7 The Aesthetic of Character Characters are the agents performing actions in a story: persons, personified animals, or objects. Character and characterization ae such ai ob of fiction that they are very seldom discussed in critical works or ia text books on children’s literature. If mentioned at all, the questions concern characters will most likely be who they are, what they do, ar what they rep resent. We may find phrases in children’s book reviews about “powerlul characterization,” but what exactly do crities mean by this? What is the function of characters in the narrative, and what is cl the set of artistic devices used by writers to reveal ch ers? Despite the postmodern and poststructural denigration of characters, they are sill central in fiction; basically, we read fie ested in human nature and human relationships as revealed through fictive characters. acters for their read” LET US EXPLORE Choose a children’s novel and try to pose as many questions as you can think of concerning characters. Here are some suggestions for you to develop: © Are the characters important in themselves, or are they merely in strumental for the plot? Do they represent something? In this cease what? ‘* Is there one clearly identifiable protagonist, or are there several characters who can be considered as main characters? ‘© What is the relationship between the main character and other characters? ‘* What kinds of characters are they—good, bad, neutral? Are we as 145146 Chapser 7 readers supposed to like them, admire them, empathize with them, or on the contrary, condemn them? ‘c most of the characters clearly divided into good and bad ones, jor ate they more comples, with contradictory psychological ‘+ How do we as readers get to know the characters? Does the narra- tor state explicitly what they are like, or are we allowed to draw ‘our own conclusions? People of Flesh and Blood or Merely Words? One of the most profound problems in dealing with literary characters is their ontological status (ontology = issue of reality): are we to treat them as real people, with psychologically credible traits. or merely as textual con structions? Literary theory from Aristotle 10 our day has given a variety of answers to this question. On the one hand, we ean view literary characters as real people and ascribe them a background and psychological features that may not have any support in the text. This approach is called mimetic. We have already discussed mimetic approaches to literature in general (chapter 4), Mimesis means imitation, so from this approach we would say that liter~ characters imitate real people in real life. On the other hand, we can per- ceive characters merely as a number of words, without any psychological substance. This approach is ealled semiotie, and semioties, as we remember, is the theory about signs. With this approach, characters are merely signs or signifiers; they do not have to behave logically or even plausibly; they do not ha whole, coherent, and believable. These two approaches are ex= a reasonable attitude is somewhere in between. The ontological question, that is, the question of the difference between literary characters and real people, is highly relevant for children’s literature research, There is a much stronger tendency to treat and judge character children’s books as if they were real people, as compared to the mainst CHARACTERS AS ACTORS We have touched upon characters from a formalist and structuralist view point when we were discussing composition (chapter 5): characters as role figures in the plot. Interestingly enough, this approach goes back to classic poetics. For Aristotle, characters are subordinate to the plot, and their fune- tion ina literary work is merely to perform actions. Aristotle distinguishes between pratton (actor or agent) and ethos (psychological figure, personal- ity), maintaining that agents are indispensable in a literary work, while psy- The Aesthetic of Character 17 al. Moreover, the only psyel “base” features ate essential for the cory, primitive as it vs today, used as ¢ ying, principle for traditional children's fiction, in which characters’ actions a ical Features. Within formalist and structuralist theory, developed 2,300 years after Ar istotle, characters are also treated merely as agents who perform cet tions and therefore have no psychological features whatsoever. All structural models describe characters in re rficially as wo how they relate to each other. This does not allow a deeper analysis of the characters’ traits and still ess any “inner life.” "Therefore such models have been successfully applied to plot-oriented children’s stories. It woukd be meaningless to analyze Dorothy in The Wizard of Oz in psychological terms, since she only has one feature: she is good. She does not present any complexity inherent to human beings in