COMP 401
Sr Sem: Through the Looking Glass: Comparative Children's Literature Fall 2014
Division I
This is not the current course catalog

Oh, the reads we will read, if you follow my lead!
We will amble at first and then soon pick up speed,
And we’ll bury our noses in books thick and thin.
This I vow by the hair on my chinny-chin-chin.
There’ll be picture books, fairy tales, primers, and verse,
Tales of joy, fun, and laughter; and, alas, the reverse.
Some were written in English, but most of them not.
Though we’ll read in translation: Sign on up, polyglot!
For example, there’s Aesop, Collodi, and Grimm,
Machado, and Kästner. Surely, you’ve heard of him?
We’ll critique illustrations, we’ll wonder, we’ll ponder,
And by turns we’ll divine what defines this grand genre.
Is it mere fun and games, pixie dust, sweet as pie?
Does it ask to be read with a serious eye?
Books appeal to our puzzler, our minds, after all,
And a child is a thinker, no matter how small.
You’ll reflect, cogitate, then you’ll write, write, write, WRITE!
And your thoughts will become this instructor’s delight.