The Australian Library Journal

Researching Australian children's literature

Maurice Saxby

When in 1962 I began to research the history of Australian children's literature, access to the primary sources was limited and difficult. From a catalogue drawer in the Mitchell Library of hand-written cards marked 'Children's books' I could call up from the stacks, in alphabetical order, piles of early publications. My notes about the books were filed by date of publication - where given - so that a historical perspective began to emerge. The National Library yielded further data, but extracting it was more difficult. There was no catalogue and the library's fiction holdings were housed in what had been a wartime hut. No attempt had been made to differentiate the implied reader: child or adult. But the staff members were helpful and friendly and I was provided with a desk and a chair. Morning and afternoon tea with biscuits came around on a trolley and cost just one penny. The Victorian State Library held a rare books collection under the charge of Margaret Ingham, and I was given access direct to the shelves. Apart from these three collections there was little else available to the scholar.

Bibliographical help was also meagre. Morris Miller's two-volume bibliography of Australian literature (1940) listed only the works of some of the better known children's writers of the period, for example, Ethel Pedley. Macartney's edition extended to 1950 (1956) was helpful, but eliminated most of the references to children's books. Green's two-volume history of Australian literature (1961) included brief comments about major writers such as Ethel Turner and her daughter, Jean Curlewis. A sketch map of the area was to appear in 1963 with the publication of Rosemary Wighton's Early Australian children's literature in the Lansdowne series Australian writers and their work. There was little else of help in my research.

In 1996 I was to revisit the same period of Australian children's literature - the one hundred years following the appearance in 1841 of A mother's offering to her children, the first children's book to be written and published in Australia. Two years later I began research into the following thirty years 1941 to 1971. Sources and resources are now plentiful. The growth of popular and academic interest in our children's literature has burgeoned, until today it has become both an economic and literary industry. Specialist collections are now available, although there is a need for a union catalogue of holdings. Marcie Muir's two-volume bibliography was published in 1992; and numerous academic papers and publications have proliferated, along with the growth of organisations committed to providing ready access to information by researchers, teachers, students, parents and children themselves. The publication of Paul Jennings's warm and accessible guide, The Reading Bug ... and how you can help your child to catch it (2003), is an index of the present healthy state of writing for children in this country. Theory is reinforced by the writer's own experience and expertise. Academic respectability is added to evangelical zeal in promoting reading among children.

The early development of Australian children's literature through the 1960s

The tremendous growth and development of resources as well as interest in Australian children's literature began after World War II with the establishment of support organisations such as the School Library Service of New South Wales and then similar services in other states. The formation in 1945-6 of the Children's Book Council of NSW and the national body in 1959, along with the establishment of the Children's Book of the Year awards, was undoubtedly the most influential factor in promoting professional and public interest in children's reading in post-war Australia. The award provided a carrot for writers and publishers, created media and public interest and became a meeting ground for teachers, librarians and parents (Pownall, 1980).

The 1950s saw a cultural and artistic renaissance in Australia (for example, Conway, 1971; Cope & Kalanzis, 1994) that included writing for children. Nan Chauncy's Tiger in the Bush (1957) established the modern period of our children's literature (Niall 1984). The 1950s and 1960s saw the rise of an 'establishment' that included names - largely female - such as Patricia Wrightson, Joan Phipson, Ivan Southall, Eleanor Spence, Hesba Fay Brinsmead, Mavis Thorpe Clark, and Colin Thiele (McVitty, 1981). These writers became known internationally and were reviewed in journals such as Junior Bookshelf in Britain and The Horn Book in the USA. The interest generated in them arose largely through the publicity given by the Children's Book Council of Australia and its journal, Reading Time. But developments in Australian publishing, such as the appointment of children's editors, also helped. As a case in point Joyce Boniwell Saxby left the National Library of Australia to become children's editor with Angus & Robertson in 1963. Publications such as my own History of Australian children's literature 1841-1941 also had some effect in that they reached overseas libraries.