real life, and she hardly shows any psychological development. She is, by contrast, highly motivated in her be havior by the objective of the plot co return home. The functional or act tial model would be more than adequate to describe the characters in Thi Wizard of Oz. This does not mean, however, that Dorothy is a deficient character as compared to a protagonist from a modern psychological novel. Dorothy is simply a different kind of charaeter, an actor rather than a per sonality. “Today we expect psychological dimension in literary characters. We expect an ethieal dimension, of Aristotle’s ethos, character as a psychological entity. While the majority of children’s books are still action oriented, that is, focused more on actions and events than on character and characteriza- tion, there has been a notable shift in Western children’s fiction toward a more profound interest in character, toward psychological, character-ori- ented children’s novels. Until recently, most children’s books did not por- tray characters with personality traits other than good or evil. Harold Bloom claims in his recent book on Shakespeare that the psychological dimension in literary characters was Shakespeare's invention. Since children’s literature isa relatively recent phenomenon in the history of literature, the psychole cal aspect of literary character in children’s fiction does not emerge on a larger seale until the 1970s in the Western countries. A psychological literary Jen's literature is a collective “invention” of several major ehologieal eh fe optic important than their psye to plot and only su authors of the last twenty to twenty-five years Consider a number of children’s novels in terms of plot orientation or character orientation. Contemplate whether the characters have anya8 Chapter 7 psychological or ethical dimensions. See whether you ean observe any historical development toward psychological characters. CHARACTERS AS PEOPLE netic approach to literary characters, we are interested in what they are and how they relate to real people as we know them from the real world. In children’s literature, main characters are most often children or animals (occasionally inanimate objects) representing children. Mimetically ed studies of children’s literature focus on the kinds of characters that qve meet in children’s novels, such as boys and girls, men and women, par: randparents, siblings, teachers, ethnic minorities, immi muy gay and lesbian characters, animal and tay characters, witches, wizards, dragons, ghosts, and other supernatural ereatures, We can also analyze conerete characters, such as Jo March, Anne Shirley, Ramona, or Harry Potter. We have a variety of tools for such analyses. We can treat characters from a sociohistorical viewpoint, as representatives of en as representatives of nationhood (for instance, is the Cat in the Hat a truly American hero?), We can treat them from a psychological viewpoint, as bearers of certain psychological features. Many interesting studies of particular characters are based on modern child psychology, for instance, works by Erik Erikson, Melanie Klein, and D. W. Winnicott, We can further treat characters from a biographical viewpoint, as reflections of their authors’ lives and opinions. We can also see characters as hearers of ideas, as mouthpieces for ideologies and beliefs, or as models for young readers in their socialization. All these methods are closely connected to mimetie approaches to literature as such, already discussed in chapter 4. cents, stepparents, gt ® their time and social group, oF & A Typical Children’s Another way of looking at characters from a mimetic point of view is try- ing to identify the most typical traits of all characters in children’s fiction. “There are two main types of characters we meet in children’s books: the un- derdog and the trickster, both originating from myth and folklore. The most common hero in a folktale fs an underprivileged child, the youngest sum or youngest daughter, often a child of unknown origin. Ar the end, the hero finds his fortune, “the princess and half che kingdom,” and triumphs over those who seemed cleverer and stronger in the beginning. ‘The abandoned orphan is ost typical character in children’s fiction. The degree of can vary from the parents’ going off for work to their being avay traveling or even dead; as shown before, they may be also absent emo- iterature Character Iso the abandonn Ww ‘The Aesthetic of Character 9 tionally. We can call children whose parents ave them, ““funetional orphans.” Another typical character in children’s fiction, originating in folklore, is the trickster. ‘Tom Sawyer is a trickster. Peter Rabbit is a trickster. A “tom boy girl” like Jo March and Anne Shirley, alludes to the trickster figure ax well, while in Pippi Longstocking a girl is put into a typical