The title was so long, I couldn’t even put it in the title line of the post. Katherine Rundell’s nonfiction title is Why You Should Read Children’s Books, Even Though You Are So Old and Wise. This edition from 2026 is an update of the 2019 edition, and it is updated because one section deals with library issues from 2025.
It seemed appropriate to talk about this book since we’ve been discussing children’s books off and on this year. Rundell covers the reasons to read children’s books, and the history of the publication and subjects of children’s literature. Rundell writes children’s fiction, and starts the book by talking about the importance of a public library in her own childhood. She says she writes her own books with two readers in mind, herself as an adult, and twelve-year-old Katherine. I remember myself as a young reader, and I can understand what she says. “My twelve-year-old self wanted autonomy, peril, justice, food, and above all a kind of density of atmosphere into which I could step and be engulfed.” Oh, I remember the absorption in Baum’s Oz. And, even as an adult, I sank into J.K. Rowling’s Hogwarts. The early books in the Harry Potter series allowed me that escape into a world as I hadn’t experienced in years. She talks about the “headlong, hungry, immersive world” of reading as a child. Yes! I wish that happened in the adult reader’s world.
Rundell says there are times in life when only children’s books will do. I can attest to that. I know I’ve told the story that while I was waiting to hear about a library job that I wanted that I could only read Nancy Drew books. There was no adult world that provided the escape I needed.
The development and history of children’s literature is covered, beginning with morally uplifting books, but those evolved right along with fairytales, stories that were designed for adults and children. And, children never needed to be shielded from the violence in those stories. I went through a stage when I read multiple books in Andrew Lang’s series of folk and fairy tales. Then, there was what she calls the “First Golden Age”, Lewis Carroll, J.M. Barrie, E Nesbitt, books that featured orphaned or unsupervised children. She does discuss American authors, as well as the political aspects of children’s books and imagination.
As I said, the book was updated to discuss statistics about library use, and the Trump administration’s closure of the Institute of Museum and Library Services in 2025. Rundell argues that libraries are under threat, and must be defended.
Why You Should Read Children’s Books, Even Though You Are So Old and Wise, is a short book, only 80 pages. Rundell brings a reader’s view, and an author’s eye to a interesting subject. However, while making it a brief book, it is a little dry at times. That’s a shame because it’s an interesting topic.
Why You Should Read Children’s Books, Even Though You Are So Old and Wise by Katherine Rundell. Knopf Books for Young Readers, 2019/2026. 80p.
FTC Full Disclosure – I picked up a copy of the book at my local independent bookstore.