This same period saw the growth of both school and children's libraries. The first full-time teacher-librarian was appointed in NSW in 1949 and children's librarians in public libraries grew in numbers with the inclusion of a paper on children's literature in the LAA's Registration Examination. Lectures were given to candidates by myself and others. I, along with Dennis Hall and Marjorie Cotton, were examiners in the early 1960s. Hall, who was editor of the NSW School Magazine, wrote sometimes acerbic reviews of children's books for the Australian Book Review. Cotton was passionate about children's literature and was one of the most influential children's librarians in Australia. She was elected the first president of the Children's Section of the Library Association of Australia in 1953 (Cotton 1989, p50).

The visit to Australia in 1964 by Professor Sara Innis Fenwick from the University of Chicago who spent six months in Australia at the invitation of the LAA as a Fulbright lecturer and the publication of her report on children's libraries in 1966 did much to stimulate the provision of quality children's literature and its study among children's librarians, both school and public. In particular Fenwick (p39) urged national co-operation between both school and public librarians and with all who recognised the need for 'more education, both formal and informal...' including the need for a program of continuing education.

This need was recognised by Margaret Trask who in 1972 offered a course through the Division of Postgraduate Extension Studies at the University of New South Wales on Fantasy, science fiction and science materials and published the papers. She offered a similar course on picture books in 1974, and in 1975 one called 'A sense of history.' Previously in the late 1960s Trask had organised an open seminar on Australian children's literature with a paper by this writer on its history.

It is from this period the Children's Section of the LAA and the Australian Section of IBBY (International Board on Books for Young People) - which operated under the umbrella of the LAA - along with ASLA (Australian School Library Association) and numerous bodies interested in literacy and children's literature, were to hold regular conferences and seminars across Australia emphasising the value of quality literature in the personal and social development of children. Such events were to proliferate and are too numerous to list. However a sampling of such conferences includes:

• the 1975 National Seminar on Children's Literature at Frankston State College, Victoria;
• the1978 IBBY conference Through folklore to literature in Sydney;
• the second Pacific Rim Conference on Children's Literature held at Melbourne State College in 1979;
• the ninth biennial conference of the Australian School Library Association in Brisbane 1985;
• the first joint national conference of ARA (Australian Reading Association) and AATE (Australian Association for the Teaching of English) held in Darwin in 1989;
• the first national conference of the CBCA (Children's Book Council of Australia) in Sydney in 1992 - to be followed every second year in states around Australia;
• and in 2000, A wake for print? at Leura, NSW under the auspices of ASLA (Australian School Library Association).

Each of these meetings and many more such gatherings have published their proceedings which circulate among members and become reference tools for researchers. In particular the Children's Book Council, Canberra Branch, has held regular seminars at which children's writers, illustrators and academics committed to the study of children's literature have delivered papers that form the basis of a series of much referred to and quoted publications such as The Inside story: creating children's books (1987) edited by Belle Alderman and Stephanie Owen Reeder. Partly because of such publications and the wide reputation internationally of Australian scholarship, Australian academics have been invited to lecture overseas and have become consultants and contributors to publications such as 20th century children's writers (each of the five editions from 1978 to 1999); St James guide to young adult writers (1999); Anita Silvey's Children's books and their creators (1995); The international encyclopedia of children's literature edited by Peter Hunt (1996) and The Cambridge guide to children's books in English edited by Victor Watson (2001). A guide to Australian children's literature by Jeffey Prentice and Bronwen Bennett (1992) documents milestones and achievements in the literary and commercial contexts of Australian children's literature to the date of publication. The arrival in 1993 of The Oxford companion to Australian children's literature edited by Stella Lees & Pam Macintyre with impeccable scholarship established the credentials - recognised internationally - of an Australian literature for children.

This period of the late 1960s was also a time when the Commonwealth Department of Education was anxious to develop better school libraries. Federal aid to secondary libraries was mooted, but learning from previous grants for science equipment that gathered dust because teachers were not sufficiently trained in its use, it was agreed that teachers properly trained in the organisation and utilisation of resources were just as important as the resources themselves. In 1968/9 Milton Simms, the librarian from James Cook University, and myself from Alexander Mackie College in Sydney, offered a two-week course at Townsville for teachers released from both state and private schools. There was firm emphasis on the selection and use of literature, including Australian writing.

