2016 Lenski Children's Literature Lecture on History of comics, children & libraries

Comics and young readers will be examined
by Carol Tilley for the 2016 Lois Lenski Children’s Literature

Illinois State University’s annual Lois Lenski Children’s Literature Lecture will feature Carol Tilley, a professor at University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, who will present “A Severe Case of Comics: Looking Back at the Problem That Wasn’t.” Her talk will be held Monday, March 21, at 7 p.m. in Stevenson Hall, Room 101.

Tilley is an associate professor in the Graduate School of Library and Information Science at UI-UC. She is a nationally recognized expert on children’s comics and comic book history. Her research on comic archenemy Fredric Wertham, author of Seduction of the Innocent (1954), has been featured in The New York Times and will be a part of her presentation. Tilley has recently been awarded the Arnold O. Beckman Award for her current research project, “Children, Comics, and Print Culture: A Historical Investigation.”  Tilley teaches courses on the readership of comics, media literacy, and youth services librarianship.

Approaching comics from a variety of perspectives, Tilley’s scholarship has appeared in Children’s Literature in Education, Information & Culture: A Journal of History, and The Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology.  Tilley’s research focuses on the intersection of young people, comics, and libraries, particularly in the United States during the mid-20th century.

Professor Tilley is affiliated with the Center for Children's Books and the Center for Writing Studies and is the co-editor of School Library Research.  Tilley earned a Master’s of Library Science and a Ph. D. in Information Science from Indiana University.

The annual Lois Lenski Children’s Literature Lecture is co-sponsored by ISU Department of English and Milner Library. The presentation is open to the public. 

Chatting about Lewis Carroll with Kara Miller of Innovation Hub

How did Lewis Carroll change children's literature and publishing? Those were the questions that Kara Miller wanted to know about when she interviewed me from WGBH's radio show  "Innovation Hub." The show airs Saturday, Nov. 21, at 10 a.m. eastern time. Here's a link to the blog post: http://blogs.wgbh.org/innovation-hub/2015/11/20/what-you-dont-know-about-alice-wonderland/

We had fun chatting about how Lewis Carroll was influential in changing children's literature from didactic to more entertaining. We also talked about how Carroll was involved in publishing the first Alice book.

I appreciated the opportunity share the celebration of the 150th anniversary of the publcation of "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland" with WGBH, a radio station I enjoyed listening to when I lived in Boston.

Update on Wednesday, January 27, 2016 at 09:56PM by JAS

Thanks to Innovation Hub for re-tweeting about my interview on Lewis Carroll's birthday.

Evolution of Alice exhibit at Milner Library

Photos from the new exhibit of "The Evolution of Alice in Wonderland for 150 years" at Milner Library at Illinois State University. 

Title of Alice in Wonderland exhibit near Special Collections on the 6th floor of Milner Library at Illinois State UniversityA first edition of Through the Looking-Glass by Lewis Carroll

Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and materials inspired by Alice.

Alice puppets from the library's Lois Lenski collections

(Un)Birthday Celebration at UNC-Charlotte

Thanks to the Children's Literature Graduate Students and Mark West at University of North Carolina-Charlotte's English Department for inviting me to be part of their (Un)Birthday Celebration of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland.

I am looking forward to meeting with students and talking about "Alice and Multiple Wonderlands." How has Alice endured for so long? How did Lewis Carroll, particularly as the controller of the Wonderland empire, help to cement the book's legacy? What is it about the books that still appeals to readers? These are some of the questions that I have been pondering as I prepared the talk.

Peter Pan play marks 110th anniversary

Tonight is the 110th anniversary of J.M. Barrie's play "Peter Pan" first being performed. Laura Kennedy, the local NPR station WGLT, interviewed me about Peter Pan and its multitude of forms that Barrie created. Thanks to Laura Kennedy for being such a great interviewer and making me sound so good.

Here's the link to the interview.http://wglt.org/wireready/news/2014/12/05436_12-26PeterPanWEB_040330.shtml

In the interview, you will hear how Peter Pan is linked to the legendary Victorian Pantomime's that filled theaters with laughter during the holiday season. I also talk about how Barrie befriend a family of boys and then based much of the Peter Pan story on playing with them as well as missing his younger brother, David, who died in childhood. Barrie published numerous versions of the story in adult novels, as a play, as a novel for children and more.