Margery Fisher (1913–1992)

I probably wouldn't have bought this book except that it was in the remainder's pile and had some nice illustrations. And I think that snap judgement was probably correct. I must confess that I've not read the book from cover to cover but enough of it to make some observations.
Margery Fisher comes as a highly credentialled expert on Children's literature and has written extensively about Children's literature. Ok so far so good. But she comes across as insufferably opinionated. And, I think, show more her opinions are pretty suspect. I did a lot of reading as a kid and I've had three children who have been read-to extensively and have self-read extensively. So I'm making some judgements based on this live experience.
Margery is heavily into characterisation. If a character is not adequately fleshed out (in her opinion) then the book is more or less written off. So she writes off Enid Blyton (whom I loved a a child...and so did my kids and my sisters etc., etc). Biggles......another one of my favourite characters .is written off as "Very lightly distinguished from his comrades". Well that may be true but as a child I was more than happy to accept the characters ..each with their own idiosyncrasies.....and be carried along by the sheer adventure of the story. WE Johns and Enid Blyton DID tell a good story. And Margery seems to omit this from her criticism. She is kinder to a few other authors: Anna Sewell and Black Beauty seems to have escaped the icy chill of a nasty review and even Mary Poppins escapes rather lightly. But on the whole, I found the reviews rather negative and not necessarily accurate. (Though I found myself agreeing with her assessments of Noddy and of Billy Bunter and I found out that Bunter was an agglomeration of three actual people that the author knew.
It's a bit annoying because the reviews are generally by characters ...so there is an entry about Billy Bunter whereas he began as a minor character at "Greyfriars School". And there his no entry for Gimlet...another one of WE John's book series. And I rather preferred Gimlet to Biggles. So because of this character organisation, it's sometimes hard to find the relevant book. (Though the index of authors is helpful and I found one of the authors there, whom I liked very much but who did not seem to attract much public attention: Willard Price and his Amazon Adventure). Interestingly, my own son really liked the book too. I guess, from my perspective, I see this set of reviews as being from a rather prim, out-of-touch school marm, rather than from a child's perspective. OK the character development might have been weak but did the story capture the attention? That seems to be the best criteria for me. Was it also reinforcing moral values? Well maybe and maybe not. Is that important? Yes, I guess it is. And the authorities banned "The Scorpion" comic around 1952.....because it lauded the outlaw. (Though I and my friends rather liked it).
I should also mention the illustrations because it does have a wealth of illustrations; most of them in black and white. Then, most of the illustrations were in black and white when I was doing my early reading. And, to give her credit, she does cover American children's literature to some extent. I noticed the Bobbsy Twins" there and must say I rather agree with her critique of this series. (a bit boring). Overall, interesting, a nice collection of illustrations but I thought she is a bit out of touch with what children really enjoy. Two stars from me. show less