This was followed by a similar course organised by myself at Alexander Mackie College in Sydney. Similar courses held in Melbourne were also funded by the Commonwealth. Such training was considered so successful that the Commonwealth sponsored separate courses for one and then two semesters in 1974/5, such as those at Kuring-gai College of Advanced Education, Lindfield, for teachers from a wide variety of schools. The early Kuring-gai courses placed specific emphasis on the importance of literature in the development of literacy and as a tool for personal growth. In late 1975 Margaret Trask was to found the Department (later School) of Library and Information Studies at the College with a brief to provide generalist and teacher librarianship courses. Graduates were subsequently to join the staffs of various library services and the NSW Department of Education and to contribute substantially through their occupancy of senior leadership positions in school and children's libraries across Australia.

As a result of these courses, along with the development of studies in children's literature at both College and University levels, children's literature gained academic respectability. Post-graduate diplomas and then Masters Degrees developed across Australia in the late 1970s and early 1980s. In the 1990s doctoral students began to study at Australian universities.

The rise of children's publishing and book selling

Academic studies - across both school and public library systems - which brought about a greater awareness of the crucial part that children's literacy and literature plays in a child's education for life began to interact with a growing commercial awareness of such a role. Publishers from the 1970s continued to appoint children's editors and one such, Margaret Hamilton, left the employ of Hodder & Stoughton in 1988 to create her own list - Margaret Hamilton Books. Omnibus, an Adelaide-based children's publishing company, was established in 1981 and in the 1980s filled gaps in Australian children's publishing, particularly in books for pre-school and early school-age children. Mem Fox's Possum Magic (1983) with illustrations by Julie Vivas, published by Omnibus, was hugely successful commercially and found favour with teachers, parents and children alike. Jane Covernton's Four and twenty lamingtons: a collection of Australian nursery rhymes (1988) led the way to collections of rhymes, chants and songs that are peculiarly Australian. An academic, Walter McVitty, had also in 1985 established his own specialist children's list, paying particular attention to quality both in writing and in book production. His deluxe illustrated editions of Ethel Turner's Seven Little Australians in 1994 and Colin Thiele's Sun on the stubble in 1996, along with the picture book editions of traditional stories such as Ali Baba and Robin Hood, illustrated by Margaret Early, mark a high point in Australian children's book production. Julie Watts, the present executive publisher, Books for Children and Young Adults at Penguin Australia, in a letter to the author in June 2003 confirms that company's commitment to quality in children's books and her own nurturing of publications such as Jennings's The reading bug in the belief that such books can help 'change the world.'

Along with specialist publishing came specialist bookshops. Albert Ullin established a children's bookshop, 'The Little Book Room' in Melbourne in 1960, and he was to be followed by Pegi Williams in Adelaide and by Robin Morrow who opened 'The Children's Book Shop' in Beecroft, Sydney, in time for Christmas 1971. In Perth The Singing Tree children's bookshop in the 1980s and 1990s, owned by David and Rayma Turton, not only drew customers from across Australia but from overseas.

The emergence of periodical literature related to children's books

It was Rayma Turton who, at the time of a combined gathering of IBBY and the Loughborough Conference on Children's Literature in Great Britain, held in Perth in 1985, conceived the notion of a journal devoted to children's literature along the lines of the British Books for Keeps. In Australia the embryonic New Books for Boys and Girls founded in 1957 by the Children's Book Council of NSW had evolved into Reading Time, at present in its 47th year. That journal began as a vehicle for short annotations of children's books which evolved into more lengthy critical reviews. Under the editorship of Anne Bower Ingram and later Geoffrey Atkinson and now John Cohen, it also includes articles related to the criticism and value of the literature.

In 1977 the very practical and unpretentious Children's Library Newsletter prepared by a volunteer group headed by Val Watson, an eminent children's librarian, metamorphosed into Orana: Journal of School and Children's Librarianship, a refereed journal published by the Library Association of Australia (now Australian Library and Information Association). Today Orana contains a judicious mixture of news, information technology, reviews of professional reading, international comments, and an open forum for subscribers. It features articles such as 'Australian YA fiction - a catalyst for innovation and evolution: a Canadian view' by Russ MacMath (32 [4] November 1996), and in the same issue, 'Once upon our time: research into the value of told story today' by Barbara Poston-Anderson and Lea Redfern.

