This Day in Children’s Book History: September 16th

Selected historical events

• 1898Year 916thday- born:Ger­man-Amer­i­can chil­dren’s book author and illus­tra­tor Hans Augus­to Rey was born in Ger­many[1]He and his wife Mar­garet Ray co-authored the clas­sic “Curi­ous George” series of pic­ture books, cre­at­ing the image of curi­ous mon­key George, who is loved by chil­dren all over the world.[1].
• 1948Year 916thday- born:British chil­dren’s book author Julia Don­ald­son is born[2]She is known for her pop­u­lar rhyming chil­dren’s sto­ries, includ­ing The Gruffa­lo, and was the Chil­dren’s Lau­re­ate from 2011 to 2013.[2].
• 1955Year 916thday- Pub­lished:The Peo­ple’s Dai­ly of the Peo­ple’s Repub­lic of Chi­na pub­lished an edi­to­r­i­al on the same day enti­tled “Mas­sive Cre­ation, Pub­lish­ing, and Dis­tri­b­u­tion of Chil­dren’s Books,” point­ing out that the vari­ety, quan­ti­ty, and qual­i­ty of chil­dren’s books at the time were far from meet­ing demand, and called on all sec­tors of soci­ety to address this issue.[3]On the same day, writer Guo Moruo wrote an arti­cle in the Peo­ple’s Dai­ly titled “Please Write for Chil­dren,” crit­i­ciz­ing writ­ers for their ten­den­cy to despise chil­dren’s lit­er­a­ture and call­ing on the lit­er­ary and art com­mu­ni­ty to write more works for chil­dren to enrich their spir­i­tu­al life.[4]These calls prompt­ed cul­tur­al depart­ments and writ­ers’ asso­ci­a­tions to take mea­sures to sup­port chil­dren’s lit­er­a­ture cre­ation, which had a pro­found impact on the devel­op­ment of chil­dren’s lit­er­a­ture in New Chi­na.

Other alternative events

• 1898Year:Helen Palmer, an Amer­i­can chil­dren’s book author, was born. She is the wife of the famous chil­dren’s book author Dr. Seuss. She has writ­ten chil­dren’s books such as “What Are You Going to Do on Sat­ur­day?” and co-found­ed the Begin­ner’s Books Press.[5].
• 1922Year:Ger­man chil­dren’s lit­er­a­ture author Ursu­la Wölfel is born[6]She has writ­ten many works of chil­dren’s lit­er­a­ture and has won hon­ors such as the Ger­man Youth Lit­er­a­ture Award.
• 1932Year:Tai­wanese writer Zheng Qing­wen was born[7]He not only writes nov­els for adults, but also devotes him­self to fairy tale cre­ation. He has cul­ti­vat­ed chil­dren’s imag­i­na­tion with fairy tales such as “Yan Xin Guo” and “Sky Lantern, Moth­er”.
• 1935Year:Amer­i­can ani­ma­tion pro­duc­er and chil­dren’s book author Jules Bass was born[8]As co-founder of Rankin/Bass Ani­ma­tion Stu­dios, he helped cre­ate the clas­sic chil­dren’s tele­vi­sion spe­cial “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Rein­deer” and has writ­ten chil­dren’s books such as “Herb the Veg­e­tar­i­an Drag­on.”
• 1944Year:French chil­dren’s book author and illus­tra­tor Mar­tine Blanc was born[9]She has writ­ten sto­ries and illus­trat­ed many chil­dren’s pic­ture books, and her works are very pop­u­lar among French chil­dren read­ers.

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[1] [2] [8] [9] Sep­tem­ber 16 Writer Birth­days – The Petri­ni Page

Sep­tem­ber 16 Writer Birth­days

[3] [4] A Com­pre­hen­sive Review of the Evo­lu­tion of Chil­dren’s Lit­er­a­ture in the “Sev­en­teen Years” – Chil­dren’s Lit­er­a­ture – Chi­na Writ­ers Net­work

https://www.chinawriter.com.cn/n1/2019/0916/c404072-31354454.html

[5] Helen Palmer (writer) – Wikipedia

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helen_Palmer_(writer)

[6] Ursu­la Wölfel – Wikipedia

https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ursula_W%C3%B6lfel

[7] Zheng Qing­wen – Wikipedia, the free ency­clo­pe­dia

https://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E9%84%AD%E6%B8%85%E6%96%87