In:Transnational Books for Children 1750-1900: Producers, consumers, encounters
Edited by Charlotte Appel, Nina Christensen and M.O. Grenby
[Children’s Literature, Culture, and Cognition 15] 2023
► pp. 356–376
Chapter 16A World of books
The transnational imagination of child bookmakers in late nineteenth-century America
Published online: 8 August 2023
https://doi.org/10.1075/clcc.15.16san
https://doi.org/10.1075/clcc.15.16san
Abstract
Three late-nineteenth-century American farm boys
wrote and illustrated a homemade library. The Nelson family lived in
rural New Hampshire, USA in what seem narrowly local circumstances –
far from transnational. Yet the books they create depict an
imaginary “World”. Their library reflects competition and conflict
between imaginary nations, but also collaboration, with some books
claiming transnational authorship and publication sites.
International communication provides impetus for the Nelson
brothers’ bookmaking in ways that illuminate the transnational
dimensions of children’s book production in the real world. The case
study offered in this chapter both explores the significance of
global thinking for the Nelson’s bookmaking and asks what their
homemade publications reveal about the transnational circulation and
function of all children’s books.
Article outline
- An American family and their books
- Books that make a world
- The violence of world-making
- A world that makes books
- Conclusion
Notes References
References (44)
Texts by the Nelsons
The “Nelson Family
Juvenilia Collection of Pamela Russell and Murray McClellan,
ca. 1892–1895” is held in the Archives and Special
Collections at Amherst College’s Frost Library
(MA.00249). Bibliographical
details and digitized images of this material, including all
the texts referred to in this chapter (listed separately
below), are available
at <[URL]>.
Writings about daily life
Nelson,
Arthur, Elmer, Hial, Ida, and
Walter. The Worlds and
Works of the Nelson
Brothers. Writings
about daily life <[URL]>
Library of homemade books and periodicals
Nelson, Arthur, Elmer, Hial, Ida, and Walter. The Worlds and Works of the Nelson Brothers. Nelson Homemade Books. <[URL]>
American Family Robinson. 2 vols.
Chit Chat.
Complete
Geography of the World.
Complete
History of Big
Continent.
Flags.
Fragment 15 –
Horse Rase Anthology.
Gazetter of
the World.
History of
Long Continent.
History of the Wourld.
Intellectual
Farmer.
Military
Uniforms.
Mountain News.
Nelson Bros. Novelties (seed catalogue).
Nelson Bros Seedsmen.
Pioneersman.
Seven Days in the Country.
Thirty Days War.
Weekly Telegram.
Western World.
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