Between ideology and delight

For many of us, casting about in our memories for the books that we read as children brings back moments of delight and despair. These books spanned a wide range – many dull tomes were championed by our parents or teachers as 'instructive'; others, of far greater value to us, were treasured and traded among friends like precious black-market goods. These memories recall our fascination with worlds that straddled the familiar and the strange, speaking to our known worlds of childhood (both real and fantastical) while catering to our need to comprehend the bewildering world of adults.

In recent years, the cherished literature of childhood has come under critical scrutiny from multiple directions. Amar Chitra Katha, the once-popular comics series, has been dissected for its regressive class and nationalist agenda. Racial and gender stereotypes have been highlighted in the works of Enid Blyton, widely read in our region, and in popular vernacular texts, such as Sukumar Ray's playful Bangla verse for children.

A reorientation is required, one that could restore a sense of wonder to literature and invite children into new worlds of the imagination, even while being sensitive to the prejudice and deprivation experienced by many children in this region. And indeed, many promising initiatives have embraced this challenge, as attested to by the stories in this issue of Himal, even as authors and publishers are increasingly awakening to the need to delight, and not merely 'educate', our children. This new emphasis on enchantment (as seen in the cover artwork for this issue, by Delhi artist Nilima Eriyat) becomes all the more urgent given the need to restore lost childhoods, leave alone provide an education, to many children. Good literature for children might appear trivial to some, but it offers a potent ) becomes all the more urgent given the need to restore lost childhoods, leave alone provide an education, to many children. Good literature for children might appear trivial to some, but it offers a potent tool to equip them with the tools necessary for their survival – be it learning how to deal with the presence of landmines in their backyards or figuring out how to challenge the prejudice in their lives. Just as importantly, literature must remain a stronghold in which childhood remains intact against the pressures of the encroaching world of adult needs and anxieties.