labellementeuse | (no subject)

(no subject)

Hi y'all, I have a quick question.

We've been doing "Matilda" in English at the moment, which has been really fun. Some things people have suggested in terms of the kind of film/text it is is as a part of a kind of "children's noir" or "family black comedy", texts that are darker, more sophisticated, and much more intertextual than books or films for children are generally considered to be - children reading/watching these texts have some understanding of stereotype, parody, they understand the conventional storyline and they also understand when the conventional storyline is deliberately being twisted. A really good example of this is A Series of Unfortunate Events. The Amazing Maurice and His Educated Rodents is another good one. I was wondering if anyone else had any examples? it's a really interesting idea and I'd like to look at it in more detail, maybe for an essay I'm writing.

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Un Lundun looks like a good example of recent ones, the hero gets beaten early and the sidekick has to try and save the day.

I'm trying to find the title of an old book I read once where the prince had to collect egg cartons in order to make a cardboard dinosaur to win the princess, I think it kinda made fun of quest fantasy.

The Phantom Tollbooth is very reliant on all sorts of outside sources, though more of a straight quest.

Obviously you also have Coraline which is just scary.

Um... His Dark Materials? Are we getting older than you expected?

Its funny that you talk about Matilda as if its much more sophisticated than children's books are meant to be (expected to be?), cos I know you'd love it if people had that expectation of kid's books ;)

Robin Jarvis' books are very dark, especially Deathscent, the Depthford Histories and Tales from the Wyrd Museum. Usually the 'goodies' win, but at a large personal cost.

Hmmmm not too sure about the black humour but Patricia Wrede's dragon series certainly plays with the traditions.

The stories that come to mind for me probably fall less into the 'noir' category and more into the 'written earlier, so dark is more expected' category. They include E. Nesbit's The Railway Children and A Little Princess. Obviously they're also much more sentimental than Matilda and ASoUE.

Bruce Coville!

Diana Wynn Jones? Maybe a little older than you were thinking, but titles like Dark Lord of Derkholm are definitely send-offs of the stereotypical fantasy novel.

Witch Week and Diana Wynne Jones in general plays off the stereotypes - like Millie/goddess of Asheth and her obsession with boarding school stories. Howl's Moving Castle and its play on fairy tales.
The Wee Free Men series has a lot of intertextuality and nods to a more mature audience from what I can recall.
A Wrinkle in Time has a lot of philosophical, metaphysical concepts in it, I don't know if that's the sort of thing you're thinking of.
This sounds like a fun class :)

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