition and useful classifications of multicultural literature by addressing the pull between literary value and pedagogical purpose. He weighs definitions of multicultural literature as all-inclusive against those that include only the literature of "parallel cultures." The second section of the book looks closely at questions of criticism and evaluation. What makes a multicultural book a good book? Should authenticity matter? How does one determine the cultural authenticity of the creator of multicultural literature? Can one write truthfully from an outsider position? What is the difference between inclusion and representation? Cai's final section aims to understand and bridge the prevalent concerns about using multicultural literature in education. He offers a sophisticated reader-response approach to books' ability to cross cultural boundaries, to combat color blindness, to inform and to empower, and to foster students' development across multiple dimensions of learning. Individual chapter references and cited works of multicultural literature, an appendix of related websites, selected bibliography, and index.

Alison Lurie Boys and Girls Forever: Children's Classics from Cinderella to Harry Potter 219 pp. Penguin 1/03 Paper edition ISBN 0-14-200252-6 15.00

Pulitzer Prize-winner Alison Lurie is rooted in adult letters but occasionally ventures into children's books. In Don't Tell the Grown-ups (1990), she reconsidered classics of children's literature to expose their subversive elements; one might expect unconventional sensibilities in Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, but in The Tale of Peter Rabbit? In Tolkien? And T. H. White? That first collection of essays marks an important moment in children's literature criticism, as critics began to consider how texts challenge, reflect, or offer ideas about "the child" as not merely a literary character but as a...

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