Characterization

Into the story setting the author places characters, those who are involved in the action and those around whom the story revolves. Character development in stories is a complex process. Authors create characters in very specific ways: by the way in which the characters are described in text, by what the characters say /do/think, and by what other characters in the story say about them.

Characterization is a crucial dimension of literature for children. Folktales and fairy tales tend to have stock figures whose characters are "flat" and who simply symbolize good and evil: the cruel stepmother, for example, or the generous king.

Other forms of literature, however, need characters that are well rounded, believable, and realistic. These are the people (or animals or things) whom children come to love or hate, admire or pity, laugh at or cry with. Children often form special relationships with characters they meet in the stories that they read.

As in the case of setting, well-developed story characters behave with consistency and authenticity. Their words, thoughts, and actions are consistent with the personalities that authors breathe into them. Even animals and objects take on personalities that children remember long after they have outgrown the literature of their childhood: readers long remember the disarming charm of Winnie-the-Pooh, for example, or the loyal bond of friendship between Frog and Toad.

Style

An author's style of writing is simply selection and arrangement of words in presenting the story. Good writing style is appropriate to the plot, theme, and characters, both creating and reflecting the mood of the story. Although some authors develop a style so distinctive that it is easily recognizable, their work may show variation from book to book. Most children do not enjoy a story that is too descriptive, but they can appreciate figurative language, especially when the comparisons are within their background of understanding.

The best test of an author's style is probably oral reading. Does the story read smoothly? Does the conversation flow naturally? Does the author provide variety in sentence patterns, vocabulary, and use of stylistic devices? Although it is difficult for children to analyze a particular author's style, they do react to it. They dislike a story that is too sentimental; and they see through the disguise of the too moralistic tales of the past. Adults are more responsive than children to the clever, the slyly written, and the sarcastic. Frequently, children are better able to identify what they dislike about an author's style than to identify what they like.

Point Of View

The term point of view is often used to indicate the author's choice of narrator(s) and the way the narrator reveals the story. Whose story is it? Who tells it? In folk and fairy tales, for instance, the storyteller tells the tale, and the storyteller knows the thoughts and actions of all the characters. The storyteller's voice is also used in modern fiction, for books in which the author reports the comings and goings, the conversations, and the feelings of all the characters, villains as well as heroes. We say that such stories have an omniscient, or all-knowing, narrator.

With the use of the third person, the omniscient point of view allows the author complete freedom to crawl inside the skins of each of the characters, thinking their thoughts, speaking their words, and observing the action of the story. It also allows the author to speak directly to the reader, if he or she chooses, just as a storyteller would in a face-to-face situation.

Many children's books take a point of view that also uses the third person but gives the author less freedom. This limited-omniscient, or concealed narrator view does, however, provide closer identification with a single character. The author chooses to stand behind one character, so to speak, and tell the story from over his or her shoulder. The story is then limited to what that character can see, hear, believe, feel, and understand. The more direct narrative voice of the first person, once considered unusual in children's books, is quite common today. The author's choice of point of view (or points of view) necessarily influences style, structure, and revelation of character. In evaluating books we need to ask not just who is telling the story, but how it influences the story. What perspective does the narrator bring to events, and what vision of the world does that offer to children?