Small Stones to Fill Big Pictures

Children’s literature is one of the youngest, most diverse, and most flexible genres – and easily one of the most contested, most closely monitored forms of writing. Charged with educating, entertaining, and protecting its young readers, contemporary children’s literature moves with the demands of the society in which it is produced, responding to cultural conflicts, social changes, and pertinent questions of its ti me. Nowhere is this more apparent than in Canada, a nation with one of the most culturally diverse populations in the world, with all the possibilities and problems which result from this. In reference to Canada’s cultural mosaic, Small Stones to Fill Big Pictures takes stock of the unique conditions surrounding the production of Canadian children’s literature, explores the themes which preoccupy writers in the late 20th and early 21st centuries, and, above all, analyzes the conceptions of childhood presented in ten fascinating ethnocultural and regional children’s picturebooks.