male-trickster role. While the trickster is more common in entertainment literature, the first character type, the underprivileged child, is che most widespread in con- temporary psychological children’s novels. Both the underdog and the trick: ster are characters who, as the plot progresses, change their power position from low to high or at least higher. They are comic heroes, appearing, in a comic plot (see chapter 5). This is what we often refer to as the intrinsie hope and optimism of children’s literature. As we have discussed before, down- ward movement and thus tragic heroes are unlikely in children’s fiction, al- ty started to appear in young adult wve but do not eare about EXERCISE Choose two children’s novels, one plot oriented, the other character oriented. Compare the characters in terms of their psychological quali- ties. Is it fruitful at all to consider characters in plot-oriented novels, in psychological terms? Is it fruitful to apply structuralist models to character-oriented texts? FROM GENDER ROLES TO GENDER PERFORMANCE, ‘The interest in the gender aspect of children’s literature emerged in the 1960s and °70s, as part of the general interest in a sociohistorieal approach to li ture. The early studies of children’s books from the gender point of view focused on gender roles: the way boys and girls, or men and women, were portrayed, as well as how these portrayals reflected the actual situation in society. Gender stereotyping, was the key concept of these studies. A stereo- type is a character who behaves in exactly the way he or she is supposed to, according 1 the prevailing conventions. Since nate wl female ster cuty ical traits aze opposed to each other, itis easy to present a schematic abstract pattern of “masculinity” and “femininity”: Men/boys: ‘Women/girls strong beautiful violent nonviolent150 Chaprer 7 unemotional, tough emotional, soft aggressi submissive competitive sharing protective vulnerable independent dependent active passive and so on EXERCISE male characters in chil: Apply the schema to a number of male and dren's novels. Do you find that male characters fit into it more often than female ones? While not all male and female literary characters follow this schema, it can help us evaluate gender stereotypes. in our culture, “male” features are im- plicitly superiors feminist eritics refer to this fact as “phallocentrism.”” Yet, female characters who show at least some male traits and thus break away from the stereotype, such as Jo March or Anne Shirley, are frequently forced back into female patterns. As one critic has put it, in literature boys grow, while girls shrink. If we tried to apply the schema to Anne, she would match most of the male traits in the beginning of the novel and most of the female ‘ones in the end. That is, rather than showing the character's development toward strength and independence, as would be the ease with a male charac ter, the novel instead demonstrates how women were compelled by the patri archal (= mal ced) society 10 adjust to the female stereotype. When Pippi Longstocking, a character genuinely inspired by Anne Shirley, is al lowed to be everything that Anne must give up in order to be accepte operating within a different genre. It is in fact only fantasy and s fiction that can, with certain reservations, portray female characters free from stercotyping. ‘One of the general problems male-female, or masculine-feminin firet sight. ‘Thus, in oes ‘must remember that the plots of children’s novels usually follow the patterns of male myths and, generally, “masculine” (or gender-neutral) narratives, oriented toward tangible achievements, “Feminine” narratives are dilferent and can be hard to discern sinee they are not as pronounced as the rigid be- sinning-middle-end struetures we are used to and the heroic male character associated with it. she assessing gender is that the opposition ig more complex than it may seem at ing female characters in children’s fetion, we The Aesthetic of Character 151 e Archetypes On archetype, girl who lives close to nature. Wendy in Peter Pastis one of t heroines, escaping into her green workd away from both urban eivilization and her parents’ oppression, and returning to it in her recuperating memo ries as an adult. ‘The protagonists of Johanna Spyri’s Heid? and Burnett's The Secret Garden are further examples of the green-world hy ‘The growing-up-grotesque archetype implies meeting the incompatibility of personal freedom and societal demands by going into depression or sec sion. This process has also been described in terms of abjection, a gitl's fe ing of aversion toward her own body as it develops into a young womans Consider this quote from Lyddie: clearly feminine pattern that has been identified is the green-world She hadn't had s new dress since they sold the sheep four years ago. Since