CHILDREN'S BOOKS
Sia,—Reviewing children's books is—or should be —a rather specialised job. Even the selection of those to be reviewed calls for a wide knowledge of what is and has been written for children. It is curious, therefore, to find the author of your main article on children's books, 'Around the Age Groups,' con- fessing her ignorance by stating that 'not long ago, I believed that the most constantly recurring themes for writers of children's books could be enumerated as follows: Theme one, the typical British family adventure, with no single hero. Theme two, the boarding schoql, with one outstanding, parentless character doing thrilling things on a guardian's cheque in the hols. Theme three, the Horse. . . . Theme four, the minuscule escapades of small mammals.' Miss Tisdall is out of touch with child- ren's books of the last ten or even fifteen years. She has not, perhaps, heard of William Mayne, Philippa Pearce, C. S. Lewis, Catherine Storr, Hester Burton or Elizabeth Stucley. Children's author's take their work seriously. So do their publishers and their readers. To display such facetious ignorance is insulting. Would you give space to a reviewer of SPECTATOR, NOVEMBER 30, 1 9 6 :" adult fiction who stated that she had always cat' egoriscd it into Theme one: romantic slush; thole, two: thrillers; theme three: sadism and sex; 1311: 'after working my way with mole-like diligence through some recent books, had discovered some new authors called Angus Wilson, Doris Lessing and Patrick White? 20 Lyndhurst Gardens, NW3 FACT-FINDING ROSEMARY MANNING
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