Sometimes, a new course draws on my expertise. Â Other times, a new course is a chance for me to develop that expertise. Â This class — “Censoring Children’s Literature” — is definitely the latter. Â I have an interest in the subject, and I’ve tried to structure the syllabus around major issues concerning the regulation of what…
Random House’s newly updated Seussville website – featuring my biography and timeline – recently went live. This is the first time I’ve written a piece for a corporation, but Dr. Seuss did it all the time. Though he published his first children’s book in 1937, he made his living through advertising … until the bestselling The…
With the fall term imminent (starts Monday), I’m posting a link to the latest iteration of my English 545: Literature for Adolescents. My goal is always “diversity” in many senses of that word.  We read books by writers of different backgrounds (African-American, Iranian, Chinese-American, Latino, Caucasian), genders, sexualities, classes — which are probably the categories most…
Comedy is hard. Lane Smith makes it look easy. I’m not going to reveal the punch line to his latest, It’s a Book, because I don’t have to: There are plenty of amusing moments along the way. When the jackass asks, “Where’s your mouse?” Smith provides a wordless page in which a mouse emerges from…
Dr. Seuss‘s Green Eggs and Ham is one of the reasons I do this blog, write books, and am an English professor.  Nearly forty years ago, Green Eggs and Ham — which turns 50 this month — taught me to read.  It also taught me that reading is fun, helping to make me a life-long reader. The…
A 1943 letter from Crockett Johnson. Asked about himself, he dodges the question.
Is it just me, or does “This is the lady who knows what children think — BEFORE THEY DO” sound like the tag line for a horror movie? Â You will be relieved to know that Ruth Krauss could not read children’s minds. But she was an excellent and sympathetic listener. In her earliest work, she…
Two high-school cartoons by Crockett Johnson. Neither has been seen since the 1920s.
Tim Egan, seriously funny author-illustrator of picture books, deserves a prize. A big prize. In this post, I try to explain why.
Different kinds of scholars, different kinds of scholarship. But many paths to success in academia.
