CHILDREN’S LITERATURE IN HITLER’S GERMANY
CHILDREN’S LITERATURE IN HITLER’S GERMANY
The Cultural Policy of National Socialism
CHRISTA KAMENETSKY
Ohio University Press
Athens, Ohio
London
© Copyright 1984 by Christa Kamenetsky
Printed in the United States of America
All rights reserved
Second printing and first paperback edition, 1986
Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data
Kamenetsky, Christa. 1934-
Children’s literature in Hitler’s Germany.
Bibliography: p.
Includes index.
1. Children’s literature. German—History and criticism. 2. National socialism and literature. 3. National socialism in literature. I. Title.
PT1021.K35 1984 830'.9'9287 83-8220
ISBN 0-8214-0699-X
ISBN 0-8214-0843-7 (pbk).
To Ihor and Andrey for their love and patience.
Contents
PART I: LITERARY THEORY AND CULTURAL POLICY
1. The Roots of Children’s Folk Literature in Pre-Nazi Germany
2. From Book Burning toward Gleichschaltung
3. The Nazis’ Theory of Volkish Literature
PART II: THE INTERPRETATION OF CHILDREN’S LITERATURE
4. Folktale, Germandom, and Race
5. Norse Mythology and the Nazi Mythos
6. Saga Ethics and Character Training
7. Fiction: From Myth to Mythmaking
9. Picture Books between Continuity and Change
PART III: THE USES AND ADAPTATIONS OF CHILDREN’S LITERATURE
10. Primers: The ABC’s of Folk Education
11. Readers: Textbooks in Ideology
12. Puppets, Plays, and Politics
13. Volkish Rituals for Children and Youth
PART IV: METHODS AND LIMITATIONS OF CONTROL
15. Folklore and Curricular Reforms
16. New Directions for School Libraries
17. Children’s Reading Interests
Acknowledgments
I wish to thank the following publishers whose illustrations I used with their formal or implied consent:
ARS edition (formerly: Verlag ARS sacra Josef Müller); Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt; Verlag Moritz Diesterweg (and Otto Salle), G.m.b.H.; Alfred Hahn’s Verlag, Walter Dietrich K.G.: Hanseatische Verlagsanstalt (formerly Aktiengesellschaft Hanseatische Verlagsanstalt); Harper and Row, Publishers (on behalf of Lippincott); Verlag Ferdinand Hirt; Informationen Jugendliteratur und Medien; Gerhard Stalling Verlag; Thienemanns Verlag; Cornelsen-Velhagen & Klasing G.m.b.H.; Voggenreiter Verlag. In addition, I thank the staff of the Hoover Institution on War, Revolution, and Peace (Stanford) for having made accessible to me illustrated materials that were originally published by the National Socialist Party, the Reich Youth Leadership Organization, the National Socialist Teachers Association, and other official agencies of the Third Reich.
I also wish to express my appreciation to the German Information Office (New York), the Börsenverein des Deutschen Buchhandels (Frankfurt), the Deutsche Bibliothek (Frankfurt), and the Library of Congress for having aided me in locating some of the sources and publishers.