Rayma Turton's vision gave birth to three magazines: Magpies: talking about books for children founded in 1986, to be followed four years later by The literature base and Papers: explorations into children's literature, each edited by Alf Mappin. The literature base continues to provide teachers with practical approaches to making quality literature part of the school day and helping children to become avid but critical readers. It includes units ranging from the value and uses of traditional literature - myth and legend, fable, folk and fairy tale - to poetry, environmental and Aboriginal studies and other relevant topics. Papers has now been taken over by Deakin University and its focus is on refereed articles of a highly academic nature with an emphasis on contemporary literary theory. Many of the articles derive from work in progress toward the contributor's PhD thesis.

Magpies and Reading Time are glossy, full-colour quarto-sized journals with the implied readership of teachers and librarians. They both review recent children's books from both Australia and New Zealand, arranged through readership from pre-schoolers to young adults. Along with the reviews, both publications increasingly feature articles and scholarly papers by leading Australian - and sometimes overseas - practitioners in the field. The May 2003 issue of Magpies contains, among other features, a 'Know the author' - Joanne Horniman; the profile of the book designer duo Donna Rawlins and Wayne Harris, both prize-winning illustrators; along with an article about three new natural history books for children. Reading Time (also May 2003) contains profiles of two publishers: David Harris of Scholastic and Mark Macleod of Random - now Hodder Headline - along with a comprehensive and scholarly article by Dr Belle Alderman which documents with appropriate references the formation, function and range of the Lu Rees Archives of Australian Children's Literature housed in Canberra. The archives, founded in 1974 also issues an annual journal, begun in 1981, The Lu Rees archives: notes, books and authors which also includes articles arising from academic research - such as 'A tradition of innovation: folklore in Australian children's literature' by Carole Carpenter from York University, Toronto. As a Harold White Fellow at the National Library of Australia, Carpenter carried out an investigation into the 'role of children's literature as a discourse of Australian multiculturalism' (Carpenter 2001, p5).

Complementary to Reading Time and Magpies is Viewpoint: on books for young adults founded in 1992 and compiled by an editorial board from the University of Melbourne. As with the other journals it publishes regular reviews along with feature articles, but with an emphasis on publications - including appropriate picture books - suitable for use with late teenagers.

In the late 1980s Magpies conducted seminars at The Singing Tree and published transcripts of the talks in Magpies. 'Over the rim of reality', taken from a paper presented by Maurice Saxby at the Magpies fantasy seminar in 1987, for example, was published in Vol 3, No 1, March 1988. Susan Cooper, the American writer of fantasy, also presented a paper that was published in Vol 3, No 2, May 1988. Australian children's literature is now well served through such publications and a growing number of theses and regular book events, such as those organised by Agnes Nieuwenhuizen, author of No kidding: top writers for young people talk about their work (1991), both at the Australian Centre for Youth Literature, State Library of Victoria and throughout that state.

Biographical dictionaries

The first Who's who of Australian children's writers appeared in 1992 and in 2002 came Book people: meet Australia's children's authors and illustrators in seven volumes edited by Paul Collins, published by Macmillan Education. The Eye of the soul (1998) by Stephen Matthews contains a perceptive introduction and then interviews with seventeen of the younger generation of Australians writing for children and young adults. Heather Scutter's Displaced fictions: contemporary Australian fiction for teenagers and young adults (1999) critically examines the ideology of that now considerable body of fiction. Perhaps the most influential theoretical study by an Australian is from John Stephens of Macquarie University. His Language and ideology in children's fiction (Longman, 1992) is quoted widely in children's literature studies across the globe.

Library resources

Such research into the source material, and the publication of learned books and articles has been made possible largely through the healthy growth of specialist collections since my own early forays into the holdings of the Mitchell and National libraries. Prentice and Bennett (1992, pp25-37) list fourteen special collections. Since then the State Library of Victoria has added to its rare book section an extensive archive of wartime and post-war children's books and ephemeral material painstakingly collected by the philanthropic Ken Pound after whom the collection is named. Many rare books and variant editions of the same book provide fertile ground for the research student. Similarly a collection housed at St Peter's school, Sydney, and named AORA, was put together and is managed by a group of enthusiastic children's librarians under the leadership of Miranda Harrowell of Ryde Public Library.

