"Girl" Books and Homebodies

| Tasha

Shirley Dent has an article in The Guardian that talks about why "girl" books focus on home.  While I read the article, I was nodding in agreement.  Yes, the appeal of Little Women is in the home, that Christmas, the family, the warmth, especially in contrast to the War.  Yes, that focus is also true of the Little House on the Prairie series and most of Frances Hodges Burnett’s books like Secret Garden and A Little Princess.  So yes, many of them are focused on the feeling of home.

BUT

Then I started thinking (dangerous, I know) about all of the books that I would not label as "girl" books.  And yes, I hate that term and it gives me pangs to use it.  Farmer Boy by Wilder appeals to both genders and that home is one of the most warm and well-fed in literature.  Harry Potter is entirely about family and home and how to find it without it being right there for you. 

I started making a serious list, but found that almost every book I thought of has a sense of home in it as a central theme.  I believe it goes hand-in-hand with the natural theme of belonging and individuality that do their dance in almost every book for children and teens out there. 

So yes, "girl" books focus on home.  But so do a majority of books that all children and teens will enjoy.  Sad really that such a sexist theme had to be given to the article.  I believe the power of the piece would have been even more with the realization that this is a theme in all of children’s lit.  Peter Pan, anyone?

5 thoughts on “"Girl" Books and Homebodies”

  1. Perry Nodelman & Mavis Reimer, in their wonderful textbook The Pleasures of Children’s Literature, claim that most children’s literature has the basic structure: “home-away-home.” Some books spend more time on the adventures “away” (Peter Rabbit, Where the Wild Things Are, Treasure Island) while others celebrate “home” more (the Little House books might be a good example here). Sometimes it’s about creating/finding a new home (The Secret Garden); other times it’s about learning to love the home you have (From the Mixed-Up Files, maybe? Or The Watsons go to Birmingham–1963?). But the celebration of home is pretty persistent, and I don’t think it’s particularly gendered.

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  3. A think the distinction between “home” as a sort of innocuous location, and perhaps values placed on it leading to gender roles within the home – is certainly a finer point that is glossed over in the article you mention.
    Since the article inadvertently links “homemaker” and “home” as synonymous, it creates two large of a room for the theme to occupy. And nearly every book can enter.

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  4. I agree with Libby. From what I can tell from my studies of children’s lit, it mostly began in the Victorian era, but you could argue that it really is part of the Hero’s Journey: must leave home to find it/yourself. (Whether you actually physically leave home or not.) I can’t remember who wrote the article–it could be from the same Nodelman/Reimer piece–that mentioned how The Wind in the Willows, which is a very male-centric book when it comes to characters, emphasizes that Victorian ideal of home being where the heart is, etc.
    Now, I haven’t taken the time to read the article you linked, because I have to run, but it does seem to me that “home” is a very broad, non-gendered concept in most children’s literature I’ve read.

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  5. Yes, Wind in the Willows is a perfect example of a book that is not “for girls” but is about home.

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