Quote:
Originally Posted by AnotherCat
While I know The Secret Garden has a highly regarded place in the history of children's books I wondered how popular it is, or could be, with todays children?
Or if, today, it is read mainly by adults?
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Speaking personally, I first read it in 1952, not long after the Margaret O’Brien film. I liked it and reacted emotionally to the story but I think I appreciate and enjoy the novel far far more now.
C. S. Lewis claimed that most great children’s books are ”specific art-forms” equally read and most enjoyed by adults because they bring so much more life awareness and literary knowledge to their reading. In “On Stories” he makes the point that “No book is really worth reading at the age of ten which is not equally (and often far more) worth reading at the age of fifty—except, of course, books of information.”
I suppose that explains why I still like some of the books I read as a young person but unfortunately it doesn’t answer Another Cat’s question about what young people
today would think of
The Secret Garden.
Perhaps someone else has information on how a modern young reader would regard the novel. For instance, I wonder how they would react to the social class attitudes in the book.