The Courtney Oldmeadow Children's Literature Foundation situated at Dromkeen at Riddell's Creek, Victoria, houses a rare library of manuscripts, books and artwork and is open for research. The annual Courtney Oldmeadow lecture and dinner was inaugurated in 1982 and the Dromkeen Medal for services to Australian children's literature was first awarded to Lu Rees - posthumously - in 1982. It has recognised annually the contribution of writers, academics, illustrators and librarians since that time. Like the Nan Chauncy Award of the CBCA, the Dromkeen Medal is a recognition of the outstanding contribution of the recipients for their promotion of the literature itself and their service to the children who enjoy the benefits of that literature. The Dromkeen book of Australian children's illustrators (Scobie, 1997) is a sumptuous tribute to the work of some seventy-six of our finest illustrators: yet another facet of today's excellence.

Along with Dromkeen, Nutcote, the home of May Gibbs, has been preserved as a vital and accessible memorial to the development of a vigorous literature for children. Out of the campaign to establish the May Gibbs Foundation which administers Nutcote has emerged a complementary body, the May Gibbs Children's Literature Trust (Prentice, 2003, p11). Looking to the future of children's literature in Australia, the Trust offers national fellowships and mentorship programs for aspiring writers and illustrators. A feature of children's literature in Australia at the present time are the many opportunities for children to meet authors and illustrators through such bodies as Lateral Learning which organise speakers and workshop leaders to visit schools. High-profile authors like John Marsden and Gary Crew are just two of those who conduct seminars and writing workshops, not only for school students, but for aspiring writers.

A meeting with the recipients of the 2003 May Gibbs mentorship program at Hunters Hill brought to light pertinent observations about the current state of children's literature in Australia. The group voiced my own growing concern with what borders on being both a commercial and academic industry. Although publishers of integrity still strive to produce books of excellence there is a growing emphasis on the new at the expense of the old and of reprints of the works of the 'establishment' as well as other worthy but now out-of-print titles. Bookshops and readers alike demand the latest. The Harry Potter phenomenon is the extreme of what has always existed: the fad, the popular. It takes to the limit the Biggles or Blyton syndrome and the fixation on such series. It highlights the need for studies such as Jennings's The reading bug (2003). There is a danger that publishers will concentrate on 'best-sellers' to the detriment of deserving contenders in the marketplace. Unless sales are guaranteed through prior consultation with book clubs and standing orders - where schools accept books sight-unseen - publishers now seem reluctant to risk an untried author or illustrator.

A further reservation expressed at the May Gibbs mentorship program mentioned above was that libraries could be in danger of diminished book votes because of the demands of technology. While never once denying the need for computer literacy or the power of the visual image, the question arose as to whether there is a danger of encouraging children to be answer-rich and question-poor. The internet provides instant answers, but does it nourish the soul? it was asked. Spufford (2002, p9) contends that 'the book becomes part of the history of our self-understanding'; 'the book in the hand is a tool of growth.' An editorial (Turton in Magpies Vol 17, No 5, November 2002) quotes Ros Price, children's publisher, Allen & Unwin, as stating that too many children's books are being published, but that there is a narrower range of books on bookseller's shelves. The editor concludes: 'Better, perhaps, for publishing to reflect the changing patterns in both trade and institutional purchasing and prune lists to those well-deserving of their place on the shelves - be they offerings of a literary nature or stories of wider appeal well-written within their genre.' Harris (2003, p15) supports this view, and Macleod (2003, p20) adds a further cautionary note: 'Children's literature has become a playground for adults rather than those for whom the books were originally intended.' Genuine and worth-while research could well become academic one-upmanship.