then, hor body: had begun to make those strange changes to womanhood that exas rated her. Why couldn't she be as thin and straight as a boy? Why couldn'e 1c have been a boy? Pethaps, then With an older son to help, maybe he could have made a living for them on the Will farm. (22) her father would not have had to leave The tomboy figure in children’s fiction is an excellent example of abjection. wecepting their own femininity, heroines such as Jo March and Anne Shirley suppress it by manifesting nonfeminine behavior. Both charac- ters have to subdue hot tempers incompatible with feminine norms. Anne is literally silenced as she abandons her imaginative, poetic language. Cross dressing and androgyny are two more ways of denying one’s body and gen- der. In contemporary novels, the grotesque archetype can be stretched quite far, since today’s young, women’s unwomanly manners are slightly more tol erated than in Jo March’s day. Louise in Jecob Have I Loved suppresses her femininity to distance herself from her pretty and talented twin sister. also trying to fulfill her father’s secret desire for a son. Louise dresses care lessly; has a male occupation, fishing: and seemingly makes no attempts to grow up as a “normal” woman, Portraying this survival strategy, the author explicitly deseribes her as unattractive (among other things, with an ugly sear from chicken pox), the way she perceives herself. A much younger here Gilly Hopkins, employs a similar survival strategy by being deliberately nasty. In children’s fiction, girls are doubly oppressed: as women and as chiklren Such oppression implies that in a children’s novel, a female character's devel ‘opment is more universal than that in mainstream fiction, where femininity is overt and explicit. Not least because girls’ fiction is historically 4 elatively recent genre, masculine patterns, as in many other fields, hold a default value in children’s fiction. Paradoxically enough, the contemporary character of Rather th152 Chapter 7 children’s fiction has inherited significantly more traits from the female ar chetypes than from those of the traditional male hero. Changi 1 Approaches to Gender Of course, our ideas about typical male and female traits change with tim ‘Our assessment of “masculine” and “feminine” behavior is also based on our preconceived opinions. Jo March’s unladylike behavior was perceived fferently when the novel was published than we perceive it today. Contem- porary juvenile novels contain much stronger language than Jo's “Christo- pher Columbus.” Female characters especially have changed radically since Liale Women; and boys in contemporary novels are allowed to be soft and ‘caring. Hermione in the Harry Potter books has recently become a favorite ‘object for gender analysis. There are several ways of assessing this character. We can view her as a strong-minded, intelligent, independent female who is herr Je companions’ equal and in some ways even superior (for instance, she is smart and more suecessful academically). On the other hand, Hermi- ‘one is a stereotypical “strong and independent” female, who is only allowed to be brilliant in traditionally female areas and is constantly eclipsed by Harry and even Ron when it comes to bravery and action. In one episode she is literally “petrified” and thereby denied agency. Thus in the Harry Pot- tor books, masculine characteristics are repeatedly given priority. For obvious reasons, gender aspeets are more prominent in fiction for slightly older readers, especially in young adult fiction, since gender identity is an essential part of the identity quest during adolescence. It many ca characters in children’s novels are “gender neutral” in the sense that their biological gender is not crucial for the plot. For instance, there is nothing, precluding a male protagonist in The Wizard of Oz. Often the whole issue of gender is simply circumvented by having a group of characters, boys and girls, in the main role, as we see in The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. Yet because boys and girls in our society are in fact expected to behave differ- cnily, the character's gender is still not an aceident. We could not possibly have a girl in the main role in The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, simply because it would nox be plausible for a girl to go to a graveyard in the middle of the ight oF to tin avery to have fin on an island On the other hand, Jo's revale against societal norms would not be as radical if she were a boy. While the strong influence of feminist criticism during the last ewenty has drawn our attention to the portrayal of girls in children’s and juve~ nile novel, the most reent trend has also focused on boys and masculinity. This is a welcome development, since male characters should by no means ina kind of positive discrimination, The