Background of the Theory

Huggins , Ezra Jack Keats’s 1962 picture book The Snowy Day, Virginia Hamilton’s 1993 novel Plain City 2008:1. The six texts are variation of texts with the difference of publishing time and other aspects among them and also known as texts of children’s literature. This diverse group of texts was published in two different countries over a period spanning almost two centuries…But despite their many differences, all six texts do have one thing in common: most people would identify them as children’s literature 2008:2. Led by the inner construction of the texts and their seen features as particular kind of literary work, Nodelman believes that more values can be explored in those texts. He says that there is something about the texts themselves, some feeling or quality, that not only tells him that each of them is children’s literature but that also makes them seem somehow similar to each other 2008:7. The assumption in his analysis is mostly about the role of a kind of power behind the process of constructing children’s literature. This assumption is based on the idea of children’s literature. According to Nodelman the literary work is produced by a creator that must make judgements about what to produce based not on what they believe will appeal to children, but rather on what they believe adult consumers believe they know will appeal to children or perhaps, what should appeal to them, or what they need to be taught 2008:5. Adults’ control in the production system of the literary work can be traced by looking at the internal form of the work itself. As commonly recognized, the creators of children’s literature are adults. The creation of children’s literature is done under some purposes. This is based on the idea that children should be made easier for adult to handle. In order to accomplish the purpose, adults put their attention on values that they need to apply to children. Nodelman says that adults do not only demand to control children, they also want the children to accept or even to need the controlling of adults. By and large, we encourage in children those values and behaviors that make children easier for us to handle: more passive, more docile, more obedient and thus, more in need of our guidance and more willing to accept the need for it Nodelman, 1992:30. These characteristic and values of children’s literature of having the adults as an important part can be seen in the construction of the works themselves as the work of literature. When inserted their purposes, adults develop a certain power of controlling by their position as the creators. This potential power will enable adults to manage and to make a children’s literature become a medium for their purposes. This is the way the value can be passed through the children’s literature. The character of children is described as the opposite of adults. Their simple mind led by desire and ignorance in handling anything in life is considered as their natural characters. On the other hand, it can be seen that the characters of adults in children’s literature are described as the source of knowledge. They are the side on which children will learn that their desire should be changed into other behavior that will prevent them from the bad and problematic situation. ... [T]he state of being in uncertainty, of not knowing a world that keeps changing and not understanding a self that keeps changing, is the opposite of what adulthood is that it is the essence of what it means to be a child... 2008:40. Children’s desire is the condition of their uncertainty, their demand of objects that according to themselves could be a source of happiness or possible values that will please them. This desire put them into a different category to other characters in the children’s literature, which are the characters of adults. We can see that each of these characters complement other characterization. By observing adults character with their knowledge, some points will be gained to identify the characterization of children characters with their desire. The idea of adults’ position and role in children’s literature can be discussed by using Nodelman’s concept that is known as the idea of adult knowledge. The explanation of this idea can be seen in the conclusion made by Nodelman in his analysis on various numbers of children’s literary works. One of the conclusions is about the position of adults in the children’s literature as the character with the source of knowledge. Nodelman says that the position of the texts tends to confirm the idea that it is adult knowledge that reveals the inadequacies of childhood desires 2008:80. The identification of this knowledge can be seen in the text of children’s literature. The knowledge is the opposite of other values such as childlike or animal wisdom values that can be seen in the work of children’s literature. Quite simply, adult knowledge is knowledge, and in being represented as the opposite of adult knowledge, childlike or animal wisdom can only be understood as a lack, a deficiency—a state of bliss defined by what is absent from it 2008:44. In the construction of children’s literature it can be found that the position of adults has a better knowledge than the children. The knowledge is the basic knowledge about any aspects in life. Nodelman says, “it seems, adults like children to know less than they do or, perhaps more accurately, like to be able to believe that children know less than they do? and reward them for being so or seeming to be so” 2008:27. This idea puts the position of adult in children’s literature as a centre of character with the best knowledge in the work of literature . The position of adults can be seen in many aspects of the construction such as the narration, plot, theme, or the characterization of the characters. In children’s literature, adults are known for their knowledge which is positioned as the most important thing in their existence. Meanwhile, children are constructed as having a desire. The desire is designed as the source of any acts that will be done by the character of children in children’s literature. These characters are unaware of their desire because they are described as innocent and dependent on the adults in order to gain a better understanding of the surrounding or their life. Nodelman says, “children are innocent enough not to know the danger in what they desire and need to learn it” 2008:80. Their character is described as having the simplicity of thinking and know very little of their surrounding. This value, according to Nodelman, is one of the significant points in the characteristic of children in children’s literature. To think as one imagines a child thinks, to be simple, to know less—all this means is that one is less conscious of the brute horror of the bare truth, despicable and unbearable reality itself 2008:44. The other finding in the analysis is Nodelman’s idea that adult knowledge and children desire are constructed in a narration. Based on his analysis on the six texts,