Be all this as it may, the short-list of books entered for the CBCA Awards, 2003, indicates that there are still books to entice, entertain and enrich young readers. From some twenty entries in 1946 the number has risen steadily over the years until in 2003 the number was 331. For early childhood there are now such simple but evocative and informing picture books as A year on our farm by Penny Matthews and illustrated by Andrew McLean (2002), or Pamela Allen's rhythmic and exuberant The potato people (2002) incorporating the chant, 'One potato, two potatoes.' For those who have mastered print and are independent readers, Simon French's Where in the world (2002) delights both the mind and the senses with the imagery of music and of travel to evoke character and place, along with a growing sense of identity, and so to provide the reader with a home in the wider world of human experience. A similar epiphany and a developing sense of place is offered to mature readers in James Aldridge's The girl from the sea (2002), while Ian Bone and Markus Zusak in their respective novels, The song of an innocent bystander (2002) and The messenger (2002) mine goodness, beauty and understanding from unlikely soil.

Australian children's literature today has become 'all things to all people'; an eclectic smorgasbord to nourish as well as entertain young readers; a means of documenting social change and contemporary mores, and a fertile ground for research. Specialist collections, bibliographical aids, numerous papers and reports, lectures, conferences and academics committed to serious study, along with teachers and librarians actively promoting quality literature, confirm that the state of children's literature in this country has never been healthier. An editorial in the Sydney Morning Herald (21 June 2003) claims that the Harry Potter hype 'has made books cool' and improved literacy: 'Non-readers have turned into readers, book-haters into bookworms.' It might also be argued that despite the lure of the visual media there are still an enduring number of children committed to print. An editorial in The Australian on the same day claims: 'The war against the dark digital lords is not lost and books can defeat the supposed spells TV and video games cast on the young.' The Herald concludes with insight, 'We read to know that we are not alone. That's enough.' It is certainly enough for both children and adults; and is as true today as it ever was.

References

A mother's offering to her children by a lady long resident in the colony [Charlotte Barton] (1841) The Gazette, Sydney.

Alderman, Belle (2003) 'The Lu Rees Archives of Australian Children's Literature' Reading Time, 47 [2].

Alderman, Belle and Reeder, Stephanie Owen eds (1987) The inside story: creating children's books, CBCA, ACT Branch.

Aldridge, James (2002) The girl from the sea, Penguin, Melbourne.

Allen, Pamela (2002) The potato people, Penguin, Melbourne.

Bone, Ian (2002) The song of an innocent bystander, Penguin, Melbourne.

Carpenter, Carole (2001) 'A tradition of innovation: folklore in Australian children's literature' The Lu Rees Archives: Notes, Books and Authors, 23rd Issue, 2001.

Chauncy, Nan (1957) Tiger in the bush, Oxford, London.

Collins, Paul (2002) Book people: meet Australia's children's writers and illustrators, Macmillan Education, Melbourne.

Conway, Ronald (1971) The great Australian stupor: an interpretation of the Australian way of life, Sun Books, Melbourne.

Cooper, Susan (1988) 'Preserving the light' Magpies 3 [2], May.

Cope, Bill & Kalanyzis, Mary (1994) 'Making diversity work: the changing cultures of Australian workplaces' Headon, David and others eds. The abundant culture: meaning and significance in everyday Australia, Allen & Unwin, North Sydney.

Cotton, Marjorie (1989) A good kids book knower, published privately.

Covernton, Jane (1988) Four and twenty lamingtons: a collection of Australian nursery rhymes, Omnibus, Adelaide.

Fenwick, Sara Innis (1966) School and children's libraries in Australia: a report to the Children's Libraries Section of the Library Association of Australia, Cheshire for LAA, Melbourne.

Fox, Mem and Vivas, Julie (1983) Possum magic, Omnibus, Adelaide.

French, Simon (2002) Where in the world, Little Hare, Sydney.

Green, H M (1961) A history of Australian literature: pure and applied, 2 vols. Angus & Robertson, Sydney.

Harris, David (2003) 'It's not child's play' Reading Time. 47 [2].

Hunt, Peter ed. (1996) International companion encyclopedia of children's literature, Routledge, London & New York.

Jennings, Paul (2003) The reading bug ... and how you can help your child to catch it, Penguin, Melbourne.

Lees, Stella & Macintyre, Pam (1993) The Oxford companion to Australian children's literature, Oxford University Press, Melbourne.

Macartney, F T (1956) Australian literature: a bibliography to 1938 by E Morris Miller, Extended to 1950, Angus & Robertson. Sydney.

Macleod, Mark (2003) 'Mark Macleod editor and publisher - behind the name' Reading Time, 47 [3].

