Memorable children's narratives immerse readers in imaginary worlds that bring them into the story. Some of these places have been constructed in the real world-like Pinocchio's Tuscany or Anne of Green Gables' Prince Edward Island-where visitors relive their favorite childhood tales. Theme parks like Walt Disney World and Harry Potter World use technology to engineer enchanting environments that reconnect visitors with beloved fictional settings and characters in new ways. This collection of new essays explores the imagined places we loved as kids, with a focus on the meaning of setting and its power to shape the way we view the world.

Although Walt Disney is best known as a filmmaker, perhaps his greatest skill and influence was as a reader. While many would have regarded Felix Salten's Bambi and Carlo Collodi's Pinocchio as too somber for family-oriented animated films, he saw possibilities in them. He appealed to his audience by selecting familiar stories, but transformed them to suit audience sensibilities. Many of the tales he chose to adapt to film went on to become the most read books in America, eventually becoming literary classics. Although much published research has addressed his adaptation process - often criticizing his films for being too saccharine or not true to their literary sources - little has been written on him as a reader: what he read, what he liked, his reading experiences, and the books that influenced him. This collection of essays addresses Disney as a reader and shows how his responses to literature fueled his success. Essays discuss the books he read, the ones he adapted to film, and the ways in which he demonstrated his narrative ability. Exploring his literary connections in reference to his animated and live-action films, nature documentaries, theme park creations, and overall creative vision, the contributors provide insight into Walt Disney's relationships with authors, his animation staff, and his audience.

This work demonstrates that not everything that Disney touched turned to gold. In its first 100 years, the company had major successes that transformed filmmaking and culture, but it also had its share of unfinished projects, unmet expectations, and box-office misses. Some works failed but nevertheless led to other more stunning and lucrative ones; others shed light on periods when the Disney Company was struggling to establish or re-establish its brand. In addition, many Disney properties, popular in their time but lost to modern audiences, emerge as forgotten gems. By exploring the studio's missteps, this book provides a more complex portrayal of the history of the company than one would gain from a simple recounting of its many hits. With essays by writers from across the globe, it also asserts that what endures or is forgotten varies from person to person, place to place, or generation to generation. What one dismisses, someone else recalls with deep fondness as a magical Disney memory.

With the growing emphasis on theory in literary studies, psychoanalytic criticism has taken its place alongside other forms as an important contribution to literary interpretation. Despite its tendency to make readers uncomfortable, it offers insights into human nature, and hence is appropriate in examining a genre such as children's literature.Sixteen chapters in this work explore the psychological subtexts of a number of important children's books, including Carlo Collodi's ""Pinocchio"", Roald Dahl's ""James and the Giant Peach"", Kenneth Grahame's ""The Wind in the Willows"", Louise Fitzhugh's ""Harriet the Spy"", Mark Twain's ""The Prince and the Pauper"", and E.B. White's ""Charlotte's Web"". While most of the analyses deal primarily with the psychological development of characters, some focus on the lives of authors and illustrators, such as Beatrix Potter and Jessie Willcox Smith. Other chapters analyze the various responses that readers have to children's books. Understandable and interesting for both scholars and general readers, this work draws on the ideas of such psychoanalytic theorists as Sigmund Freud, Alice Miller, D.W. Winnicott and Jacques Lacan.

Prompted by the question, "What would children's lives have been like if these people had not lived?" Shapers of American Childhood: Essays on Visionaries from L. Frank Baum to J.K. Rowling explores individuals in literature, media, health, business, and other areas who impacted childhood in the twentieth- and twenty-first centuries. Ranging from the recognizable, such Walt Disney and Benjamin Spock, to the less well-known, such as Ernest Thompson Seton and Augusta Braxton Baker, these people left indelible marks on children's culture as we know it today. Often controversial for their time, their ideas transformed American life, contributing to the ideal of a happy childhood.

President Theodore Roosevelt had a passion for reading books, and he did not keep this passion to himself. He often wrote about his experiences as a reader and collector of books. He wrote scholarly essays about literature and literary history. He often wrote book reviews for such publications as The Atlantic Monthly, The Bookman, The Outlook, and The New York Times Review of Books. Roosevelt’s writings about books are worth reading for their own sake, for in these pieces he provided critical insights into influential books. His writings about books, however, are also important because they show how Roosevelt responded to the books that he read. Roosevelt’s reading influenced his thinking on the many topics that interested him, so these writings provide researchers with a better understanding of the role that books played in the formation of his ideas, attitudes, and political positions. Theodore Roosevelt on Books and Reading brings together for the first time Roosevelt’s writings about his experiences as a reader, his scholarly essays about literature and literary history, and his exuberant reviews of some of the books that he especially liked. A sister volume to Mark I. West’s Theodore Roosevelt and His Library at Sagamore Hill, this new volume features Roosevelt’s own responses to many of the books in his personal library. All of the selections in this volume reflect Roosevelt’s passion for reading. These selections will resonate with anyone who shares Roosevelt’s love of books.

President Theodore Roosevelt called himself a "book lover" and for good reason. From his boyhood days in the 1860s to the very end of his life in 1919, Roosevelt had a deep-seated passion for reading books. Wherever he went, he brought books with him. Whether he was rounding up cattle on a ranch in North Dakota, giving campaign speeches from the back of a train, governing the nation from the White House, or exploring an uncharted tributary of the Amazon River, he always made time to read books. Theodore Roosevelt and His Library at Sagamore Hill includes an overview of Roosevelt's life as a reader, a discussion of the role that reading particular books played in shaping his life and career, and a short history of his personal library. The book also provides researchers and others interested in Roosevelt's life with a complete list of Roosevelt's books that are currently located at Sagamore Hill, his home in Oyster Bay, New York. The books in his personal library reflect his love of classic works of literature, his interest in history, and his fascination with the natural sciences. Theodore Roosevelt and His Library at Sagamore Hill concludes with an essay that Roosevelt wrote near the end of his life in which he reflected on his reading habits and commented on some of his favorite books.

Godzilla stomped his way into American movie theaters in 1956, and ever since then Japanese trends and cultural products have had a major impact on children's popular culture in America. This can be seen in the Hello Kitty paraphernalia phenomenon, the popularity of anime television programs like Pokemon and Dragon Ball Z, computer games, and Hayao Miyazaki's award-winning films, such as Spirited Away and Princess Mononoke. The Japanification of Children's Popular Culture brings together contributors from different backgrounds, each exploring a particular aspect of this phenomenon from different angles, from scholarly examinations to recounting personal experiences. The book explains the interconnections among the various aspects of Japanese influence and discusses American responses to anime and other forms of Japanese popular culture.