The Novel “Beyond the Blue Border”: Insight into the Past of the “Ossis” for the Modern Teenagers

The article analyses the debut historical juvenile novel by the German writer Dorit Linke (b. 1971) “Beyond the Blue Border” (“Jenseits der blauen Grenze”, 2014) in the aspect of the literary, historical and pedagogical potential of the text. The main events take place in the Baltic Sea in August 1989 when youths tried to escape from Rostock to West Germany with flashbacks into their life in the GDR. The connection between the periods of the late 1960s and 1980s is emphasized. It was a time of formation or changing the worldview of the main novel’s characters, which belong to three different generations: 1933 (grandfather), 1968 (parents) and 1989 (teenagers). The title of the book points to a kind of marine locus, representing the key stereotypes about the element of water and the inner state of the heroes. The sea is regarded as a constitutive topos, which not only performs the traditional background function of nature but also turns into an artistic image of a literary text. The narrative from the perspective of a teenage girl makes it possible to explain better to the reader of the appropriate age the motives of the incredible act of their peers and helps to get insight into the everyday life of the “Ossi” (residents of East Germany) in contrast to the “Wessi” (West Germans). In this way, the modern German historical juvenile literature demonstrates the relevance for its recipients, performing the cognitive and didactic functions without aggressive interference in the minds of adolescents.

Inspiration from Translation: The Golden Age of English-Language Children’s Literature and Its Impact on Polish Juvenile Fiction

The article presents a cross-sectional view of the impact of the translations of English-language juvenile literature of the Golden Age on Polish literary production for young readers. This panorama of infl uences and reception modes is presented in three comparative close-ups, dealing with characters and recipients (English ‘girls’ novels’ and their Polish equivalents), literary convention (adventure novels), and fairytale quality, imagination, and fantasy (Polish literary works inspired by English classic fantasy books). The study shows that Golden Age children’s literature transferred into Polish by means of translation brought new trends, motifs, genres and themes to Polish juvenile literature, signifi cantly contributing to its development.

A Comparative Study of Magic Realism in Works of Neil Gaiman and Angela Carter

Since the release of Gabriel Garciá Márquez’s One Hundred Years of Solitude, Magical Realism has been in favour as a narrative style or genre in adult fiction. The representation of the genre in children’s and juvenile literature, on the other hand, is a recent trend; the components of the genre have been tracked and proven to be genuinely important in the interpretation of current children’s fiction, such as David Almond’s Skelling (1998). The aim of this paper is to look at the elements of magical realism in Neil Gaiman’s Coraline and Angela Carter’s Nights at the Circus works in this respect.

Preparing for an Imperial Inheritance: Children, Play, and Empire in Eighteenth-Century Britain

In examining how children engaged with the British Empire, broadly defined, during the long eighteenth century, this article considers a range of materials, including museums, printed juvenile literature, and board games, that specifically attempted to attract children and their parents. Subjects that engaged with the wider world, and with it the British Empire, were typically not a significant part of formal education curricula, and so an informal marketplace of materials and experiences emerged both to satisfy and drive parental demand for supplementary education at home. Such engagements were no accident. Rather, they were a conscious effort to provide middling and elite children with what was considered useful information about the wider world and empire they would inherit, as well as opportunities to consider the moral implications and obligations of imperial rule, particularly with regard to African slavery.

CLEMENTINE HELM BEYRICH (1825–1896), THE UNUSUAL CASE OF A WOMAN POPULARIZER OF THE GEOSCIENCES DURING THE NINETEENTH CENTURY IN CENTRAL EUROPE

ABSTRACT During the nineteenth century the role of women was very much restricted. In the geosciences, women were not able to study and thus even less able to publish. Here the work of one female writer is presented who, due to her upbringing in an intellectual family with close connections to the most celebrated scientists in Prussia/Germany, such as Alexander von Humboldt, the mineralogist Christian Samuel Weiss, Ernst Haeckel and many others, was aware of scientific progress and the discussions of the times. Based on her unusual education by teachers and scientists and her intellectual abilities, and knowledge acquired through marriage to a well-established geoscientist, she wrote popular juvenile literature that included geological and palaeontological content. This scientific content was typically woven into fairy tales or novels for adolescent girls and served as a way to spread geoscientific knowledge to a large audience.

Oscar Wilde’s Fairy-tale The Selfish Giant in Ellis’s Works: from Dramaturgy to Poetry

The article discusses some aspects of the reception of Oscar Wilde’s fairy tale The Selfish Giant by the Russian symbolist poet and translator Ellis (L.L. Kobylinsky; 1879–1947) as reflected in archival sources and memoirs of his contemporaries. Particularly, Ellis’ participation in theatre performances for children and his interest in the forms of juvenile literature are considered within the framework of his overall poetical activities. Among these plays, a piece entitled The Garden of the Giant which is based on Wilde’s tale The Selfish Giant is to be mentioned first and foremost, since Ellis himself attributed great importance to this work making several attempts to publish it separately and even trying to convince a Moscow modernist publishing house Musaget to implement his rather extraordinary plans. The article also attempts to demonstrate that Ellis’ passion for Wilde’s literary heritage can be traced in his own subsequent work as his second collection of verse Argo (1914) proves it. As, I argue, its first section entitled Snuffbox with Music has been developed under the influence of Ellis’ previous work on juvenile performances, which manifests itself in dedications, the texts of the section borrowed from the juvenile plays as well as through the motivic structure of this cycle.

Race and Ethnicity as a Compound Risk Factor in Police Interrogation of Youth

This chapter focuses on juveniles, particularly juveniles of color, in police interrogation contexts. A scientific and professional perspective is provided on the factors affecting children in this setting. The chapter draws from the adult and juvenile literature on interrogation, as well as research on racial factors, to suggest that there are unique vulnerabilities that minority and stigmatized youth bring to the interrogation context. These vulnerabilities may increase their susceptibility to interrogative pressures and false confessions. The chapter also provides recommendations for ways to protect this vulnerable group and calls for interrogation scholars to add race and ethnicity to their research inquiries. This will provide a clearer empirical understanding of the mechanisms by which race and ethnicity affect interview and interrogation behavior and outcomes.