MacMath, Russ (1996) 'Australian YA fiction - a catalyst for innovation and evolution: a Canadian view' Orana: Journal of School and Children's Librarianship, 32 [4].

Matthews, Penny and McLean, Andrew (2002) A year on our farm, Omnibus, Adelaide.

Matthews, Stephen (1998) 'The eye of the soul: Australian writers for young adults and children discuss the imaginative process', Magpies Magazine, Brisbane.

McVitty, Walter (1981) Innocence and Experience, Nelson, Melbourne.

Miller, E Morris (1940) Australian literature: from its beginnings to 1935, 2 vols. Melbourne University Press, Melbourne.

Muir, Marcie (1992) Australian children's books: a bibliography Volume One 1774-1972; Volume Two 1973-1988, Melbourne University Press, Melbourne.

Niall, Brenda (1984) Australia through the looking-glass: children's fiction 1830-1980, Melbourne University Press, Melbourne.

Nieuwenhuizen, Agnes (1991) No kidding: top writers for young people talk about their work, Pan Macmillan, Chippendale, NSW.

Poston-Anderson, Barbara and Redfern, Lea (1996) 'Once upon our time: research into the value of told story today' Orana: Journal of School and Children's Librarianship, 32 [4].

Pownall, Eve ed (1980) The Children's Book Council in Australia 1945-1980, CBCA, Canberra.

Prentice, Jeffrey (2003) 'On Ian Wilson' Viewpoint, 11 [2] Winter.

Prentice, Jeffrey & Bennett, Bronwen (1992) A guide to Australian children's literature, Thorpe, Melbourne.

Prentice, Jeffrey and Bird, Bettina (1987) Dromkeen: a journey into children's literature, Dent, Melbourne.

Saxby, H M [Maurice] (1969) A history of Australian children's literature 1841-1941, Wentworth Press, Sydney.

Saxby, Maurice (1988) 'Over the Rim of Reality' Magpies 3 [1], March.

Scobie, Susan comp (1997) The Dromkeen book of Australian children's illustrators, Scholastic, Sydney.

Scutter, Heather (1999) Displaced fictions: contemporary Australian fiction for teenagers and young adults, Melbourne University Press, Melbourne.

Silvey, Anita ed. (1995) Children's books and their creators, Houghton Mifflin, Boston & New York.

Spufford, Francis (2002) The child that books built: a memoir of childhood and reading, Faber, London.

St James Guide to Writers Series (formerly Twentieth-Century Writers Series) (1999) St James guide to children's writers, 5th ed. St James Press, Detroit & London.

St James Guide to Young Adult Writers, 2nd ed. St. James Press, Detroit & London.

Stephens, John (1992) Language and ideology in children's literature, Longmans, London.

Thiele, Colin and Lennox, John illus. (1996) Sun on the stubble, Walter McVitty, Montville, Queensland.

Trask, Margaret ed. (1972) Fantasy, Science Fiction, Science Materials: papers presented at the course offered by the School of Librarianship through the Division of Postgraduate Studies, University of New South Wales, 16-19 May 1972. School of Librarianship, University of New South Wales, Sydney.

Turner, Ethel and Lennox, John illus. (1994) Seven little Australians, Walter McVitty, Montville, Q'ld.

Turton, Rayma (2002) Editorial Magpies 17 [5] November.

Watson, Victor ed (2001) The Cambridge guide to children's books in English, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.

Who's who of Australian children's writers (1992, 2nd ed. 1996) Thorpe in Association with the National Centre for Australian Studies, Melbourne.

Wighton, Rosemary (1963) Early Australian children's literature. Australian writers and their works, Lansdowne, Melbourne.

Zusak, Markus (2002) The messenger, Pan Macmillan, Sydney.

Biographical information

Dr Maurice Saxby AM is the author of the standard reference work History of Australian children's literature and collaborated with Margaret Trask in the 1960s and 1970s to spread knowledge of Australian children's literature. Maurice worked at Kuring-gai CAE at the time Margaret was establishing new courses in library and information studies. He has received many awards including the Dromkeen Medal and the Nan Chauncy Award and has lectured on the subject both in Australia and internationally.