Research Talks

In association with the Department of English and Creative Writing, the NCRCL hosts a number of research talks across the year which are given by a wide range of experts in the field of children’s literature and are open to anyone who wishes to attend.

Recent Research Talks

Lesley Delaney (UCL and V&A)
‘Walter Crane and the Decorative Art of Learning to Read’
Tuesday 27 March

Walter Crane (1845-1915) was the most prolific and influential children’s book creator of his generation. Crane believed that good pictures and design could stimulate interest in books and help children learn to read from a very early age. ‘Children’, he said, ‘can learn definite ideas from good pictures long before they can read or write’. This presentation challenges the view that Crane’s work is purely decorative, and shows him to be the instigator of a number of key developments in picture book reading. Crane’s nursery book designs demonstrate how every feature of the book, including the cover, title page, endpapers, illustration and page layout, could be used to encourage a young child’s enjoyment of reading. He radically improved the standard of ‘toy books’, the cheap mass-market books that featured alphabets, nursery rhymes, fairy tales and modern stories. He also designed an innovative series of musical rhymes and fables for babies, as well as experimental books that show how reading, writing and arithmetic can be taught through imaginative play. Crane’s pioneering use of art and design popularised the idea of visual literacy in the Victorian nursery, and had a revolutionary effect on school teaching schemes.

Lisa Rowe Fraustino (Eastern Connecticut State University)
‘The Disney Subject’
Thursday 15 March