Aesthetic of Character 153 EXERC! Choose a children’s novel with a number of male and female charac ters, Study carefully the way these characters are portrayed. Here are questions to help you in your assessment: « Is the character's gender decisive for the plot? “Try to perform mental gender permutation on the character and see whether the character will still Function in the plot « Is there a gender balance in the text? Do boys or girls have all the leading parts? Why? Is the gender balance dictated by the plot? +# Who is active and who is acted upon? * Do boys get away with, and perhaps even get praised for, behavior that girls get punished for? Are boys allowed to speak while giels are silenced? # Are boys and girls, men and women stereotypically portrayed? Do they behave, speak, and think according to the society's pre scribed norms? If there are any deviations [rom the norms, how do other characters react to those? Where is the author’s'sym- pathy? Gender Performance A more subtle approach to characters’ gencler aspects is to examine ic in terms of social construction and societal expectations. ‘The concept of per formative gender, as opposed to the biological gender, draws our atten to the characters’ behavior along the prescribed norms, called in feminist criticism a gender script. Ifthe character is depicted as female, but behaves like a male, we may say that she is performing according, to the prewritten ale gender script, or matrix. It is fully possible to put a female character in an adventure plot, but this will be a simple gender permutation, creating, a “hero in drag.” Quite a few contemporary fantasy novels portray strong, masculine heroines slaying dragons and mecting male opponents in open combat. This is a typical example of tokenism. These seemingly female chat acters are tokens, a female body sct in a male role. Superficial female attri bhutes (most often, long hair) do not ereate a female identity; the character could have been male without the plot changing significantly, since the plot itself is unmistakably male. By contrast, some of the female chatacters al ready mentioned above, stich as Jo, Anne, and Louise, deviate from the pre- scribed gender norms while retaining their feminine identity. In doing so, they in fact interrogate the norms that force women into secondary and sub- missive roles.154 Chapter? Comtemporary feminist and queer theory have given us powerful analyti- cal tools to examine gender patterns in literature, and we have gone much further than merely stating the occurrence of gender stereotyping. While very litle of queer theory ean be directly applied to literature, the idea of gender as performance rather than an inherent feature is certainly worth pur- suing. EXERCISE, Choose a children’s or a young adult novel with a female protagonist and examine whether she is in fact depicted as female in her gender performance. Draft a gender seript for the character—it must take into consideration the genre, setting, and plot within which she is perform ing. Does she comply with the seript or deviate from it? What happens she does deviate, what is the reaction af her sucromndings, what is the implied author’s position? Has the performative analysis changed your initial assessment of the character? THE PATRICIDAL CHILD In chapter 1, we took a brief look at the ways author-oriented psychoanaly sis works. In applying psychoanalytical models to literary characters, we in remember that they are not real people and do not have to appear in accordance with the actual course of mental disturbances. We will use patterns described by Freud and his followers to examine certain recur- rent psychological patterns in literature, which may, but need not be, the consequence of the author’s familiarity with Freud. After all, the Oedipus complex, Freud’s most famous concept, appears in literary texts thousands of years before Freud described it ‘The Oedipus Complex in the Nursery The essence of Freudian theory can be summarized by stating that all human problems originate in early childhood traumatic experience, most ‘often connected with sexuality. Oue example is Uhe so-called printal scene,” 2 young child’s accidental witnessing of the parents’ sexual intercourse, which causes a disturbing realization of being sexually inadequate. Accord ing to Freud, a boy always feels subconscious hate and rivalry toward his ther, who possesses the person most dear to the child: the mother. ‘Thus the boy instinctively wishes to get rid of the father so that he ean have the mother all for himself. Since hate toward the father and a secret sexual desire | The Aesthetic of Character 155 for the mother are forbidden sentiments in a civilized society, the presses them, which may lead to psychic disturba comes manifest in dreams and fancies. A ne y sup. ce and in any ease be al