What Great Books Do for Children by Arthur Schlesinger Junior

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Recommended: The effect of fairy tales on human development

Critique of “Fairy Tales”

The most well authored articles must have a combination of understanding, organization correct grammar and several other components. These articles ought to have a superb thesis and refer to meta-discourse. All great essays must make the reader feel something whether they agree with the article or not. Arthur Schlesinger Junior’s “What Great Books Do For Children” is not an excellent example of an brilliant essay. It does not have enough development, thesis is not structured well, his arguments are obvious, and his conclusion is incorrect.

The essay explains how children perceive books they read. The author tells the story about how his mother used to read to him and how much he loved imagining things from these stories He explained how children do not see books as a “behavioral” standpoint, such as opinions on racism, sexism, classism and others, but they use their imagination and make it grow. They enjoy imagining about dragons, ogres, or a princes journey to find a long lost damsel in distress (Kingsley, Squire & Mars, 2000).

Schlesinger Jr.’s article does not use enough development in his essay. His argument is that children are not being taught behavioral problems while reading books, but they are expanding their imagination. Though this sentence itself seems to be fine, he doesn’t expand on it. He does not explain why books expand children’s imagination. Nor does the essay explain why children’s books do not promote “good or bad behavior”. The only support is his personal experiences when he was a young child and the fact that “behavioral” books do not last as long as folklore ones do. The argument would be better supported if Schlesinger would give examples of books on both sides explaining why...

... middle of paper ...

... article is that the arguments are completely obvious and have little to do with his primary argument. He needs to research and come up with real reasons why he believes that he is right; otherwise, the article is not legitimate and cannot be relied on. There is also the conclusion. It states things that were not in the article and therefore does not work. He could use these phrases in his paper, and then put them into the conclusion, but it does not need to be there otherwise. Again, this article is not terrible. If it was worked on, it would have an excellent point. However, at its current arrangement, the paper does not have all the requirements it needs.

References
Grimm, J., & Grimm, W. (2007). Fairy tales. Cleveland: World.

Kingsley, C., Squire, M. H., & Mars, E. (2000). The heroes: Or, Greek fairy tales for my

children. New York: Schocken Books

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