- Kelly, what do you personally find interesting in Russian children’s literature?

- I’ve always been drawn to literature outside the canon: memoirs, letters, travelogues. I think my interest in children’s and YA literature is related to that. I’m also interested in Anglo-American children’s literature, especially from the period you could call the Golden Age of YA—from the 1990s through the present. That would include Philip Pullman’s series (“His Dark Materials”) which opens with one of my favorite children’s books, The Golden Compass, as well as novels by David Levithan, Mal Peet, Meg Rosoff, and Laurie Halse Anderson. Over the last thirty years, YA has become one of the few profitable literature markets in the US.

- In Russia, we’re still debating whether the individual books coming out today actually comprise a modern children’s literature. How would you answer that question?

- I think children’s literature in Russia (and in the Soviet Union) has always existed and continues to exist today. It’s currently developing in new and exciting directions after a brief dip in the 1990s. The idea that children’s literature doesn’t exist feels odd. If we take all the novels and short stories published for adults, a mere 1-2% (or even less) would be considered “real literature” or part of the canon. You could say the same of children’s or YA literature.

It’s worth mentioning that YA literature is relatively new in Russia, if we take it to mean a genre that focuses first on real problems teenagers have, rather than idealized school stories or mysteries with teenage protagonists. Naturally, children’s literature in Russia has its own course of development, different from that of Anglo-American children’s literature, but I would say that both definitely exist.

- How would you characterize that difference in development?

- What first comes to mind are the differences in genre. In the Russian tradition, the short story is still an important element of children’s literature, while it has all but disappeared from the American tradition.

I also find that, until recently, happy endings were more characteristic of the Russian tradition than the Anglo-American one. I’ve seen Russian parents online insisting that Russian children’s literature should preserve the “magic of childhood.” They believe books should give children hope and that too much “reality” is dangerous. Parents in the West (not just in Great Britain or the US) don’t expect the same for their young readers and actually want literature, even fantasy, to more accurately depict reality and tell children the truth about their country, society, and life.

Perhaps the most noticeable difference I’ve found between Russian and American literature is in the role of the main character. An American protagonist is expected to solve his problems independently. Children’s books can have certain sidekicks that help a child achieve his goals—say, Hagrid in Harry Potter or Lord Asriel from The Golden Compass. Overall, though, it’s very important for the child or teenage protagonist to come to terms with her life, find her own place, and solve her problems independently. 

That emphasis on a strong individualistic position for the hero is different from what we see in Russian books.

- Do you think that the lack of an individualistic protagonist is tied to our Soviet past?

- Yes, to some degree. That’s something I'm currently writing about with Olga Bukhina and Professor Andrea Lanoux. There was a period in the 1990s when Russian publishers finally accepted the hero with a strong sense of individuality. Then, in the 2000s, there was a shift back in the direction of a collective approach to problem solving and protagonists immersed in a group.

- Which authors of contemporary Russian literature do you find especially interesting?

- To be honest, my taste in Russian-language authors from the Soviet period through today has a lot to do with my own background. I think that’s probably true for most researchers and readers of children’s literature. I like Grigoriy Oster’s humor. Out of authors who’ve written both in the Soviet period and contemporary Russia, I’d say he’s my favorite. Like many Russians, I enjoy the work of Dina Sabitova, Marina Aromshtam, and Ekaterina Murashova and I would be happy to see their books translated into English. [Marina Aromshtam’s The Real Boat has been published in English in 2019 by Templar books. Marina Aromshtam is Papmambook’s editor-in-chief.] In his YA books, Oleg Rain does something quite rare for Russian authors, portraying the perspective of a modern teenage boy.  I also love the work of Dashevskaya, Kuznetsova, Zhvalevsky/Pasternak, and Dotsuk.

I’d say I’m particularly excited to see this shift toward “realism” in Russian YA, with writers trying to reflect the world of today’s teenagers, against the demands of parents and a market that expects “happy books.”

- You have two children. Do they read or are they familiar with any Russian children’s books?

- My children know only Cheburashka by Eduard Uspensky and Korney Chukovsky's classics [some of Chukovsky’s books were translated into English, including Telephone (NorthSouth, 1996) and Mishmash (Rovakada, 2013)]. My daughter has been taking advanced courses at Grinnell in her two last years of high school and will spend a summer in Russia before going to college, so she’s read a bit more. As for English-language children’s literature, both of my kids loved Harry Potter and Rick Riordan’s series about Percy Jackson. My son used to love YA dystopian novels, but now, at 13, he’s moved on to more adult books (Stephen King, John Grisham, etc.). My daughter's read absolutely everything in American and British YA. One of her favorite books was It’s Kind of a Funny Story by Ned Vizzini.

Image: rovakada.wordpress.com

- What were your favorite books when you were a child?

- As a child, I spent a lot of time in England and fell in love with the Swallows and Amazons series, Enid Blyton’s mysteries, and books set in boarding schools. In terms of fantasy or specific titles, I really loved A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L’Engle and The Last of the Really Great Whangdoodles by Julie Andrews.

- Do you give your children suggestions for what they should read?

- Like most American parents, I’d say I really tried not to interfere. Of course, when they were little, I’d choose picture books or poetry books (Shel Silverstein, for example) that I wanted to read aloud to them, but I’d also let them pick out their own books at the library or in bookstores. My son liked books on particular subjects, so now I know a lot about sharks, planes, rocks, and Egypt. Rocks were definitely my least favorite. If I had to name a book we all love, it would be the Harry Potter series, which kind of grew up with my daughter. We’d read them aloud together, or separately but at the same time, and in the car we’d always be listening to the audiobook narrated by Jim Dale.

- Do you think parents should get involved when it comes to children’s reading choices?

- Of course, parents can recommend favorite books to their children, but they shouldn’t insist that kids read everything they used to like, or think that books were better back then. Every year at Christmas, starting from when I was ten, I’d get Dickens’s A Tale of Two Cities. I only got around to reading it when I was 42. My kids didn’t like some of my childhood favorites, and I think that’s fine. There are a lot of great children’s authors writing today and we have plenty of quality fiction and popular science books for kids. I don’t like when parents insist that “nothing good comes out these days!” (Madonna said something like that before writing her own boring children’s book.) It’s just not true and it shows an unwillingness to learn and grow along with your child.

Interview by Maria Boston
Translated from the Russian by Alisa Cherkasova
Cover photo provided by Kelly Herold

Follow us on Facebook.