psychological process is, by Contrast, the child's suecessive emotional liberation from the parents, ig order to be able to develop healthy sexual relations in adulthood Freud’s patterns were male oriented, they can also by ostensibly are secretly in love with their fathers and th of their mothers: the Electra complex. In stories, we meet four types of parent/chi amined in terms of Freudian psychoanalysis: mother—dauhter, mother son, father—son, and father—daughter. All these relationships are widely described in myths and fairy tales, as well as in li “They are the most basic human relationships, which, as already discussed hefore, acquire a spe cial significance in children’s fiction. Let us start with a brief glance at some well-known fairy tales, the importance of which has been especially empha sized in the works of the famous psychoanalytical critie Bruno Bewelheim In Puss is Boots, for instance, the hero, assisted by his trickster friend, kills the ogre and takes over al its riches. In psychoanalytical terms, resents the young boy’s image of his fa the boy can go on with his own life. The main conilict in Sow White is rivalry between an aging mother and the daughter approaching, puberty. Al though the evil queen is not portrayed as Snow White's biological mother wwe know that most figures of evil stepparents in fairy tales are misms of real parents, since it is less offensive in our socicty to feel hate toward a stepparent than toward a biological parent. Snow White's biologi al mother dies, remaining forever benevolent in her dauyghter’s memory. In her stead, an evil mother figure appears, wishing to eliminate the daughter who is a threat to her sexual power over men. Rapusrel is a variant of Sow White, also centered round mother/daughter relationship, The witch is Ra punzel’s foster mother—as in Snow White, a less offe! logical mother. By keeping Rapunzel locked in her daughter maturity and sexuality, since she sees het as a future rival. The young heroine's triumph over the witeh is, as in Snow White or Cinderella, a symbolic depiction of a young female adolescent’s liberation from her mother’s dominance. Yet another version of Cinderella and Snow White, sometimes called All-Fir, Catskin, or Donkeyskin, depicts a daughter lecing from her father’s incestuous attention. Thus in many fairy tales we see de scriptions of relationships and feelings that are highly tabooed in our society but that nevertheless exist in our subconscious and can cause traumas: moth ers’ rivalry with their daughters, mothers desiring, their sons, sons desiring their mothers and therefore hating their fathers, fathers scared of sons as 11 vals and potential murderers, fathers’ desire for ‘One would presume that these issues are irelevant for children's liv Ithough applied to girls, who lore wish to et rid her who must be eliminated before ate euphe- ir daughters, and soAesthetic Approaches to Children’s. Literature An Introduction Maria Nikolajeva a The Scarecrow Press, Inc. Lanham, Maryland + ‘Toronto + Oxford 2005SCARECROW PRESS, INC. Published by Scarecrow Press, Ine wholly owned subsidiary of “Thee Rowman Ge Litleficld Publishing Group, Ine 4501 Forbes Boulevard, Suite 200, Lanham, Maryland 20706 www.searecrowpress.com PO Box 317 Oxford (OX2 9RU, UK Copyright © 2005 by Maria Nikolajeva Alf rights reserved. No pat of this publication may be reproduced, stored im a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any. means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, ‘without the prior permission of the publisher. British Library Cataloguing in Publication Information Available Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Nikolsjeva, Maria ‘Aesthetic approaches to childcen’s literature : Nikolajeva. pcm Includes bibliographical references and inden. ISBN 0.8108-5426-0 (pbk. : alk. paper) |. Children’s literature, Americaty—History and efticism—"Theory, ete 2. Children’s literature, English—History and erticism—Theory, et 3, Children" Books and reading —Norch America. I. Til, PS490.NS5_ 2008, 810.9'9282—dea? 2004024130 ©The paper used in shi publication ects she minimum requirements of Ameriean Rood Standard for lnfetaton Sencar Permastace of Paper for ne ibry Maen ANSUISO 2394-1998, Manuaced inthe Ud Sum of Ameden Contents Preface Introduction: Do We Need a Separate Aesthetics for Children’s Literature? ‘The Aesthetic of the Author ‘The Aesthetic of the Work ‘The Aesthetic of the Genre The Aesthetic of the Content ‘The Aesthetic of Composition ‘The Aesthetic of the Scene The Aesthetic of Character ‘The Aesthetic of Narration ‘The Aesthetic of Language 10 The Aesthetic of the Medium 11 The Aesthetic of the Reader 12 Conclusion: Which Tool Shall I Choose? Bibliography Index Subject and Name Index Title Index: About the Author 21 49 Fay 9 127 145 ii 197 223 247 209 273 301 301 309 313